How ‘Friday the 13th’ and its prequel are going to find a point of connection… thanks to a simple sweater

In 1980, a slasher changed everything society thought about horror movies: Friday the 13th became monumentally famous, even though the saga’s main killer, Jason Voorhees, didn’t appear until the very last minute in a dream sequence. The film’s antagonist was none other than his mother, Pamela Voorhees, who took revenge on the teenagers for letting her poor son die at Camp Crystal Lake a few years earlier. Now, after 10 sequels, a reboot, and an endless number of comics, video games, and more, the saga returns with a prequel that proves the machete is still sharp.

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The prestigious A24 is already getting ready for the October 15 premiere of Crystal Lake, the prequel to the first film in the saga, in which Linda Cardellini will play a young version of Mrs. Voorhees (even though she’s only 3 years younger than Betsy Palmer was when she played that role). Was there any need for this? According to the actress, absolutely.

“We all know where Pam ends up because that’s where the killing starts in the first film. So they gave me a beautiful beginning and a place to go. There’s an arc to someone who has good intentions and tries to survive, who’s doing the best she can and fighting for the things she believes are right”, she says. She fights for the things that are right until she comes across an axe and decides to kill off the teenagers who are at it non-stop, apparently.

Although there have been several actresses playing the character, Palmer is the definitive one, and Cardellini is clear that she can’t live up to her: “You can’t duplicate what Betsy did, playing this devoted mother. But I can take that and bring it to Jason’s childhood years. I don’t think you get where Betsy did without really loving Jason and knowing him. That was really important to us. And no, you can’t be another Betsy. But I do pay her a little tribute with a certain sweater that shows up”. She’s referring, of course, to the sweater the character is wearing when she is decapitated in the film. We’ll have to see whether it lives up to Friday the 13th or instead ends up as nothing more than a mere Thursday the 12th.