YMMV / Freddy vs. Jason

• Awesome Music: The soundtrack album is full of badass Heavy Metal tunes by bands such as Slipknot, Lamb of God, Killswitch Engage, Sepultura, Chimaira and In Flames.
• Adorkable: Charlie's attempts to impress Lori are hilariously awkward.
• Alternative Character Interpretation: Notice how Freddy's face goes from his usual Slasher Smile to a mixture of seriousness and confusion after Kia calls him a faggot. One could probably imagine that he was thinking "Bitch, what is wrong with you?! Even I wouldn't sink so low as to use homophobic slurs!" Or he was mad that she was accusing HIM of being gay... something that in the 70s would be looked at with disdain and hatred. Keep in mind that just a minute earlier he called Kia "dark meat."
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Lori Campbell. Some think she's among the worst Final Girls in the series, if not the worst, because of Monica Keena's performance and the character being a very shallow stereotype. Others think she's a very brave and likable girl who manages to become a badass at the end.
  • Kia as well. Some viewers very much enjoyed Kelly Rowland's Large Ham performance and found the character to be both amusing and likeable. Others found her to be nothing more than a grating, poorly written stereotype and felt Kelly's performance was amongst the worst in the movie.
  • Freddy Krueger has also fallen under this. Some see it as one of Robert Englund’s better portrayals as Freddy and found it as creepy and enjoyable as he was in the first couple films. Others despise Robert hamming it up more times than necessary and the overuse of exposition he explains to the audience despite the rather simple plot (though that one is less on Robert and more on the overall writing).
  • Same with Jason Voorhees. Some fans saw it as one of the better portrayals of the character, praising him for his menacing size and more Frankenstein-esque movements as adding something new to the character. Others found it to be one of the most pathetic and laughable incarnations, criticizing said Frankenstein build as making him look and feel stiffer than even earlier installments and overall disliked his weird trait of being afraid of water all the sudden. Then there are those who hate this take altogether just because he’s not played by Kane Hodder.
• Catharsis Factor: Admit it, you were cheering seeing Freddy get a brutal, bloody beating from Jason before getting his head cleaved off, especially if you're familiar with how vile he was in the previous films.
• Character Rerailment: Freddy Krueger returns to the terrifying, demonic monster he was introduced as in the original movie from 1984, as he being played almost completely dead serious and has none of the sequels' campy trends or humour that he became infamous for. And while he still uses his witty one-liners, they're being used less for the silly humour like in the sequels and more - just like in the original movie - to emphasize just how much of a sadistic, murderous monster he actually is.
• Complete Monster: See here.
• Contested Sequel: Depending on the fan (of Freddy, Jason, or both), this movie is either the greatest thing to have happened in both franchises or an incoherent mess that pisses on their legacies.
• Creator's Pet: While it is actually a plot point, Jason getting way more kills than Freddy throughout the film can make him come across this way.
• Critic-Proof: Despite being bashed by critics, this is the highest-grossing film in the history of both franchises (or at least the Friday the 13th franchise, since the Nightmare reboot outgrossed this one).
• Cult Classic: Being a crossover film featuring two iconic horror villains does that.
• Designated Hero: Jason's undeniably A Lighter Shade of Black compared to Freddy, but it's still a bit weird that someone with such an incredibly large body count is made out to unambiguously rooted for in the climax, especially because he continues to kill our main characters during this time.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Gibb (due to being played by popular scream queen Katharine Isabelle) and Freeburg (because of his hilarious one-liners) tend to be the best received of the teens. This is despite how both of them have less than half an hour of screen time and neither character is around for the Signature Scene climax.
