If Jason Still Haunts You, You're Not Alone

I like to revisit these movies around Springtime because it was during this season in 2003 that I saw them for the first time. All of them... horribly...one...by one. This was when DVDs were like crack cocaine and every piddly paycheck was put towards at least a couple discs. As the story goes (that I've told many times) despite growing up as an avid Fango fan I actually missed out on a lotta the popular Horror series, and then suddenly earning my own income + new affordable technology in home entertainment paved the way for the bloody binge on which I was about to embark: Elm Streets, Hellraisers, Halloweens, Chainsaws, and Friday the 13ths. 

"Binge" is a key word when it comes to assessing the experience - particularly with the F13 movies. Watching them all that closely together (up to Part 9 which was the newest disc available to me at the time) made for a pretty pleasant and cohesive venture (despite the bizarre continuity hiccups from film to film). It's not exactly one big story arc as much as it is a cute lil' bump in the road; my big takeaway to this day is I don't know how anyone endured the dullness of each individual movie as they were being released without the safety net of being able to jump right into the next one. The anticipation of something interesting happening is what got me through, and that really only paid off in stale breadcrumbs along the way. 

So, when I say I "revisit" them on an annual basis that means I "throw them on" for approximately 12 nights in a row and engage in other activities, set to Harry Manfredini's sputtering score, occasionally glancing up to see a tree or a boob or a machete - basically paying as much attention as a Crystal Lake Camp Counselor back in '58. After all, I know them all as well as I'm ever going to know them - which is to say sorta peripherally. I just finished up my most recent return to Camp Blood and I did try to invest a little more focus into each film, hoping for some kinda epiphany regarding their cumulative awesomeness. Did I experience an "aha! moment"? Let's review...

- Paul

Friday the 13th (1980)

It pulls most of its strength from its whodunnit premise, but the motivations are so abstract that it's hard to get invested. (Obviously after the first viewing it has more meaning.) It also suffers from the same paradox as most of the movies: they force us to hang out with these characters for 80 minutes while they do nothing but exchange dialogue and we still manage to not care or know anything about them. Truly some existential wizardry right there. But I suppose I didn't come here for consistent storytelling or David Mamet discourse -- I'm out for blood, skinny dipping, and maybe some origin/mythology crap to create a mild sense of immersion for what's to come. It delivers on roughly 60% of those elements, and so...

Grade: D

This is certainly one "original" in a franchise that completely folds under the weight of all that came after. Even as a "Violent Slasher Flick" it has almost nothing to offer; you definitely can't call it "tame by today's standards" either, because it played right alongside The Shining, The Fog, Dressed to Kill, Nightmare City, Inferno, Zombie Holocaust, Cannibal Apocalypse, and Cannibal Fucking Holocaust. How a heavily edited split second of Kevin Bacon taking an arrow to the throat shocked audiences in 1980 is beyond me. 

Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981)

The first 10 minutes suggest something a little different (even if 5 of those minutes are just flashbacks from Part One) and it's kinda refreshing and actually suspenseful. Then it literally becomes the same movie as last time - but with a few improvements. Again we don't know who the killer is but now that question mark has a lot more weight to it: maybe it has something to do with the angry mom in Part One? Then of course we quickly learn it's Jason who didn't die(?) when he was a child, now seeking revenge for his mother's death(?). Again, who cares, I'm just here for more gore and a bigger body count. And again, who cares, the final product is missing so many of its makeup effects that the only real massacre we see is the one executed by the MPAA. 

Grade: D+

Some legitimately clever shots, stronger performances, and a couple likable characters help to differentiate all the white noise it borrows from the first one. All of its climaxes (it has a few) are mostly effective, and the reveal of grownup Jason is truly satisfying. 

Friday the 13th Part III (1982)

Finally, some meat on these bones. It's the same setup, same locations, same structure, it's the same goddamn weekend! We're up to like Monday the 16th or something! But now we got Disco music, and biker gangs, and middle-aged stoners, and clumsy 3-D choreography that's awkward with or without paper glasses. Approaching this with fresh eyes, my leading questions would be: Why does Jason look dramatically different overnight, and why does he continue to wear that hockey mask long after the gag has played out? 

Grade: C+

For the first time I start to get a hint of it not taking itself so seriously; there's clearly a lot more intentional comedy being integrated into a lotta scenes - up to & including the final jump scare, which feels like it's mocking the previous films. 

