Friday the 13th‘s latest surprise entry gives Jason Vorhees a potential rival that could be the key to expanding the series for a new generation. Jason Vorhees has been slaughtering teenagers as a pop culture fixture for decades, but has not had any fresh cinematic adventures in some time. That’s what makes the Angry Orchard short “Sweet Revenge” so effective.

Bringing back Jason and a new batch of victims, the big feint of “Sweet Revenge” is that it introduces a new character who seemingly becomes a potentially immortal killer like Jason. This is a great concept, setting the stage for a rival to Jason that could help usher in new directions for the long-dormant Friday the 13th franchise.

Friday The 13th’s Sweet Revenge Set Up The Perfect Rival For Jason Vorhees

Friday the 13th‘s “Sweet Revenge” sets up Eve to become a new counterpart to Jason Vorhees, which could be an ideal direction to take the franchise. “Sweet Revenge” is a short film, serving both as an advertisement for Angry Orchard as well as a fresh entry in the Friday the 13th series.

For the most part, the short seems to follow the standard plot of any number of slasher movies, with Jason interrupting a friend’s weekend at a cabin near Crystal Lake. However, things take a turn when the apparent “final girl” of the story, Eve, seemingly becomes a silent but unstoppable killer like Jason.

The short ends with Jason and Eve confronting one another, leaving the fallout of their potential fight to the imagination. It’s a great concept, establishing that Jason isn’t the only unstoppable killer that Crystal Lake could create. It raises plenty of intriguing questions about the lore of this world, but also opens up a lot of possibilities for Eve.

While it’s possible the two could team up or be connected by whatever force reanimated them both, it would be more compelling to see a future Friday the 13th pit the two of them against each other. Their apparently similar abilities and murderous capabilities could make for interesting contrasts in how they operate and fight.

Eve could have the same unstoppable qualities as Jason, making her a unique figure who could withstand any punishment Jason dishes out. While she may not be as big or strong as Jason, her sleeker size and smaller frame could give her a speed and stealth advantage over Jason.

While Jason has always been driven by memories of his mother, Eve’s murderous intent seems to be far more personal. There’s a chance she could want to destroy Jason for killing her fiancé, even just for getting to him before she could. This could make for a very exciting face-off for Jason, fighting an enemy he can’t simply kill.

Even just having the concept of another Jason on the prowl is an exciting development, especially if Jason is given a motivation to hunt down and kill them. Perhaps there can only be one of them at a time, and Jason needs to kill his prospective “replacement” before whatever force reanimates him leaves him.

Friday The 13th Could Have An Ideal Spin-Off Thanks To Eve

Friday the 13th should bring back Eve (or, barring that, a character like her) to help push the series into fresh directions. Giving Jason a genuine rival who is just as dangerous, ᴅᴇᴀᴅly, and unstoppable as he is would make for an interesting take on one of horror cinema’s most iconic killers.

It also raises the prospect of a potential Friday the 13th spin-off, something the series has experimented with in the past but never fully committed to. However, turning the final girl into a new prospective big bad has a lot of potential, giving filmmakers a chance to subvert horror tropes and expectations with a film focusing on this new killer.

Giving someone like Eve a spotlight could shift franchise focus to new locations. While Jason is hard to disguise as anything but a hulking killer, Eve’s relatively normal appearance could allow her to blend more easily into crowds or denser populations. This could give a new Friday the 13th to realize the potential that Jason Takes Manhattan squandered decades ago.

Jason going on the hunt for this new killer could be an easy way to bring the hulking slasher killer to new locations, giving him new types of people to come up against (and hack to pieces). It could be an exciting way to expand the lore of the franchise, exploring more about Jason and Eve’s apparent resurrections.

This could even be a way for Friday the 13th to do their own version of a legacy sequel, introducing a new killer like Jason while not having to necessarily get rid of the original. It’s even possible that Eve or someone like her could star in their own Friday the 13th film, expanding the franchise beyond Jason.

While Eve herself might not return after “Sweet Revenge,” the core idea behind the character and her role in the short is too good to ignore. Characters like Eve open up the floodgates for Friday the 13th‘s future in some exciting ways, especially if it finally gives Jason a worthy adversary.