Sean Cunningham owns everything related to Jason except his name and his origin. Oh, is that all?
Cunningham told CNN: “I think for sure [Jason] will come back. [Edit: He *always* comes back.] But I can’t tell you it will come back this year or next. Will Jason come back in the theaters? Right now, it is 50-50.”
Okay, until Cunningham and Victor Miller can come to an agreement, though, what could Cunningham conceivably do with his portion of the franchise? We’ve already explored what Miller could do, and it turns out to be quite a bit. What are Cunningham’s options? Simply, he owns Jason, but if he does a movie with Jason, he cannot *call* him Jason. He can put the hockey mask on him. He can use the title FRIDAY THE 13TH. He can have Jason hack away at as many horny teenagers as he wants. But would the audience accept a Jason movie wherein Jason is never named?
I think, actually, yes. They would. It wouldn’t be easy, but it could be done. Think about SHAZAM, where the lead character goes through the entire movie without a name. (His name, for those who don’t know, isn’t Shazam. That’s the magic word he utters to activate his powers. The superhero’s name is Captain Marvel, but of course that name is now copyrighted to Marvel Comics.) In GREYSTOKE: THE LEGEND OF TARZAN they never once uttered the name “Tarzan”. It *can* be done. It would just take a clever script-writer and a little creativity.
