40 Years Later, Crystal Lake Officially Pays Off A Scrapped Friday The 13th Idea

Published Oct 18, 2026, 11:01 PM EDT

Dani Kessel Odom (they/them) is an autistic lead writer and TV critic who covers sci-fi shows like Doctor Who and Pluribus, fantasy shows like The Magicians and Percy Jackson, and horror of all kinds. They also cover Marvel and DC TV shows and movies, with a robust knowledge of comic books. Their TV reviews can be found on Rotten Tomatoes.

Dani is also part of ScreenRant's books team, using their fiction writing and literature studies as the backbone for their book analyses.

They have covered events, such as the Denver Fan Expo. Professionals in the field, such as Damien Leone and Lucy Hale, have shared their articles. Their review of Ponies was quoted in the show's TV trailer.

In university, they majored in English Writing with a minor in psychology. They have always had a passion for analyzing TV and movies, even taking filmography and scriptwriting classes in university. They also studied and participated in onstage and onscreen acting extensively from the ages of 7 to 18.

Aside from working at Screen Rant, Dani has worked as a freelance editor and writer over the past decade, often in a ghostwriting capacity.

This article includes discussions of medical abuse and murder as well as SPOILERS for Crystal Lake!

Crystal Lake picks up an abandoned plotline from the Friday the 13th movies, making it an important part of Jason Voorhees’ story. Friday the 13th is one of the most successful slasher horror franchises of all time, and Jason is a fan-favorite bad guy and the slasher villain with the second-highest kill count. That said, Jason Voorhees has always been a bit of a mystery. There’s a lot we never knew about his life before the drowning and his strange, almost unhuman abilities. Fans were left to speculate. However, Peacock’s Crystal Lake decided to change that.

The original Friday the 13th movie introduced Pamela Voorhees as the killer, and the reveal shares a lot of information about her relationship with Jason, even if they don’t appear on screen together. However, the other side of Jason Voorhees’ family tree is a bit of a mystery. Before Crystal Lake, Elias Voorhees never appeared onscreen, though he gets briefly mentioned in Jason Lives and Jason Goes to Hell.

However, a scrapped storyline meant for the 1985 film Jason Lives would’ve made Elias Voorhees a more significant character in the Friday the 13th movie franchise. Director Tom McLoughlin didn’t choose to cut the storyline, though, with the decision falling to Paramount. Luckily, Crystal Lake finally picks up the idea forty years later and runs with it in a creative new way.

Friday The 13th's Cut Plans For Jason's Father Elias Explained

Information about the original Friday the 13th Jason’s father storyline has remained extremely vague. However, McLoughlin did a Q&A after the New Beverly Cinema’s Friday the 13th triple feature on June 5, 2009, outlined in a retrospective on The Ultimate Rabbit, where he shared some details about the bigger plans for Jason’s father. To flesh out the villain a little more, McLoughlin wanted the movie to explore Elias Voorhees and his role in Jason’s life, but Paramount Pictures squashed that idea.

Even after that, the director had many possible endings for Jason's life, and the two discarded choices introduced Mr. Voorhees. One possible ending would’ve shown Jason’s father reviving the iconic slasher villain with voodoo magic. Another original ending for Friday the 13th Part 6, which got storyboarded and added to the Deluxe Edition DVD, would have set Jason’s father up as a potential threat.

In the cut scene, Jason’s father shows up to meet the cemetery caretaker, Martin, and pays him for looking after the graves. When he looks at Jason’s grave, he looks angry, suggesting that he knows Jason isn’t in there. Because it’s such a brief scene, there’s no way to know whether Elias would’ve been an ally or enemy. Ultimately, the problem with Jason Lives’ alternate ending is twofold. The biggest issue is that it would’ve forced the franchise to explain Elias Voorhees and his backstory, which Paramount didn’t want. Additionally, Martin died in the movie.

That said, the novelization of Jason Lives features Elias Voorhees as a hulking, abusive miner from Ohio. His relationship with Pamela was extremely tumultuous, and Elias detests Jason because of his disability. Crystal Lake seems to pull some character details, though not all, from these sources while also adding a completely new backstory.

How Elias' Role In Crystal Lake Changes Pamela & Jason's Origin Stories

Credit: Peacock

While neither villain is redeemed by Crystal Lake, the Friday the 13th killers, Pamela and Jason Voorhees, are a lot more nuanced now that the TV prequel has introduced their tragic origin stories. Pamela and Jason Voorhees endured severe trauma at the hands of Elias Wittering, who ran Project Argonaut. Elias convinced Pamela to undergo treatments with Bellflower even though she was hesitant about it being experimental. It’s unclear how much he knew at this time, so it could have been well-intentioned. However, he eventually learned the truth and continued to put his wife and child through medical abuse.

Elias Wittering didn’t object to the injections into Pamela’s stomach or putting her on experimental mood stabilizers. He lied to her about why Jason had to go into the clinic so much. When she started questioning Bellflower and the effects of Project Argonaut on Jason, he gaslit her into silence. When she finally spoke up, he threatened to take her child away from her, twisting everything around to be her fault.

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As for Jason, Elias led the entire project that treated Jason like a test subject instead of a human being. He knew they were subjecting Jason to radiation, which made him sick and caused his hair to fall out, but he kept going with it. He was fully on board with abusing and traumatizing his own son for the sake of scientific progress, which is absolutely disgusting. The only time he pushed back against Bellflower was when his son was born with a physical deformity.

Ultimately, Pamela’s experiences with Elias shape her as a character. Because of her unresolved trauma, she has a lot more to be angry about. Her believing the worst in people makes a lot more sense. After the drowning, she assumes malice from two stupid teenagers who weren’t paying attention. This wouldn’t make sense, except that an authority figure already failed her son once, so the jump doesn’t seem as big. Mind you, none of this makes her less of a villain. She murdered countless people for over a decade.

As for Jason, it’s unclear what turned him from an empathetic child before the drowning to a killing machine a year later. However, his father’s actions explain how Jason survived the lake drowning. The growth and strength afterward clearly come from Project Argonaut. What’s more, his father subjected him to many experiments that could have changed his brain processes after the trauma of the drowning.

Why Jason Kills Elias In Crystal Lake, But Not Pamela

Credit: Peacock

At the end of Crystal Lake season 1, Elias tries to convince Jason that he’s a loving father. However, the grown 12-year-old clearly remembers enough from his childhood to know Elias was a danger. Since he doesn’t speak, it’s unclear whether these are implicit memories that he held onto for the seven years after they left Bellflower or if he consciously remembers the torture. Either way, in his mind, Elias had to go.

However, Jason spares his mother. This choice is a bit of a mystery, especially since we don’t see inside Jason’s mind. We don’t know how much he remembers. We don’t know why he became a monster, though some theorize oxygen deprivation from the lake could have caused brain damage. Truly, Jason post-drowning is still quite a mystery.

However, two possible explanations come to mind when I try to break down that ending. He might remember his mother, like he remembered a little bit about Grace and their shack. He may know from his childhood memories that she loved him and treated him well. Alternatively, he may have known she was the one who left him supplies and felt the genuine love radiating from her when she saw and interacted with him.

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  Linda Cardellini

  Pamela Voorhees

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  William Catlett

  Levon Brooks