Friday the 13th - The Final Chapter (1984)

What do you get when you add Corey Feldman, Crispin Glover, more nudity, a faster pace, and the return of Tom Savini? More of the same actually. Despite having strong actors in this or any of the previous ones, they're still condemned to play boring characters in a boring movie with a boring story and a boring villain. Again, the kills are compromised for the sake of an R rating, and while those are truly the film's greatest technical achievements, there are really very few merits to fall back on. 

Grade: C-

For most Friday the 13th fans, this truly is "the final chapter" - not only because it's the one where Jason actually dies, but also because of how aesthetically similar it is to the first three movies. Personally I think these first four films could've been condensed into one lean 2 hour Thriller (or should be after the fact).

Friday the 13th - A New Beginning (1985)

Here's where the sequels start to kick in and take advantage of the chance to do something different. Of course, it's not that different but the efforts are obvious: a new mystery, less camping, more comedy, more drama(!), and an Altmanesque ensemble of unique characters that don't all blend into one indiscernible swatch of plaid flannel. 

Grade: B

I compiled a cohesive list once of my favorite things about this movie, but in this context I wanna reiterate how these movies never got the "camping" vibe right for me, and so it was all the more stimulating to watch them lean into the troubled teen Elm Street mood a bit. 

Friday the 13th Part VI - Jason Lives (1986)

For the first time, they truly stopped trying (and failing) to be scary. Exciting, suspenseful, clever, fun - yes to all. And funny! Save for the last 10 minutes I don't think there's a set piece that doesn't end with a punchline. Even the silent, faceless Jason has a personality for the first time. 

Grade: B+

Let's face it, they were never gonna be Halloween. Other movies of this era like The Burning and Sleepaway Camp caught on a lot earlier on how to cut up campers with style. And still, this movie manages to be better than both of those. 

Friday the 13th Part VII - The New Blood (1988)

Still my favorite of the series - that's partly because of that predictable affection that occurs when we choose a "favorite" something, but also for the reasons for which I initially made that choice. Once more, they borrow big from the Nightmare on Elm Street library, and it doesn't feel at all out of place; seven movies in, this franchise earned the right to advance from "campers vs. killer" to "Carrie vs. Zombie".

Grade: B+

Frankly, what could've been a hokey twist turns out to be a Supernatural Action escapade that manages to mute the fact that we're stuck with some of the least interesting characters thus far (as well as the most egregious examples of "edited for content" in the whole franchise). 

Friday the 13th Part VIII - Jason Takes Manhattan (1989)

Hey, have you heard? Most of this movie takes place on a boat! And some of it's in Vancouver! Once you've managed to calm down and change your diaper then you'll be able to see that it's just a plain ol' Friday the 13th movie with censored violence, pretty girls, and a buncha plot points that come from nowhere and lead nowhere. If that's good enough in those stupid woods, then it's good enough on the high seas.

Grade: C+

Kane Hodder continues to give a notably inspired performance as the masked monster, finally giving him the gravitas shared by his fellow movie maniacs. However, this entry attempts to expand on his backstory a bit, and on that front it fails 100%. 

Jason Goes to Hell - The Final Friday (1993)

Instead of annoying fake teens, we get a wild cast of annoying grownups as adults - some of them forced to do their best Jason Voorhees impersonation. Regular Jason is barely present and it's barely noticeable -- the more popular Unrated Version gives us the gore like never before. Who needs a hockey mask when we got zombie heart munching and gooey body melting?

Grade: B-

While it's blessed with a blissfully bonkers story, it often trembles under its heaviness -- especially when it makes us pay attention to boring expository mysticism about demons and magic daggers. That makes it weaker than the others. 

Jason X (2002)

Every F13 movie is shamelessly indicative of the time of its release, and there is no stronger piece of Y2K nostalgia than Jason X. Probably the most obnoxious lineup of victims assembled in nearly any Horror Movie, but added to that, the Jason pre-cyborg human look comes in last place in the series. (Though Über Jason is admittedly kinda neat.)

P. S. If you thought the depiction of New York was too Canadian, you're gonna hate Outer Space.

Grade: D-

Jason escaped Hell for this? Honestly, "Sassy Space Crew" Aliens ripoff is like my least favorite genre of Film, and so this is understandably my least favorite Friday the 13th movie. 