• Epileptic Trees: The film's ending generated a lot of Wild Mass Guessing; Ken Kirzinger (Jason's actor) mentioned in the commentary that a fan had asked him if the ending represented Jason going to Heaven.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • See that Mortal Kombat shout-out on the main page of the movie? It's amusingly prophetic because with the announcement of the first DLC character for Mortal Kombat X, Freddy and Jason have appeared in the Mortal Kombat series, in that order. Mortal Kombat 9 for Freddy and Mortal Kombat X for Jason. The mobile version of X even re-adds Freddy to the roster for those who wish to recreate the film, much like how X allows for a recreation of Alien vs. Predator, and how Mortal Kombat 11 allows for a recreation of RoboCop Versus The Terminator.
  • Jason Ritter stars in a story about a Town with a Dark Secret, with a parent who knows more than he seems to and is pretending the mysterious supernatural force in the town isn't real to protect his family? There's a Faux Affably Evil demonic entity with a twisted sense of a humor and a nice hat who enters peoples dreams to torment them? Are you sure this isn't Gravity Falls?
    • Even more so considering the alternate ending of the film on the DVD had Jason Ritter’s character being possessed by said dream demon.
  • A leaked outtake of the Funimation dub of Dragon Ball Z has Goku saying to Gohan "Hey, look at those faggot-ass clothes!"
  • Will got dubbed in Italian by Francesco Pezzulli, who would go on to also dub Clay in Friday the 13th (2009).
• Iconic Sequel Outfit: Jason's dark pants, black shirt, and heavy jacket has served as the basis for his design in most following Friday the 13th media, including the remake, Mortal Kombat X, and Friday the 13th: Killer Puzzle.
• Just Here for Godzilla: Most people watch this film just for the fight, ignoring the forgettable humans entirely. It doesn't help that each character's name is only said a few times (if at all).
• Memetic Mutation: Ever since this movie, multiple people within the Elm Street comics, as well as members of various horror fandoms, have taken to using "butter knives" as the go-to insult for Freddy's weapon.
• Misblamed: Fans are quick to blame Ronny Yu and Ronny Yu alone for the decision to replace Kane Hodder with Ken Kirzinger as Jason Voorhees, since Kane stopped receiving word after Ronny Yu was hired as director. In actuality, while he did ultimately agree to the change in casting, this was a decision made by the higher ups at New Line Cinema who wanted to recast Kane Hodder as they wanted a Jason that could tower over Freddy and had more expressive eyes. Even Yu admitted in both Never Sleep Again and Crystal Lake Memories documentaries that, even if he wasn’t a fan of either film series, he wasn't against Kane reprising Jason again as he knew both Sean S. Cunningham and the fans wanted it.
• Moral Event Horizon: Freddy's crossed this years ago, but this movie has one of his most vile actions: his possible attempted rape of Lori in her nightmare after in a dream version of her house after revealing he murdered her mother.
• Narm Charm: The final fight is scripted to play out like a wrestling match, resulting in Freddy and Jason engaging in a surprising amount of slapstick comedy and Freddy suddenly displaying surprising proficiency in martial arts.
• Realism-Induced Horror: What makes Lori's final nightmare in the film the most horrific, and one of Freddy's most vile actions, is instead of attempting to kill her in bizarre and over the top manner as he's used to, he could very well have attempted to rape her. Admittedly, he's likely using his powers to render her unable to get up, but he's making a quick comment about "the first time" before chuckling as he lifts her skirt. What makes it stand out is this is some evil deed anyone, not just the demonized spirit of a perverted serial killer, would do to her, especially since she's established to be a virgin.
• Retroactive Recognition:
  • Will is played by Jason Ritter, the future voice of Dipper Pines. He was still known as the son of John Ritter at the film's original release, though.
  • Evangeline Lilly appears as an extra, one year before her breakout role in Lost.
• Rooting for the Empire: Even as a Villain-Based Franchise, both Freddy and Jason's presences easily outshine all of the other characters in the film, namely due to how underdeveloped/uninteresting the rest of them are.
