Ever since I was a teenager, Jason Voorhees and I have been late night buds. I had a slew of Friday the 13th films on VHS and I used to watch them fairly often. One of the first jobs I ever wanted was to be a special effects wizard, which started with a desire to build model spaceships for sci-fi flicks and quickly escalated to wanting to learn how to do gore effects for horror movies. Unfortunately, it’s a lot more about computers than latex and squibs these days and my childish dreams of doing the craft have evaporated, but my love for gore cinema never diminished. Needless to say, when NECA added Jason to their “Ultimate” series, I was a happy little Camp Crystal Lake camper.

Damn, this franchise had some great movie posters! In keeping with the previous Ultimate releases, Jason comes in a seemingly enclosed box with a front flap secured by velcro. It opens to reveal a window that shows off the figure and all the accessories. All of the boxes in this series have a sweet bloated VHS sleeve feel to them, which fits the scope of the line beautifully. Did I mention that the illustrated backdrop of the tray is Jason’s open grave? Marvelous! This figure is based off of the franchise’s 6th outing, Jason Lives, which is among my favorites in the series (although it still resides firmly under its successor, Part VII: The New Blood). Jason isn’t f’cking around in this one and kicks things off by punching right through someone’s chest. Classic! Let’s get Jason out of the box and check him out… Ch Ch Ch Ch, Ha Ha Ha Ha.

Hot damn, this is love at first sight! Jason’s outfit is totally faithful to the sixth chapter of his saga and comes all kitted out with his murderin’ tools. The outfit consists of a sculpted button-down shirt, filthy trousers, and a pair of boots for all that stalking. The detail in the sculpted cloth is fantastic with all the appropriate little wrinkles and stitching. The same holds true for the work gloves, which include the sculpted cinch, tailored seams, and texturing that makes them look like unfinished hide. There are some lovely blood stains on his clothes, and I particularly appreciate the ones in places where they’re hard to make out without scrutinizing the figure under the light.

The sculpted belt includes functional sheathes for both his bowie knife and his machete, and his UMSC ammo pouch with the throwing darts sculpted peeking out of the top. Everything looks great here, but I really have to call out the incredible work NECA did on the sheath for the hunting knife, right down to the separate pouch and strap for the sharpening stone. Simply beautiful! Naturally each of the buttons on the belt and ammo pouch are individually painted. I really love this level of craftsmanship.

Moving on to the portrait. Jason actually comes packaged with his mask off, but I started with it on, for obvious reasons. It’s a great recreation of the hockey mask worn in the film and it’s not only removable, but it’s designed to be worn just like the real thing, with soft plastic straps that fit over the head. My only real nitpick with the figure is wondering how it would have looked if the the eye holes were actual holes and not painted in. I think I might have looked neat that way, but what we got is still plenty good.

Under the mask, we can see that spending some time in the dirt, hasn’t done Jason any favors. Man, this is grody. The rotting skin and exposed muscle look like strips of beef jerkey and the portions of the skull peeking through are awesome. I actually own two of this guy, and I plan on displaying him masked and unmasked.

Articulation here is solid, but there aren’t quite as many points as on some of the other figures in this series. Jason has rotating hinges in the shoulders and elbows, and ball joints in the wrists. The legs are ball jointed in the hips and have rotating hinges in the knees and ankles. There’s a ball joint hidden under the shirt, just above the waist, and another in the neck. Some swivels in the thighs and biceps would have been nice, but truth be told, Jason wasn’t the most agile of dudes, and I can get this figure to do most everything I want him to.

Accessories! You get some nice pieces with this figure, but before going on I’ll point out that there is a swappable right hand, designed to hold his cutlery, and mine was a bitch to get on because the peg seems more willing to pull out with the hand. Getting it out was a pain in the ass. In the end, I was able to get the hand on, but I doubt I’ll be swapping them again. The one I removed is designed to hold the fence post, and the swappable hand works just fine for that anyway.

The fence post comes from the beginning of the movie when Tommy and his chum dig up Jason’s corpse. Tommy goes apeshit and rips this post off the fence and stabs Jason with it. Of course, lightning hits it and we all know what a little electricity will do to a corpse, right? Soon Jason is up and at ’em and using the fence post in a particularly great kill. That whole opening sequence really is superb. Some of the best this franchise has to offer. The post that comes with the figure pegs together to make it easier to slide it into the tight grasp of his hands.

Next up you get both the bowie knife and machete. These are nicely sculpted and painted and they fit snugly into their respective sheathes.

I dig the knife a lot, but I can’t imagine not displaying Jason with his machete.

Lastly, you get Jason’s grave marker. A lovely little bonus accessory that will look great displayed in front of the figure.

Jason is another great addition to what is quickly on its way to becoming one of my favorite action figure lines. The sculpt is outrageous, the accessories are on point, and he’s got just the right amount of articulation to make him fun to pose. And with a price tag of about $21, the value vs craftsmanship of this line continues to astonish me. Most importantly, I can finally add Jason to my shelf with Ultimate Leatherface and Freddy figures! Word is that NECA doesn’t have a Michael Myers in the works, but that can’t stop me from dreaming.