Freddy vs. Jason (2003)

As a Freddy fan first I mostly disregarded Jason's presence in this - and justifiably so: in an attempt to create a better contrast between the two killers, Jason's presented as a slow, dull, Frankenstein's Monster dimwit. Despite his most nuanced and well crafted backstory to date, this is as one dimensional as he's ever been. 

Grade: B

As an Elm Street movie it's Robert Englund's swan song, and it gives him ample room to play the best Freddy Krueger the 21st Century has to offer. Jason was just a name on the poster to fulfill the competition that we'd all been waiting for. 

Friday the 13th (2009)

They spent nearly 30 years trying to find different ways to make this monster hip and interesting, but apparently his entire identity was only ever tied to a piece of protective headgear. Nevertheless, this fast paced, highly inventive, and mostly funny reboot is especially outstanding because The Original (and most of the others) are none of those things. 

Grade: B-

Obviously it couldn't help but be cynical and self aware (and that joke wears thin fast) but its biggest accomplishment is the Jason upgrade we truly needed; far removed from his Michael Myers influence and now in the age of running zombies, lifelong Friday fan Derek Mears doesn't try to recreate any past performances with his Jason, but instead brings a new, vicious, almost scary(!) slasher to the screen. That's definitely a new approach. 

My favorite Nightmare on Elm Street movie is an A+. Same for my favorite Texas Chain Saw Massacre movie, same for my favorite Halloween movie. The highest I can go in this series is a B+, with the entire franchise averaging out at a B-/C+. The whole thing's a pop song with a comfortable amount of radio play. It's a lite snack that you can eat with no commitment, standing in front of the open cupboard. The sorta contradiction is that, on their own, each movie is a bit of a drag (some way draggier than others), so you get a better sense of momentum when you watch them all together, one right after another - except that approach makes all the inconsistencies feel that much more inconsistent. Not that it bothers me too much, I enjoy witnessing the bizarre evolution of the timeline and the "mythology" as different productions bring in different ideas. Frankly I can't imagine how contemporary audiences deal with watching these movies today: how does an MCU fan or especially a STAR WARS fan not lose their goddamn mind over the sheer depth of all these "plot holes"? For me, I think those very contradictions and variables are what give these movies any personality (because it sure ain't the story); every installment is like a reboot of the previous one - a copy of a copy of a copy until it's so abstract that it becomes something original. That's kinda what happened here, and for that they're kind of interesting (or 'entertaining') on another level. But I'm sure of two things: One is I'm probably going to continue watching these without any kind of change in my approach or attitude regarding these films, and Two is that I doubt I'll ever get this cerebral about Friday the 13th ever again. 

12 Treasures from The Hollis Flea Market

I don't know how familiar you are with flea markets - whether or not you've ever been to one, or casually visited a few to get the idea, or if you're legitimately under the impression that they have fleas there. Or, maybe you're like me and spend every Sunday morning of the warm weather season snapping into boiled wieners while wading through broken bowling trophies and flipping through faded Linda Ronstadt records. And if you're even further like me still, you had your 'usual' flea market, the one you visited most and simply became known as The Flea Market. For me, that's The Hollis Flea Market in Hollis, New Hampshire. And in February of 2024 during the off season, they quietly announced on social media that they were closed forever. 

 

In my lifetime I've witnessed the collapse of retail outlets, restaurants, mom & pop stores, entire malls, movie theaters, drive-in theaters, hotels, amusement parks, even playgrounds, but a flea market - as in The Flea Market - seemed too abstract to ever be in any real danger from the nondescript bureaucracy that's gradually been boarding up the windows of my life. But, it happened, and even though I've yet to fully confront the pain of this loss, it still hurts far worse than the absence of all the other aforementioned places (which is probably why my subconscious has yet to allow me to deal with it as a reality). I'm not being cute or dramatic, this was like the death of a loved one; I'd been attending The Hollis Flea Market since before I can remember and it came with only good experiences and happy memories. (How many things in your life can you say that about?) During whatever was going on in my life, whatever problems I was dealing with, whatever phase of interests I was going through, that real estate remained the same; despite the timeliness of the junk upon the tables and the tarps, it never felt like any specific year - there was no architecture or technology to indicate anything other than postwar Americana, and all the hubcaps and broken blenders and Stephen King paperbacks and Darth Maul headphones and Tickle Me Elmos congealed into a dusty mosaic that was always in motion yet remained a constant. Like that giant storm on Jupiter.

