What happened to Kane Hodder?

[Eric Campos]

Am I just the blind guy in the bunch, or is it a complete mystery why Kane Hodder isn't playing Jason in "Freddy vs. Jason"?
I mean, this was the guy who was the biggest champion for this legendary team-up for the past several years. If anybody in Hollywood seemed excited about it - it was Kane.
So what happened?

[Pete Vonder Haar]

According to a recent interview, New Line went with some Canadian stuntman (Ken Kirzinger) because of the following possible reasons:

1) It would be cheaper
2) Kane's eyes were wrong
3) Kane was too short
4) Kane was too tall (NOTE: Hodder is 6'3". Kirzinger is maybe 6'4")

Maybe Hodder was asking Affleck money for the part.

Pete

[Eric Campos]

I saw Kane try to eat a jukebox once because it wouldn't play any Metallica. Scary...

[Pete Vonder Haar]

Lars Ulrich probably threatened the bar owner with a lawsuit if he didn't give the band a percentage every time some drunk played "Enter Sandman."

Pete

[Adam Hackbarth]

In the Kane movies, and in interviews with Kane, it is clear that he thinks of Jason simply as a killing machine... thus the series (from movie after movie) the fact that he's just an abused kid with birth defects got lost. He just became a killing machine. Yes, he is a non-stop murderer, but it is fueled by something.

So when Kane proudly talks about his Jason turns his head before turning his body and stuff like that, the character becomes something other that what it WAS. That was probably not his fault, by why not start fresh?

BIG PROBLEM WITH Freddy Vs. Jason.... when Jason has a fire retardant suit on then it switches to where he doesn't, Jason looks like he lost 300 lbs. It looked horrible.

[seancollier]

The real biggest problem with Freddy vs. Jason was Jason's on-again-off-again fear of water. Bottom line: Jason is NOT afraid of water. Jason has NEVER been afraid of water, and as a plot point, it's rather weak, considering the number of times Jason's cool with water in the rest of the film. And, in case the rumors haven't spread this far yet, sequel ideas being kicked around include...

Freddy vs. Jason vs. Ash (of Evil Dead)

Freddy and Jason vs. Ash

Freddy vs. Jason vs. Michael Myers

Freddy vs. Jason 2

[jonnyredman]

And if Jason's sooooo afraid of water he sure doesn't have any problems wading slowly out of the lake at the end of F vs J!

[bennettk]

Is this thread not way off topic...

Does anyone really know what happened to Kane Hodder or not....

[KevinCarr]

According to IMDb (which may or may not be that accurate), it was because they wanted a closer physical match to Freddy (I would imagine they're talking width, not height) and that Ken Kirzinger had more sympathetic eyes.

I thought that not having Kane Hodder as Jason was the worst part of FvJ. Why does Jason need sympathic eyes?

And so what if Jason was an abused child. Now, he's a supernatural killing machine. I mean, I was beaten up a time or two in school, but I haven't started hacking up young co-eds with a machete... yet.... BWAH-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!

[Gabitsch]

Long post. Oh well.

From what I understand, Ronny Yu wanted Jason to be more "sympathetic," whatever that means. As big a fan of Kane Hodder as I am (I'd love to use him in an offbeat role one day, maybe as a college professor or a wacky neighbor), I thought Kirzinger's Jason was cool. I liked the way he moved, a completely different feel than the Hodder Jason. "Freddy vs. Jason," while certainly not a work of art, is a different type of movie than "Jason X" or "Jason Goes to Hell."

There is another theory, though...

Maybe Yu heard the stories about Kane Hodder's "method" Jason stuff. "Jason wouldn't do that," Kane would say to the director on "Jason X." That kind of thing. Maybe Yu, well, got a little scared. I mean, Hodder has the word "KILL!" tattooed on the inside of his lower lip. He obviously takes the role very seriously.

A positive side effect of Hodder's Jason is that future Jasons, as well as future slashers from any franchise, have to compete with his use of body language. Kirzinger's also given Jason his own personal stamp. Both men are a far cry from the Nick Castle ripoffs who played Jason before.

Joe Bob Briggs has some great Jason stories at his web site. My favorite is about the guy who played Jason in "The Final Chapter." Apparently, he was so embarrassed that he had it taken off of his resume as a stunt man. Shame. "Final Chapter" is actually pretty good.

Now, about this water problem...

Anyone who's been watching New Line's Jason movies knows these people don't exactly care about continuity. And they sure as hell don't give a flip about anything established in the Paramount series. I say GOOD. There is no need to "trekkify" the Jason movies. "Star Wars," "Star Trek" and other series are full of errors, and their goofy fans complain about that stuff all the time.

"Friday the 13th" is not "Star Wars." It's better. And one of the reasons is that New Line allows its Jason directors to take the series in different directions every time. "Jason Goes to Hell" isn't exactly a clone of the Paramount movies, and didn't bother to explain how Jason came back after "Jason Takes Manhattan." GOOD! The end to "Jason Takes Manhattan" is absolutely horrible, and we didn't have to be reminded of it! As a result, "Jason Goes to Hell" is one of the strangest in the series, setting the tone for the rest of New Line's Jason flicks.

"Jason X" doesn't bother to explain how Jason returned from hell. And why bother? We're here to see Kane Hodder slice people up, for all the right reasons. With that established, the movie goes in directions even "Jason Goes to Hell" didn't.

"Freddy vs. Jason" doesn't explain how Jason looks and moves like Ken Kirzinger now, but will look and move like Kane Hodder in the future. And I'm just so offended by that. Wow. Again, big deal.

Um... oh yeah, the water thing. In Fangoria, during "Jason Goes to Hell," New Line stated that the previous Jason movies were just movies, and that "Jason Goes to Hell" would be about the "real" Jason. And why not? Paramount took a cool concept and ran it in to the ground with bad scripts, bad direction, bad acting, bad everything. Especially their last two. For every "Final Chapter" or "Jason Lives," there was a "New Beginning" or "New Blood." And as soon as they started losing money, YOINK! They pulled the plug.

(They did the same thing to "Star Trek" recently, opening "Nemesis" across from "The Two Towers," guaranteeing it would flop and that Paramount wouldn't have to spend money on "Star Trek" movies again. Sure the new TV show isn't very good, but "Nemesis" was up there with "Undiscovered Country," at least. Good movie. Rent it.)

Anyway, Jason's afraid of water in the new movie - in some scenes, yeah - because it's what Ronny Yu (and the screenwriters) wanted. It's an interpretation, one I actually found interesting. Freddy and Jason as primal forces, one spawned of fire, the other of water. Who cares about continuity in a slasher movie when the genre can allow for more?

I enjoyed most of "Freddy vs. Jason," except for the bad acting and goofy script. It was almost like... a Freddy or Jason movie! But the Freddy/Jason stuff is fantastic, damn near a wrestling match. Could have done without the crappy nu-metal, though. A more gothic approach to the score (a la "New Nightmare") would have complemented the visuals better.

And hey, at least Busta Rhymes wasn't in it. You want to bash a new slasher movie? Let's talk about that godawful MTV-spoonfed dreck that turned out to be "Halloween Resurrection."