In 1996, writer Kevin Williamson and director Wes Craven gave the horror world a much-needed breath of fresh air in the form of Scream, a satirical take on the slasher subgenre that poked fun at the various tropes that had been beaten into the ground over the previous two decades. The film was a big hit, spawning four sequels, with a fifth on the way.
That said, Scream wasn't the first instance of mainstream horror getting meta. It was only a couple years prior in 1994 that Craven himself put out Wes Craven's New Nightmare, a fourth wall-shattering take on his Nightmare on Elm Street franchise. Even before that, though, writer-director Tom McLoughlin put out his 1986 film Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives, arguably the best film in the Crystal Lake mythos -- and certainly the most meta.
An entire decade before Scream came out, Jason Lives proved that slasher movies could be equal parts bloody and funny -- in a good way, that is. Whereas many lesser slasher films are unintentionally hilarious, McLoughlin knew exactly what he was doing and ended up giving the Friday franchise the fresh spin it desperately needed at the time.
The director discussed his thought process heading into the project in the "Making Of" documentary featured on the DVD release of Jason Lives. "I was contacted through my agent that Paramount was looking for another Friday the 13th," he said. "At the time, I had only seen the first one, so I went to Paramount and I sat there for an entire day and watched each movie back-to-back. And then I kind of looked at it and said, 'Well, if we're gonna do a sixth one, I feel like I can't do it dead seriously.' It just felt like it needed to have some bit of a wink at the whole series."
According to McLoughlin, what made Jason Lives work was that it took a humorous approach without turning series antagonist Jason Voorhees into a joke (which was a major condition for producer Frank Mancuso). Said McLoughlin, "We know [Jason's] serious and yet these other characters are sort of treating him like, 'Oh yeah, this was a myth, this was a legend.' And they sort of have fun with it… until, obviously, they meet their demise."
Like Scream after it, Jason Lives takes its narrative seriously, though isn't afraid to acknowledge -- and even relish in -- just how farcical its premise is. The similarities between the two don't stop there, either. Jason Lives also features a significant amount of metahumor. In fact, the character Lizabeth Mott (played by McLoughlin's then-wife Nancy McLoughlin) is almost like a proto-Randy Meeks (played in the Scream films by Jamie Kennedy).
In her brief appearance, Lizabeth seems very familiar with the "rules" of surviving a horror movie, having the good sense to know that when you see a creepy guy in a mask, it's time to get out of Dodge (even if her attempts prove futile). Judging by the "Making Of" documentary, this scene was inspired by actual conversations McLoughlin had with his wife, the latter of whom would often point out horror movie characters' frankly terrible decision-making skills. Jason Lives is also much like the Scream franchise in that it eschews a popular horror trope by featuring no nudity, which was a conscious decision on McLoughlin's part.
According to McLoughlin himself, one person who is very aware of the similarities between Jason Lives and Scream is the person who wrote the latter. "I mean, when I first met Kevin Williamson and he said that my Friday, when he saw that, was certainly something that had an influence on Scream, because it was -- as some of the movies were at that time -- really kind of having fun with that genre," he shared.
All of this is to say that slasher movies seem to be at their best when they aren't afraid to have a bit of fun and challenge convention. While the films certainly vary in quality, there's really never been a bad Scream movie (yes, even Scream 3 is fine). Wes Craven's New Nightmare was easily the best Elm Street movie since Dream Warriors -- maybe even the best since the original. Finally, Jason Lives, the one that arguably started it all, remains the crown jewel of the Friday the 13th franchise.
While the original Friday remains a classic, Jason Lives proved the series could be so much more than teens being killed at a lake. It could have car chases, it could have gothic overtones, it could have a theme song by Alice Cooper and, most importantly, it could be funny on purpose. It was a film unlike anything the Friday franchise had done before and really hasn't been topped since.