 

I can't get too specific about my experiences there or how it's left me feeling, because one, as cathartic as writing this is, the wound hasn't even become a scar yet and I'm not fully braced for the impact, and two, as I've asserted time and time again: nostalgia is nontransferable (and the same goes for grief actually). So instead of boring you with my woes any further, let's look at some shit. 

Below are 12 items I rescued from The Hollis Flea Market over the course of nearly 40 years. Not all of them are the best of even the most important purchases I made there but each one provides a chapter in a much larger story that will serve as a sentimental journey for myself, and also illustrate the more universal experience of walking up & down dirty aisles in the blazing sun, looking for gold (and broken Happy Meal toys). 

- Paul

California Raisins AM/FM Radio

I bought this just in the past few years, and I point that out not to call attention to a grown-ass man owning a novelty radio with bendy arms from 1988, but to say that even through the lens of adult eyes I wasn't able to talk myself out of getting it. I'm a lot more practical and a lot less impulsive as a grownup, but I experienced only a brief moment of indecision before I consciously admitted I couldn't live without this maroon plastic idol. I don't even think the radio part is functional, but unless it solely plays Motown songs I ain't interested. 

Biker Babe Wooden Plaque

This could've come from so many damn places: a carnival, a head shop, an auto garage -- and what life did it lead in whatever dorm room or bar or basement in which it lived? At any rate it found its way to the flea market (big surprise) and its smutty kitschiness caught my eye and tickled a chuckle out of me. It would've ended there but I was faced with two aggressive salesmen who sensed my mild merriment and decided to shoot their shot. My polite response was "Oh I'm sure my wife would be mad if I came home with that!" which was a lie on several levels. They backed off with a level of condescension that shouted "Guess we know who wears the pants in that relationship." Looks like I showed them. 

Batman Returns Movie Storybook

Scanning and scouring and digging is often how you find the best stuff - sometimes the only stuff. But there are those cases where every item on a table seems to speak directly to you. This instance wasn't that far-fetched, it was a youngish hipster couple unloading a bunch of their childhood and so our nostalgias lined up a bit. Trouble with that is when people have to part with stuff they're probably still attached to, the prices go up. I don't recall missing out on anything that made me feel deprived, and this maybe had partially been a pity purchase. Still, I'm always intrigued to find different perspectives on the evolution of Selena Kyle into Catwoman. (Unlike a lot of the more juvenile adaptations, this one actually does make mention of getting pushed out of a window by Chris Walken.)

Judy Collins CDs

Do you ever plan your nostalgia? I do. I revel and explore and swim around in it enough that I know how to make today a precious memory at some point in the future. A good way to do that is to embrace and saturate yourself in something new - like, say, a deep dive into the song catalog of Judy Collins. I purposefully bought this CD set as a means to always remember that summer whenever I'd hear any of the songs -- not for any specific reason, it's just good to leave breadcrumbs for yourself throughout the course of your existence. And now here we are, and incidentally a Judy Collins song will forever remind me of this now-defunct flea market. 

Screamin' Jason Model Kit

Around the time I was 9 or 10 years old is when I started getting big into Fangoria Magazine, and within those gruesome pages there would always be at least one full page ad for Screamin' Model Kits featuring stylized photography of Freddy, Jason, Pinhead, et al. as fully assembled and painted finished products. And as beautiful as they were there were two big turnoffs: I'd no interest in model building, and I don't think I could've handled an 18'' Cenobite looming over me as I slept. Nevertheless, during the first summer of my big Fango phase there was a vendor in Hollis selling his fully finished Screamin' Jason Voorhees model: the legs and torso were not attached, the strap on the mask was broken, and the cardboard machete was no longer a threat to anybody. Even after supergluing the two halves together he still struggled to stand on his own power; he certainly wasn't scary and he was tough to love, but it felt so cool and grown-up having him in my room. Today all that's left is this instruction manual for this model I didn't build. 

