Every Friday The 13th Film Ranked From Worst To Best

This 1989 entry marked the end of the initial reign of Friday the 13th, and for a time looked to have been the final nail in the coffin. After 8 movies, it's hardly surprising they were running out of ideas, so the notion of taking Jason out of his traditional woodland camp setting and into the Big Apple - still considered a sleazy, dangerous place at the time - wasn't a bad hook.

Unfortunately, director Rob Hedden's film didn't have the budget to shoot the whole thing in NYC, and so the bulk of the action instead centres on a bunch of Crystal Lake teens taking a long, largely boring boat ride, not reaching Manhattan until over an hour in, which inevitably feels a cop-out.

On top of this, Jason Takes Manhattan doesn't do itself many favours with an over-complicated subplot centred on the traumas of final girl Jensen Daggett, who shares some largely incomprehensible link with Jason. Nor does the ending, in which a wave of toxic waste in the New York sewers changes Jason back into a little boy, make the slightest bit of sense.

Still, Friday the 13th movies don't need to be smart or make sense, and Jason Takes Manhattan still ticks enough of the slasher boxes to be good for a giggle. Jason gets a few great kills, including offing a rock chick with her own pink flying V, and punching a karate kid's head off on a rooftop, sending it hurtling into a dumpster below.