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Official Synopsis:
As Friday the 13th - The Series makes its chilling debut on DVD with all 26 wickedly good first-season episodes on six discs! When two distant cousins inherit the strange "Curious Goods" antiques shop, they soon discover that their deceased uncle paid the ultimate price for the hexed items in the store: his soul was claimed by Satan. Now, it's up to them and an eccentric antiques dealer to find each diabolical item sold from the store before it manifests its evil powers. Open the door to true terror with the series that's crawling with psychological suspense and spine-tingling mysteries you won't want to miss!
Our Take:
Watching the first season of Friday the 13th: The Series on DVD, I’m struck by how easy it would have been to have made a TV series out of the actual movie franchise. You could have Jason terrorizing a different group of teenagers every week, or even tackle some multi-episode story arcs wherein Jason goes on a rampage. I dunno, it could have been cool.
Instead, Friday the 13th: The Series is a heavily ‘80s-flavored anthology show a la The Twilight Zone, only lacking the overarching quality of that show. The show springboards from a pair of cousins who inherit an antique shop that contains numerous mystic and occult objects, each of which leads to that episode’s mysterious tale. The show is clearly aiming for a horror-esque vibe, but really it’s just a lot of Twilight Zone-lite with bad hairstyles and shoulder pads.
One treat in this set is the before-they-were-famous talent involved. In front of the camera, you’ll see way-back-when appearances by Sarah Polley, Enrico Colantoni, Ray Walston, David Hewlett, and Zack Ward, which are all fun, plus there’s an episode directed by Atom Egoyan. Of course, they’re all stuck in the framework of a fairly mediocre television show, so it’s not worth buying just because a talent you like is involved with a single episode.
The extra features are mostly promotional in nature, and they are:
* Original Network Launch Promos (1 minute) – Two early commercials for the show.
* Sales Presentation (9 minutes) – A clip heavy sales tool to promote the show.
Friday the 13th: The Series is a decent if unoriginal anthology show that doesn’t live up to the quality of its forebears, such as The Twilight Zone or The Outer Limits. Although the show ran for a couple of seasons, I can see why it never really took off. There’s just nothing special about it, and naming it after a popular movie franchise can’t change that.
Overall Picture:
Show: C
DVD: C
- Mike Spring
Editor
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