Fangoria #110

Speaking of! Flea markets are usually synonymous with nice weather (there are indoor options but that's an entirely different animal), but if you start too early or go too late in the season, the mood (and the weather) can be very different. I recall one very grey, sorta chilly, sorta damp Sunday in the middle of October in the early 2000s, which was most likely their last day of the business season and frankly I wasn't feeling it - my mentality had already moved onto Fall/October things and this predominately Summertime activity didn't fit in with that. And then like the segments of the Lament Configuration, everything aligned as I happened upon this seasonally appropriate periodical. It doubles as one of my favorite flea market memories and Halloween Season memories. 

Gremlins 2 Topps Trading Cards

While on the subject of favorite memories, there are few that are as magical as this. Someone, for some reason, was selling an entire box of unopened Gremlins 2 trading cards -- that's 36 packs of cards, folks. This was probably a little over a year after the movie's 1990 release and miraculously (or maybe understandably) someone was dumping these cards at a price that was cheap enough to meet my allotted spending money. A whole box of packs? I felt rich; each pack was like a bar of gold. At that point I was only mildly into the Gremlins scene but I did have a taped VCR-to-VCR copy that I borrowed from my cousin, and so the rest of that afternoon was spent opening packs while Gremlins 2 played on the TV. I amassed the entire set from that box and by the end of the day I was a fan for life.

Hopalong Cassidy Cereal Spoon

This was actually a purchase made for my son who had graduated to big boy silverware but our regular teaspoons were still too heavy and cumbersome. Frankly they're too heavy and cumbersome for me also - conquering a bowl of Coco Krispies doesn't require a utensil that could summon the power of Greyskull. So if there's a situation where we both need a spoon I will be the adult and concede - ultimately we'll both ingest the same amount of mercury or lead or whatever the hell this Baby Boomer relic is made out of. 

Pewter Figurines

When I was 11 or 12 (probably both) my biggest (if not singular) hobby was collecting these little bejeweled pewter statues. Any money I could accumulate went towards these, and the rest of the time was spent begging my parents to financially support this habit. These could sometimes be found in greeting card stores or fancy gift shops in malls, but during the brief period of my life that I dedicated to these trinkets, there was a table - a display - consistently set up at Hollis every Sunday morning. The little statues were arranged on shelves that ascended like stairs and draped in a fancy teal linen that made it look like a carpeted entrance to a castle. The price range was a slippery slope - smallish ones could be around $10 while a slightly larger one could be $40, so there were many variables when it came to choosing. I acquired so many little dragons and wizards and sword-wielding skeletons in that short span of time -- and roughly ten years later I set up my own table at The Hollis Flea Market and sold a large portion of my collection. The regret of that impulse decision haunts me more with each passing year. 

Beethoven and Chopin Busts

I'd wanted a heavy duty bust of Beethoven ever since I was a kid and noticed one prominently featured in A Clockwork Orange as well as in Hershey's 5th Avenue commercials. The closest I got was when I was a teenager I had a rubber one that sang "Roll Over Beethoven" when you pressed a button. Cut to decades later when I finally find one that appears to be made of stronger stuff - ignoring the fact that it's roughly 5'' tall I still consider it to be pretty perfect. It was also one of those situations where the seller didn't wanna break up the "set" so I got stuck with a Chopin too. I used to feel like it compromised the purity of the single Beethoven statue, but now clearly they both have significance. 

Schaefer Beer Sign

There's a feeling you get when you've reached that point where you've seen just about everything and it's almost time to go and couldn't find anything to your liking. In that situation it's not uncommon to panic and buy the last object you spot before you leave and so you end up driving home with a pair of rusty gardening shears with only one blade or a novelty shot glass from Atlantic City. I found myself in one such instance where I'd given up and accepted defeat, and when I did walk past this beer sign it certainly did pique my interest, and had I just arrived there or had I found a buncha neat stuff already then that interest would've faded by the time I got to the car. But instead it ended up being my trophy for the day and has lived in my bathroom ever since. 

