Halloween may have opened the door to the slasher films of the ’80s, but it was Friday the 13th that set the table upon which these ripoff films would feast. It took some time for the franchise to find its voice, and when it did it devolved into self parody over the span of only a few movies. There is a sweet spot in the series, and it is noticeable.

Here, now, is the definitive ranking of the Friday the 13th franchise, scrutinized and analyzed and… who am I kidding, I just watched these things and ranked them based on what I liked. And along the way, I added a few tidbits of information where it was warranted. Enjoy… or get mad. It’s up to you.

9Friday the 13th, Part II (1981)

Second verse, same as the first.

The cast is different, the director (genre journeyman Steve Miner) has changed, but the second entry into the Friday the 13th franchise does very little to expand on the mythos of its villain. True, this time around it’s Jason doing the slaying, not his mom, but that isn’t enough to make this second film unique. It does buy into the “part” aspect as a sequel, picking up just about where the first one left off, complete with a cold open kill of the first movie’s lone survivor, Alice (Adrienne King). And the “story” ramps up the nudity and the bloodshed to satiate an eager pubescent audience in 1981.

Friday the 13th, Part II would set the precedent for the rest of the senries: a new cast of horny teens are inserted into the same camp setting (this one takes place at a camp adjacent to Crystal Lake, but it doesn’t matter), and systematically taken out, often post coitus. The fact that Jason is the killer this time is an upgrade from the original, and his burlap-sack head is frightening enough, but it’s not enough to make this first sequel memorable. The budget was double the original, and we have a few more establishing shots and camera flourishes to prove it, but overall everything is too familiar to be interesting.