CRYSTAL LAKE Creator Promises Paranoid Terror and ‘Rivers of Blood’ in FRIDAY THE 13TH Spinoff Series
The world of Friday the 13th is stepping back into the shadows with Peacock’s upcoming prequel series Crystal Lake, and creator Brad Caleb Kane is talking about the the tone with some wickedly exciting teases.
Kane, coming off HBO’s It: Welcome to Derry, is diving straight into the murky mythology of the Voorhees family and promising fans a version of Camp Crystal Lake that will feel new and steeped in the unsettling energy that shaped the original film.
What viewers can expect, according to Kane, is a psychological and era driven descent into horror with plenty of gruesome payoff.
Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Kane explained that Crystal Lake isn’t a simple slasher rehash. He aims to twist expectations while staying true to what makes the franchise such a classic.
“In many ways, it’s a psychological thriller. It’s a paranoid ’70s thriller,” he stated. “It has all of the DNA of a slasher without quite being a slasher. There are rivers of blood in the show. There are very, I think, ingenious kill sequences and deaths and murders, but it’s all done in service of character and theme and place and time.”
Kane wants the series to echo the cultural and political forces that were in the air when the original Friday the 13th hit theaters in 1980. He described anchoring the prequel in the social landscape of the decade that birthed it.
He said: “I tried to think about Crystal Lake and a Friday the 13th prequel as, ‘What era did the first movie come out of’ It came out of the paranoid ’70s thriller era. It came out of the mistrust of institutions era.
“It came out of the women’s lib era, the National Organization for Women era, this consciousness raising awakening era in America. I wanted to go and play with all of those themes.”
Those themes will be explored through the rise of Pamela and Jason Voorhees, with Linda Cardellini taking on Pamela and Callum Vinson playing a young Jason.
Kane is more than confident that Cardellini is about to redefine the character. “She’s gonna shock and surprise a lot of people. I think she’s gonna get a lot of attention for this role. She’s inconceivably brilliant in it. I can’t really say any more.”
Crystal Lake is shaping up to be a tense, character centered horror story that embraces slasher roots while carving out something sharper and more atmospheric. I’m looking forward to taking a fresh dive into Friday the 13th lore.