The Beatles White Album Poster

Yes I've discussed it several times before, and consider this a guarantee (or threat) that I can't stop/won't stop. It was June of 1997 and I had like a week of 8th Grade left so I was in a fairly decent mood that Sunday. It could've possibly been the first Hollis trip of the season, and just like the summer before, I was on the hunt for Beatles stuff! In the days before online shopping it was tough to come by memorabilia for a Rock Group from the 60s; the vinyl industry had only just collapsed so finding records was like discovering The Pyramids, and at any flea market that was always my safest bet in finding anything Beatle-related. But this was way better than some moldy, sun-bleached Sgt. Pepper -- a poster that I was intellectually familiar with from books I'd read, and portions of it were included in my compact disc version of "The White Album" but truly I wanted the real thing: to own it, to experience it. And I guess I just inherently knew the imagery well enough to spot it out of the corner of my eye from several aisles over, held up on the side of a van with some fridge magnets. I don't know what the cost was or what my financial situation was in the moment - all I knew is that I'd just spent two months building a research paper on the Lincoln Assassination that was just a few days away from its due date and I consciously had the thought that I would've set that paper on fire if it meant I could have this poster. It didn't come to that (I don't know who would've benefited from such a transaction) but it was no fleeting fancy; it's still one of my most precious physical possessions. 

STATIC SHOTS

Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood

STATIC SHOTS

It Came From FANGORIA ep. 7

10 Weird Weapons from 1993

Who are you trying to get crazy with, ése? If you weren't raised in the streets of '93 you at least claimed you were. Fact or fib you better had made damn sure you didn't find yourself in the jungle with just your dick in your hand. Fortunately there was enough ferocious firepower at your fingertips to fend off these fools who didn't know what was up. Here are 10 implements of destruction that were sure to keep you safe from that gangsta lean.

- Paul

The Voorhees Dagger

Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday

Who knew Friday the 13th was rooted in Fantasy Adventure? Like any mystical artifact with magic powers, there are rules:

1. Be Jason's niece.

2. Stab him.

It has the power to piss off fans of an already goofy ass film series and kill a franchise (for approximately 8 years). 

Nerf Arrowstorm Gatling

Tonka/Hasbro

Nerf was all about the balls forever. But when it could no longer be ignored that kids were just beating the shit out of each other with the bats the next logical phase was soft yet imposing weaponry. I played Deliverance many a time with this bad boy. 

Bob-omb

Super Mario Bros.

Actual professional critics now incorporate "fan service" as a legitimate term of critique into their "reviews." Fuck them and the state of everything. Nevertheless, this was a heavy moment in the '93 Mario movie because we all, for a couple seconds, were able to understand what the hell was going on. 

O'Bannion's paddle

Dazed and Confused

You ever get the sense that this is exactly what Ben Affleck was like in High School and that's why he's so great in this? Not to put my own brand of damper on whatever acting ability he has but the spectrum of his range is between this and then everything else he's done. 

Vega's claw

Street Fighter II Turbo

The simplicity of Street Fighter is that it's all hands and fists - save for the occasional Hadoken or Shoryuken here and there. Enter Vega: the Spanish kickboxing crossbreed of Freddy and Jason who isn't hesitant about climbing a chainlink fence to utilize the force of gravity to stab his opponents in the head. He was a favorite.

Plastic gun

In The Line of Fire

I didn't have any real strong political leanings of my own when I was 10, but man I wanted so badly to assassinate somebody with this cunning little pistol. Even cooler that the bullets had to be hidden in a rabbit's foot keychain so I'd have to covertly load it during some black tie event. Someday *fingers crossed*.

Lightsabers

Hot Shots! Part Deux 

Any year that has lightsabers is gonna find its way onto any hypothetical weapons list I make. Although this choice heightened my awareness to the fact that the Naked Gun and Hot Shots! movies are largely comprised of turning silly and ordinary things into ammunition. This narrowly beat out the chicken arrow.

Homemade crossbow

The Good Son 

Actually just some kinda bolt gun which I thought was rad; Macaulay was so close to being the friend I'd always wanted, minus the constant sororicide and animal executions. But I did want a gun that wasn't an actual gun but actually did some damage so this woulda worked out splendidly. 

Hydro-Sat 3000 Z

Boy Meets World

Really it was just a Super Soaker because not even Mariah Carey was as popular as Super Soakers in '93. And I find it kinda wholesome that the most popular toy of the time was a candy colored water gun, free of any realistic implication of violence. Still though, TGIF didn't have the dinero to use the "Super Soaker" name. 

Toilet tank cover

True Romance

Everyone talks about how badass Patricia Arquette is in this scene, but Gandolfini took 10 pounds of porcelain to the skull and got back up just to eat some flames. Quentin likes to point out how thrilled he was that the cover didn't break on impact, making it the most brutal and realistic act of violence in this whimsical bloodbath of a movie.