TV Article Friday the 13th By Chris Nashawaty Chris Nashawaty Chris Nashawaty is a former senior writer at Entertainment Weekly. He left EW in 2019. EW's editorial guidelines Published on February 4, 2009 05:00AM EST Originally hatched as a cheap Halloween knock-off, Friday the 13th has become as unkillable as its resident bogeyman Jason Voorhees (a 12th installment hits theaters next week). The cast of randy camp counselors was never the reason for the film’s success — the only familiar face is Kevin Bacon, who’s speared through the neck pretty early on (oh, yeah, spoiler alert!). The real draw is makeup F/X man Tom Savini, the Michelangelo of mayhem. This uncut version (with a slew of making-of EXTRAS) restores about 10 seconds of his gory handiwork, snipped to get an R rating. B+