***"Carrie" vs. Jason with a subpar script***

Released in 1988, "Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood" takes place about ten years after the previous film, which explains its title "The New Blood": Tommy Jarvis is no longer in the picture and there's a new set of youthful blood for Jason to spill. This installment is the second to feature Jason as an inhuman rotting corpse and the F/X of Jason at the end are great. The highlight of Part VII is the inclusion of a Carrie-like heroine with mental powers who squares off against Jason at the end. We also get Terry Kiser as Tina's therapist, Dr. Crews. If you're not familiar with Mr. Kiser, he played the charismatic preacher in 1968's "Rachel, Rachel" in the mind-blowing Pentecostal service sequence.

Although my title blurb describes this segment as "Carrie vs. Jason," it's the same Friday the 13th formula, but with a protagonist who has Carrie-like abilities. The script is weak however and needed tweaked to work out the kinks, which makes it the weakest in the series next to Part III (and the last act of Part IX).

This entry features a quality collection of females, which the franchise is renowned for, but the creators failed to milk them for their potential, so to speak (and I don’t mean nudity or sleaze since the movie has a little bit of both). For instance Jane (Staci Greason) and Robin (Elizabeth Kaitan) are the top women, but not enough is done with them. Jane’s role is too brief as she’s the first to buy the farm while Robin eventually has some quality screen time, but the director fails to truly capture her beauty. For those who care, the attractive Sandra (Heidi Kozak) has a brief skinny dipping scene. Meanwhile Melissa (Susan Jennifer Sullivan) is decent, but she’s depicted as such a biyatch you almost WANT her to die.

As far as locations go, Part VII was shot in Southern Alabama, just northeast of Mobile, with bits done in Southern Cal (e.g. the house where Robin is killed is in Topanga).

BOTTOM LINE: Part VII is another retread of the same Friday formula with the distinction of the protagonist having psycho-kinetic powers and, like the previous film, Jason is now totally inhuman, an infernal monster. In addition, the climax is the best yet, featuring the "Carrie" vs. Jason fight and a spectacular explosion. Unfortunately Part VII fumbles the ball a little in regards to its subpar depiction of the women. Worst of all, the script is amateurish like Part III. Nevertheless, it's a fairly entertaining installment that thankfully lacks the camp of III, V and VI.

NOTE ABOUT THE ENDING (***SPOILER***): No, the corpse of Tina's Dad was not left in the lake for ten years, the original ending made it clearer that her Dad's body coming out of the lake was a product of Tina's mind powers, although the long chain was real. Of course, this doesn't explain why Jason's corpse was still in the lake early in the film, but I suppose we could chalk that up to the curse that was on Crystal Lake and the fact that no one in their right mind would want to visit that part of the lake (near "Camp Blood") by this point in the series.

The film runs 88 minutes.

GRADE: C