• The Scrappy: While most characters have a few fans, no one likes Will. Jason Ritter's poor acting (to the point of smiling when his friends are dying) tends to be the biggest reason why. Gravity Falls fans may get a kick out of the Retroactive Recognition, but that's about it.
• Signature Scene: The final fight between Freddy and Jason in Crystal Lake.
• Spiritual Successor: Or is it Spiritual Predecessor? In November 1984, Fangoria magazine ran a 5-page color comic strip entitled "1st Fangoria Splatterbowl," by comic artists John Arnold and Linwood Sasser, wherein Michael Myers took on Jason Voorhees and Leatherface.
• Squick:
  • Freddy kissing Lori in the form of her father, complete with sticking his tongue in her mouth.
  • Freddy lifts Lori's skirt with a potential intent to rape her.
• Tear Jerker: Lori entering Jason's dream-world. Jason is a little kid, being viciously abused by the other children, while two counsillors make out nearby and do nothing to help him. Basically she's witnessing the day Jason drowned. Lori is horrified and begs the counselors to help him, only for the man to turn into a mocking Freddy. She then dives in to save the crying kid who will become the monster that's killing her friends. It's one of the few times we ever see inside Jason's head and reminds us that beneath the undead killing machine is a scared and abused child, endlessly reliving his loss of innocence.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Blake. Immediately after losing his best friend, Trey, and swearing revenge on Trey's killers... he's unceremoniously killed off by Jason.
  • Mark. All we know about him is his brother was killed by Freddy, and he's on the up-and-up as far as the lore goes. He could have explained Krueger's MO and how to stop him to the others instead of their figuring it out in the forced, unlikely way they did.
  • The movie could have been the perfect chance to bring back characters from both franchises, especially Tommy Jarvis and Alice Johnson. It's even sadder when you remember that this was the last chance for producers to do this, as both franchises would have a reboot years later.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: In order to prevent Freddy from creeping back into their children's dreams and killing them, the adults of Springwood enacted a town-wide conspiracy to slip their kids medication that prevents R.E.M. sleep and institutionalizing anyone who discovered the truth. This could be the premise of an Elm Street movie unto itself, yet it's completely forgotten about once the teens try to take an unconscious Jason back to Camp Crystal Lake.
• Vindicated by History: Although no one would say that this is a great movie, fan opinion seems to have improved over the years, especially after the mixed and/or negative reception of the reboots that the two franchises had years later. While the human characters and the pacing continue to be regarded as the film's biggest problems, many fans admit that when the film focuses on the two villains killing people in the most graphical ways possible or fighting each other, it delivers a lot.
• The Woobie:
  • Jason as he's being mind raped by Freddy in the dream world. As he's forced to relive his ill-fated drowning way back in Camp Crystal Lake. He's even reduced to the scared child that he is, with Freddy going so far as to rip off Jason's hockey mask and calling him an ugly piece of shit. Not just that, but before his first fight with Freddy begins, the latter yells him while he's disguised as Jason's mother, ranting about how disappointed "she" is that Jason didn't stop killing. Poor Jason even gasps in shock, thinking that he really did disappoint Pamela. Making his mother proud of him has been his driving purpose as a mass serial killer, so hearing these words must have broken his heart, before he realized that Freddy was just using his mother's image to trick him into killing people.
  • Gibb is treated badly by her boyfriend, becomes depressed by his death, and then is subjected to an Attempted Rape at the same time that Freddy is tormenting her in the dream world.
  • Linderman is repeatedly harshly mocked by Kia when he tries to comfort his crush Lori, gets force-fed beer by several bullies as bystanders laugh at him, and then has a somber Dying Alone moment.
  • Mark had to watch Freddy drive his beloved brother to suicide and spends four years being unwillingly institutionalized, while being kept from having any contact with his parents. Even his friends think he's crazy. When he finally gets out, he has a My God, What Have I Done? moment upon realizing he is playing right into Freddy's hands, before being subjected to a particularly brutal attack by Freddy.

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