Friday the 13th 2009 Explains Why Jason Always Catches You (Despite Walking)

Friday the 13th fans have often wondered how Jason Voorhees seems to always be one step ahead of his prey, and the 2009 remake explains things. When Jason first slashed victims in Friday the 13th Part 2, he was a decidedly human adversary, actually running after his targets and able to be fought off temporarily with physical force. As the franchise continued though, Jason became progressively more superhuman in the way he was somehow able to always catch up to his victims, no matter how fast they were moving.

That was despite the fact that Jason’s speed at tailing his intended machete fodder just seemed to get slower and more methodical as time went on. Jason’s ability to outmaneuver his targets only got more inexplicable once he was resurrected as a zombie, with the apex of that coming in Friday the 13th Part 8: Jason Takes Manhattan, in which Jason’s ability to get in front of people can only logically be chalked up to him teleporting.

While Friday the 13th‘s 2009 remake tends to divide fans, the filmmakers behind it at least attempted to explain some of the more hard to figure out things about Jason and how he operates. One such change serves to explain how exactly he consistently sneaks around behind or in front of his prey without being noticed.

Friday the 13th 2009 Explains Why Jason Always Catches You (Despite Walking)

In Friday the 13th 2009, Jason Voorhees doesn’t just have a dilapidated shack in the woods near Camp Crystal Lake, he’s instead upgraded to a Dr. Evil-esque large underground lair. Jason’s pad may not have sharks with frickin’ laser beams attached to their head, but what it does have is multiple rooms, booby traps, and tunnels connecting to places all over Crystal Lake. Jason makes use of these tunnels to quickly move about the campground, and also has traps positioned in different spots that if triggered, sound alarms to Jason below.

These features enable Jason to use shortcuts around the camp to get in front of or behind unsuspecting victims, and know from his lair where exactly people might be snooping around above. Sure, one could argue that Jason still travels unrealistically fast, tunnels or otherwise, but at least the team behind the Friday the 13th remake tried to justify one of Jason’s most well-known and most unexplained character traits. None of that explains why he suddenly takes prisoners in the remake, but that’s it’s own discussion topic.

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