"Jason X" Moves To Outer Space to Relaunch Horror Franchise In Fun Feature Film

NO, THE JUGGERNAUT HASN’T JOINED THE NOI, IT’S THE SLASHER SERIES MAKING A BIG CHANGE OF SCENERY AS IT BLENDS IN FEMALE ACTION HEROES, AND SCI-FI AS THEY SEEK TO EXPAND ITS BASE BEYOND TEENS AND YOUNG MALES.

LEXA DOIG OF TV’S ‘ANDROMEDA’ WITH CASTMATE LISA RYDER BATTLES A RESTED AND RENEWED JASON IN "JASON X," NOW IN THEATRES.

"…and Jason is reanimated along with "Andromeda’s" Lexa Doig. Rowan, like Jason, did a "Buck Rogers" thing-ee and was frozen and lost along with him for over 455 years. Her toughman babe basically plays one half of the "Aliens" Ellen Ripley character.The other is played by her "Andromeda" cohort Lisa Ryder as the android KM."

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I wasn’t expecting much from this next incarnation of the Jason film franchise, which almost rivals Michael Myers and Freddy Krueger for longevity. But "Jason X" had a few surprises for smug critics like me. I found it fun, and used its legacy of the 1980s slasher Teen Scream Flicks to invigorate itself as they prepared to re-launch the next extension of the series. There’s precedence: even "Hellraiser" was put into space in the fourth version.

There was even some intellectual candy put inside the film for we classically trained, I mean we educated people. The research ship is called Grendel, which was among the first monster stories from Europe. A space station is the Solaris, from the book and short feature penned by Polish writer Stanislaw Lem, about the isolation and dehumanization of taking Humanity away from nature and putting them in steel cans in space. Little did I think that I’d be talking about art in a Jason flick!

The basic premise of "Jason X" was taken from "Aliens," "Terminator" and others: Jason and one of his would-be executioners/keepers are brought back by a deep-space research vessel filled with soldiers and students. As in "Frankenstein," the tinkerers just can’t leave well enough alone, and Jason is reanimated along with "Andromeda’s" Lexa Doig. Rowan, like Jason, did a "Buck Rogers" thing-ee and was frozen and lost along with him for over 455 years. Her toughman babe basically plays one half of the "Aliens" Ellen Ripley character.

The other is played by her "Andromeda" cohort Lisa Ryder as the android KM, which stands for Knowledge Module. But after Jason starts to carve his way through the soldiers and the students, she too gets an upgrade into a fearsome dominatrix black leather clad BattleBot that provides for some of the best hand-to-hand and shoot-‘em-ups in the film. And some of the best lines. "Now I’m really gonna have to hurt you" she tells Jason, as she starts to kick his ass from one end of the spaceship to the other, firing with two pistols like an outer space version of Lara Croft, Tomb Raider. But Jason ain’t goin’ out like that!

Interestingly, on the TV series "Andromeda" Doig is the android version of the ship, while Ryder is Captain Beka Valentine, one of two captains on Andromeda, which was extracted from a 500 year sleep inside the event horizon of a Black Hole. Don’t ask. Jusy watch, and you’ll be hooked like as was. Following a trend these days, there are more science fiction brothas and sistahs taking over these series. The Klingons in the last days of Star Trek Generation were predominantly Black. Makeup people can use the exotic expressions to better effect, is one explanation I’ve heard. But I digress.

There’s some interesting fights and stunt work to go along with the stabbings, beheadings, crushing, et cetera. There’s even a sistah soljah in the mix, and most of the cast is female as the series tries to move beyond its primary male audience.

There’s something about being cooped up in a spaceship where there is no escape, and films such as "Alien" and even "Virus" served it up right, although "Virus" took place on a derelict research ship that was hosting an invading signal while Jamie Lee Curtis, Donald Sutherland and Stephen Baldwin tried to get off before the hurricane hit while trying to stymie the invaders from downloading their disruptive signals.

"Jason X" leavened out some of the slasher antics, but basically it was the same template thrown over the scream, run, get trapped, get hacked/smooshed/crushed model. There’s only so much dressing you can do, especially after ten outings. It’ll be interesting to see what they do with the next one.

Some scenes in "Jason X" were almost lifted whole and plopped in from other space themed movies. There was a recreation of the shot where the brave Bishop, the sensitive android played by the versatile Lance Henricksen (also the original "Terminator" until Arnold was signed), dragged himself across the floor after being sliced in half by the Alien Queen in the second of four "Aliens." The first appearance of the Alien after it burst forth --so to speak-- was likewise redone, but this just added to the fun since we were now clued into the game plan.

"Can’t you beam us out of here or something?" asks Rowan of the crew as the sound of Jason clanging away at the bulkhead thunders through the ship. They look at her like she’s crazy. "Beam out?"

