Friday the 13th the series - Night Hunger

 Friday the 13th the series - Night Hunger

Last month I did a quick little post on the episode Cupid's Quiver from Friday the 13th the series (my favorite show of all time.) This month I decided to cover yet another episode, this one being Night Hunger. 

PLOT - A hot-rod racer uses a cursed necklace to win events by killing his competition and dipping the chain in his victims' blood. 

 

LOWDOWN - Season two was the fucking mesa of Friday the 13th the series. It was 1989, and even though the slasher films featuring Jason seemed to be stuck in a very strange limbo. (Sorry kids, unless I'm drunk I never enjoy Jason takes Manhattan.) The show on the other hand was in it's strongest season yet out of it's brief three year run. This season the characters and story lines were much more established. The plots were much more daring and extreme. In fact it took a much darker tone with it's episodes and features by far the best objects yet. I have a very strong theory that 90% of the show's success was based off John D LeMay who played Ryan Dallion. Sadly D LeMay left the show in the begging of the third season being "killed" off. It wasn't long before as the close of the third season came, the show was canceled. I have bitched and moaned over this for years. D LeMay really didn't go on to have much of a film career besides starring in Jason Goes To Hell The Final Friday a few years later. I always wonder had D LeMay stayed how long this amazing shoe would have been able to last and how many more seasons he would have been able to see. In fact I feel this movie and the chemistry between Micki and Ryan had a huge factor in the show The X-Files. If you ever want to see me geek out hardcore, just bring up John D LeMay's name. I seriously die. I mean I named my dog after this man...I'm as sick as they come. Lucky for me in this episode John looks nothing less than adorable and yet again steals the show.

 

Okay...enough of me drooling. As for this episode it's one that's grown on me over the years. In fact it took a few re-watches for me to actually pay enough attention and see this is by far one of the best episodes of the entire season. Yet again they took a much darker route with this storyline. I'm sorta a tomboy and my love for cars goes all the way back to when I was a little girl and how I would watch old 1970's race movies with my father. In fact I feel this has a huge reason why I love the movie Christine so much. This movie deals with exactly that, drag racing,  fast cars...and of course some deaths along the way. This one deals with a total asshole of a father who's always treated his young son like a complete piece of shit. Flashbacks are used to show us how he's always viewed his son as a disappointment. This sucks because there really are jerks like this out there. Those dickhead parents at sports game who are screaming at their poor little kid to hit some stupid ball. Of course years of abusive gets the best of the son who grows apart from his father after his mother's death. 

Around his twenty-first birthday his father (who owns the hardware store which is constantly seen next door to Curious Goods) comes into the store looking for a gift and remarks that his son used to hang out a great deal at the store before Uncle Lewis died. Of course this causes Jack, Micki, and Ryan to be suspicious and look into the manifest to see if the young boy ever bought anything from there. After some digging they finally come across that a birthday gift was given to him years ago. 

A silver chain.

The father decided to yet again act like a dick years ago and gave his son the chain with a blank key telling him he didn't deserve a car since he was worthless. Ever since then, the son has worn the key and chain around his neck to spite his father who he's grown to hate. 

Well it isn't long before we find out that the son's whole life is about cars. That he drag races against some local thugs, one of them being his childhood rival. Well it seems as though he earlier drives these guys off the road and then dips the key/chain in the person's blood in order to make the curse work. The curse being able to win every race he enters. Trying to climb his way to the top, he wants to race his childhood rival and prove to his father he really is worth something. 

I find this episode very interesting. First off we're dealing with some pretty heavy duty stuff. This poor kid has been raised to be this twisted, not by the objects but by the drive to prove to his father he isn't the loser he has tried to claim he is. I love the use of the object as well, dipping it in the blood (gotta love those cheesy 80's sound effects when it flashes hahaha.) One of my favorite scenes is when Micki and Ryan are trying to follow the kid in his car only to watch him switch cars and speed away. 

The ending scene always gets me. (love the use of flash backs and the rock n roll song) How the father knows he's created this monster and how there's only one way to stop it. Another tragic ending to a very awesome episode.

I love Ryan's comment at the end of how such a tiny small thing such as the chain did something this horrible. Goes to show, Evil does come in small packages. 

So all in all, a great episode with a great cursed object. Stay tuned till the next episode and me of course bitching about John D LeMay (um, why doesn't he do more conventions?)

4 Stars!