Jason X: To the Third Power

Lore & Background

The plot follows wealthy businessman Jackson Mansfield, who has his protégé Free Jefferson hire five specialists to build a cybernetic lifeform on Elysium, one of the two moons of Earth II. The team includes cyberdesigner Brad Simpson and his girlfriend Lynda Barnes; bioengineers Anyar Signh and Herbert Dearman; and cyber-engineer Skye Fellows, daughter of Doctor Armando Castillo. Their workspace is overseen by a copy of Castillo's A.I. assistant, Major Tom. Twenty years earlier, Castillo's pet project, undead cyborg Jason Voorhees, butchered him and almost everyone else in a government installation, a disaster covered up by the New American Republic. Free and Skye discover through secret logs that Free is the result of an experiment by Professor Claude Bardox on Free's deceased mother, but Free is not Jason's son.

Reader's Guide

The novel is significant as the final entry in Black Flame's Jason X novel series, concluding a narrative arc that mixed horror with science fiction. Author Nancy Kilpatrick was approached by Black Flame and given free rein to write, pending approval by New Line Cinema. She developed the outline after reading previous books in the series. Kilpatrick noted that writing the novel was a personal challenge to see if she could blend science fiction with horror well. Reception was mixed but generally positive: Nat Brehmer responded positively, Louis Fowler called it 'fun' and 'incredibly entertaining,' while Cole Hediger noted the series is more for those seeking action-packed science fiction than traditional horror chills. The novel retcons the death of a character from an earlier book, which Kilpatrick admitted was 'a stretch' due to constraints from the fourth novel.

Did You Know?

• The novel had the working title Jason X: Cubed.
• Author Nancy Kilpatrick was a fan of the Friday the 13th films.
• The novel retcons the death of London Jefferson, a character from the earlier Jason X novel Planet of the Beast.
• Kilpatrick noted that Jason Voorhees is difficult to write because the character does not speak and has 'maybe only one emotion, rage.'