From the cult classic, The Burning, here's Cropsy! This movie took the formula from Friday the 13th (released one year after F-13th) and perfected it into the ideal summer camp slasher movie - y'know with your typical oversexed teenagers getting their heads clipped by an iconic killer! Before turning homicidal, Cropsy was just a mean old drunk caretaker at a summer camp. One night, some of the camp counselors decided to get even with Cropsy, and prank him with a flaming skull. Rather than getting their desired frightening yet harmless result, they accidentally cause an enormous fire, engulfing Cropsy’s cabin, leaving him badly burned and presumed dead. Cropsy survives of course and makes his return from the hospital as a hideously deformed madman wielding a razor sharp pair of hedge-clippers.
At the time, Friday the 13th was heavily censored, meaning most of the gore effects weren’t present in most versions of the film. The horny teenager trope hadn’t really been fully developed and Jason isn’t even introduced to the series until the sequel and didn’t have his hockey mask until the third. And yet Friday the 13th somehow became ingrained as the summer camp slasher film everyone thinks of when they mention this genre. Despite being pretty much completely forgotten by mainstream horror fans, The Burning had laid the groundwork for what the slasher genre would eventually become.
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