Aside from the main stars the audience favourite would have to Sgt. Broadski, who despite the Polish name was winningly played by a dark-skinned African brotha named Peter Mensah. As the commander of the soldiers protecting the pampered kiddies students he radiated strength and bravery, and was actually given something to do in the film besides getting killed in an interesting way, as most of the cast seems be there for. Some things never change, but even the original "Star Trek" was known for introducing Yeoman So-And-So whose only function was to get killed in the first scenes after they beamed down to the planet.

Mensah’s determined Sgt. Broadski reminded me of British actor in the recent 007 movies Colin Salmon, as the team commander in the most excellent "Resident Evil," when he went up against the Red Queen in the underground complex filled with homicidal shambling zombies, reanimated after death from a virus and radiation, just like the "Dawn Of The Dead" movies. Another intrepid saviour was seen in the underrated "Event Horizon," Laurence Fishburne’s first sci-fi adventure which was like a gothic haunted ship film as a trans-dimensional vessel invented by Sam Neill warps back into the solar system after an absence of over 7 years, but with a little something extra tagging along.

There is Angela Bassett’s "Supernova" with James Spader, where their hospital ship the Nightengale picks up a passenger with a dangerous cargo. They had some sexual antics on that good ship as well, such as Bassett and Spader having a zero-gee interlude. Must be nice.

There were some of the same dumb science non sequitors in "Jason X," such as when a would-be rescue ship says they’re "4 parsecs away, we’ll be there in 45 minutes." Not in this universe you won’t! They invented parsecs when light-years became unwieldy. Briefly, it‘s a method that uses angles as seen from Terra to compute large distances for observational purposes.

(In "Star Wars" the same remark was made when Han Solo bragged to Ben Kenobi that his ship, the Millennium Falcon, did so many parsecs during the Kessel run. It is not a unit of speed, either). There are some of us who know our way around a slide rule and a Newtonian reflector telescope, and we notice such things that grate on our senses, like running fingernails down a blackboard.

What I’d like to see is the Battle Royal Throwdown supreme between Freddy Krueger, Jason Vorhees, and "Hallowe’en’s" Michael Myers, the last who celebrated his demise (?) in "H20," where former "Scream Queen" turned cell phone pitch lady Jamie Lee Curtis came back to wrap up the franchise once and for all. Yeah, right.

But until then, I guess we’ll have to do with the separate franchises, which have more life and sequels prequels and "Final Chapters" that lead onto "New Beginnings" to them than James Bond, whose twentieth outing co-starring Halle Berry is on its way to a winter holiday release date.

Before the movie’s premiere at the AMC theatre a few of us guys were standing around wondering if this really was the tenth Jason movie. "It’s the tenth, unless Jason converted to Islam in the last one" quipped JT Minor, a film fan. Lots of people I know seem to have stopped after the 4th one or so. I remember the third one because It was in 3-D. The headache I got watching it almost lasted until the fourth one. There’s something about seeing a machete hurtling at you through the forest that imprints itself in your mind.

It should be about ten, because the sixth one or so was subtitled "A New Beginning" or "A New Chapter Begins" or some such. Then there was the one after where Jason Vorhees went to Hell, returning as the personification of pure unkillable, unstoppable Evil. Then he went to the big city. The tag line for the latter was "He’s In Town With A Few Days To Kill." A handy line which was also used for Danny Glover’s "Predator 2."

There are the elements of the Teen Slasher Formula that made the film and others the object of parody done so well by the "Scream" trio movies. In one instance, the spacefarers are seeking a way to divert Jason away from them while they effect their escape. "Access the 1980s database" one suggests, while they beam images at him using their version of the "Enterprise" and "Voyager" ship’s Holodeck. It was a scene Jason knew well.

"Hi! Wanna have some premarital sex?" coos a pair of nubile high school age girls camping out in the woods. "And here, have some marijuana!" the other similacrum says perkily, as both strip off their tops while the enraged Jason charges at the virtual vamps. (Psyche!)

"Jason X" works because the film doesn’t try and take itself too seriously. Everyone knows this isn’t high art, and it sure ain’t Shakespeare. And like one of the Olden Guys said back in tha Olden Days of Hollywood, "what ‘message?’ If you wanna send a message, go to Western Union!" There is much unselfconscious bouncing of breasts as in "Starship Troopers," maybe it’s a future thing, like the Victorian era is to our going to hell in a handbasket age, And the film didn’t even try for a PG-13; it went straight for the Restricted rating, like that’s going to stop these ‘Tweens from sliding on in when theatre attendants aren’t looking.

This is a movie that you and the crew are going to have a good time at. You’ll groan as much as you laugh, but they didn’t end up making ten of these (and counting!) Jason slasher flicks because nobody wasn’t going to see them, either.

"JASON X" directed by Jim Isaac from New Line cinemas is rated a well-deserved "R" for its liberal use of sexuality, female upper torso nudity, as well as gory violence as the space cadets are sliced, diced and otherwise served up by Jason’s rusty but trusty machete. Sometimes the old ways are the best.

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