Jason Voorhees - in Popular Culture

In Popular Culture

Jason Voorhees is one of the leading cultural icons of American popular culture. In 1992 Jason was awarded the MTV Lifetime Achievement Award. He was the first of only three completely fictional characters to be given the award; Godzilla (1996) and Chewbacca (1997) are the others. Jason was named No. 26 in Wizard magazine's 100 greatest villains of all time. Universal Studios theme parks, in collaboration with New Line Cinema, used the character for their Halloween Horror Nights event.

The character has been produced and marketed as merchandise over the years. In 1988 Screamin' Toys produced a model kit where owners could build their own Jason statuette. The kit required the owner to cut and paint various parts in order to assemble the figure. Six years later, Screamin' Toys issued a new model kit for Jason Goes to Hell. Both kits are now out of production. McFarlane Toys released two toy lines, one in 1998 and the other in 2002. The first was a figure of Jason from Jason Goes to Hell, and the other was of Über-Jason from Jason X. Since McFarlane's last toy line in 2002, there has been a steady production of action figures, dolls, and statuettes. These include tie-ins with the film Freddy vs. Jason (2003).

Jason has made an appearance in three video games. He first appeared in a 1985 Commodore 64 game. His next appearance was in 1989, when LJN, an American game company known for its games based on popular movies in the 1980s and early 1990s, released Friday the 13th on the Nintendo Entertainment System. The premise involved the gamer, who picks one of six camp counselors as their player, trying to save the campers from Jason, while battling various enemies throughout the game. On October 13, 2006, a Friday the 13th game was released for mobile phones. The game puts the user in the persona of Jason as he battles the undead.

The character has been referenced, or made cameo appearances, in various entertainment mediums. Outside of literature sources based on the character, Jason has been featured in a variety of magazines and comic strips. Cracked magazine has released several issues featuring parodies of Jason, and he has been featured on two of their covers. Mad magazine has featured the character in almost a dozen stories. He has appeared twice in the comic strip Mother Goose and Grimm. Inspired by his own experience, Ari Lehman founded a band called FIRSTJASON. Lehman's band is classified as horror punk, and is influenced by the sounds of the Dead Kennedys and The Misfits. The band's name pays homage to Lehman's portrayal of Jason Voorhees in the original Friday the 13th. One of the band's songs is entitled "Jason is Watching".

"...Shit, half the shit I say, I just make it up
To make you mad, so kiss my white naked ass
And if it's not a rapper that I'll make it as
I'mma be a fuckin' rapist in a Jason mask."

In 1986, coinciding with the release of Jason Lives, Alice Cooper released "He's Back (The Man Behind the Mask)" from his album Constrictor. The song was written to "signal Jason's big return" to the cinema, as he had been almost entirely absent in the previous film. Rapper Eminem has referenced Jason in several of his songs. The song "Criminal", from the album The Marshall Mathers LP, mentions Jason specifically, while songs "Amityville" and "Off the Wall"—the latter featured fellow rapper Redman—contain Harry Manfredini's music "ki, ki, ki ... ma, ma, ma" from the film series. Eminem sometimes wears a hockey mask during concerts. Other rap artists that have referenced Jason include Tupac Shakur, Dr. Dre, LL Cool J, and Insane Clown Posse. In 1989, Puerto Rican rapper Vico C had a song titled "Viernes 13" which featured Jason in Puerto Rico. The song was so popular in the island that Vico C wrote a second part titled "Viernes 13, Parte II". VH1 issued an advertisement for their Vogue Fashion Awards which was labeled "Friday the 20th", and featured Jason's mask created out of rhinestone.

Jason has been referenced or parodied in films and television shows. In the film Scream, directed by Freddy Krueger creator Wes Craven, actress Drew Barrymore's character is being stalked by a killer who calls her on her home phone. In order to survive, she must answer the man's trivia questions. One question is "name the killer in Friday the 13th." She incorrectly guesses Jason, who did not become the killer for the franchise until Part 2. Writer Kevin Williamson claimed his inspiration for this scene came when he asked this question in a bar while a group was playing a movie trivia quiz game. He received a free drink, because nobody got the answer right. In another Wes Craven film, Cursed, a wax sculpture of Jason, from Jason Goes to Hell, can be seen in a wax museum.

The stop motion animated television show Robot Chicken features Jason in three of its comedy sketches. In episode seventeen, "Operation: Rich in Spirit", the mystery-solving teenagers from Scooby-Doo arrive at Camp Crystal Lake to investigate the Jason Voorhees murders, and are killed off one by one. Velma is the only survivor, and in typical Scooby-Doo fashion, she rips off Jason's mask to reveal his true identity: Old Man Phillips. In episode nineteen, "That Hurts Me", Jason reappears, this time as a housemate of "Horror Movie Big Brother", alongside other famous slasher movie killers such as Michael Myers, Freddy Krueger, Leatherface, Pinhead, and Ghostface. Three years later, in episode sixty-two, Jason is shown on the days before and after a typical Friday the 13th.

Jason is spoofed in the season five episode of Family Guy entitled "It Takes a Village Idiot, and I Married One". The so-called "Mr. Voorhees" explains to Asian reporter Trisha Takanawa how happy he is to see local wildlife return following the cleanup and rejuvenation of Lake Quahog. He reappears later in the episode as the manager of the "Britches and Hose" clothing store. As opposed to his monstrous personality in the films, Jason is depicted here as polite and articulate, albeit still a psychopath; he murders random swimmers and threatens to kill his employee if she screws up. In the "Tiny Toons" feature-length movie "How I Spent My Summer Vacation," Plucky Duck, Hampton Pig and his family pick up a frightening-looking hitch-hiker while returning from Happy World Land Amusement Park. As they drive, a radio news bulletin warns of the escape of a deranged mental patient from a nearby asylum, the description matching the hitchhiker's appearance exactly. The man then becomes unstable, dons a goalie mask in a clear spoof of Jason Voorhees, and unsuccessfully attacks Plucky with a chainsaw, screaming about his hatred for pork and duck, while the Pig family remains oblivious to the commotion. He later appears again at Acme Looniversity at the end of the movie, still looking for Plucky. In an episode of The Simpsons, Jason appears in a Halloween episode sitting on the couch with Freddy Krueger waiting for the family to arrive. When Freddy ask where the family is, Jason responds, "Ehh, whaddya gonna do?" and turns the TV on. He also appears in The Simpsons episode "Stop, or My Dog Will Shoot!", alongside Pinhead, menacing Bart in a fantasy sequence. The South Park episodes "Imaginationland Episode II" and "III" feature Jason among an assortment of other villains and monsters as an inhabitant of the "bad side" of Imaginationland, a world populated by fictional characters. This version of Jason has an effeminate voice and describes the removal of Strawberry Shortcake's eyeball as "super hardcore". In April 2010 Sideshow Toys released a polystone statue of Jason, based on the version appearing in the 2009 remake.