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The Worst Episodes of Friday the 13th: The Series

Every episode of Friday the 13th: The Series ranked from worst to best. Explore the Worst Episodes of Friday the 13th: The Series!

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Micki and Ryan with the help of their friend Jack try to recover cursed antiques so they can store them in safety inside the antique store's vault.

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#1 Worst Episode
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3.0/10(3 votes)
#1 - The Charnel Pit
S3:E205/26/1990
Micki is sent through a two-way time portal contained within a painting and finds herself at the mercy of the Marquis de Sade.
Director:Armand Mastroianni
Writer:Jim Henshaw
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Director:Armand Mastroianni
Writer:Jim Henshaw
3.3/10(3 votes)
#2 - Midnight Riders
S3:E132/10/1990
Micki, Johnny, and Jack are taking a break, and star-gazing in Jack's old hometown. However, a ghostly biker gang, the Midnight Riders, rolls into town. At the same time, Jack's father Cawley, who has been gone for ten years, also shows up. The gang is out for revenge, as they were falsely accused of raping a girl who lied to protect her reputation and explain the fact she was pregnant. Jack's father was one of the ones who killed the gang and hid the secret. It turns out that Jack's father is also a ghost: he died at sea, but has returned on the anniversary of the gang's death. The girl and the others who participated in the gang's death are killed, and after a brief reunion with his son, Cawley's ghost disappears as well.
Director:Allan Eastman
Writer:Jim Henshaw
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Director:Allan Eastman
Writer:Jim Henshaw
4.5/10(2 votes)
#3 - Cupid's Quiver
S1:E310/17/1987
An unattractive low-life gets hold of a cursed statue of Cupid that allows him to turn women into loving worshippers who fall at his feet. However, he is compelled to kill them in hideous ways once he has his way with them.
Director:Atom Egoyan
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Atom Egoyan
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#4 - The Poison Pen
S1:E210/10/1987
The cousins and Jack track an antique quill pen to a monastery famed for its mysterious prophecies. The pen can be used to make anything written with it come true...at the cost of a human life for each ""wish"" granted. However, the identity of the monk using the pen, and the location of the pen, isn't known. The trio must solve the mystery before it's too late.
Director:Timothy Bond
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Timothy Bond
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#5 - A Cup of Time
S1:E410/24/1987
An antique tea cup decorated with ""borrowers' ivy"" lets the user borrow youth and talent from a victim by taking their life. A senior citizen uses the cup to reinvent herself as a young rock singer, ""Lady Die,"" but a young girl whom the cousins befriend witnesses her kill one of her victims, and is at risk herself.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#6 - Hellowe'en
S1:E510/31/1987
Micki and Ryan throw a Halloween party at the shop to meet the neighbors, but two visitors inadvertently resurrect Uncle Vendredi's spirit. Now totally corrupted by evil, Lewis plans to use the energies on Halloween, the night where evil walks the earth most freely, to resurrect himself once and for all.
Director:Timothy Bond
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Timothy Bond
Writer:Unknown

The 20 BEST Episodes of Friday the 13th: The Series

6.0/10(1 votes)
#7 - Doctor Jack
S1:E711/14/1987
A doctor has obtained the cursed scapel used by Jack the Ripper, and discovers he can use it to kill one victim and miraculously heal one of his patients. His reputation as a miracle worker soon spreads, bringing him to the trio's attention. However, when Jack is injured, the doctor must choose whether to heal his enemy, or ruin his reputation.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Marc Scott Zicree
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Marc Scott Zicree
6.0/10(1 votes)
#8 - Shadow Boxer
S1:E811/21/1987
A cursed set of boxing gloves makes their owner unbeatable in the ring...while his shadow goes out and beats an innocent to death. The trio manage to recover the gloves, but the boxer they stole them from breaks into the shop and hold Micki at knifepoint until he gets them back. To beat him, Ryan has to beat Jack with the gloves so his shadow can defeat the boxer.
Director:Timothy Bond
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Timothy Bond
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#9 - Bedazzled
S1:E142/27/1988
Jack and Ryan recover a cursed lantern from two treasure hunters who use it to recover lost treasure by killing their divers with it. They take it back to the vault and then head off for a convention. The two crooks follow them to the shop and try to recover the lantern from Micki and the neighbor boy that she is babysitting. Micki manages to kill the two, and when Jack and Ryan return and ask what she did, she nonchalantly replied, ""Not much.""
Director:Alexander Singer
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Alexander Singer
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#10 - Brain Drain
S1:E184/30/1988
A dim-wittedd man discovers a cursed trefinator in a museum warehouse: a guillotine-like device that transfers spinal fluid from one individual to another. The cursed item actually transfers intelligence as well, and the man uses it to make himself intelligent by preying upon doctors at the museum. Jack and the others become involved when Jack's old girlfriend and fiancee goes to work at the museum, and is the next target for the trefinator.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#11 - The Quilt of Hathor (1)
S1:E195/7/1988
A cursed quilt, which allows the person underneath it to dream their enemies to death, finds its way into an Amish-like ""Pennitite"" community. A plain woman stumbles upon it and uses it to kill her rivals for the community leader. Ryan attempts to infiltrate the community, and the woman manages to die. Ryan decides to stay with a newfound love, believing that the Quilt of Hathor is destroyed. Little do he and the others know that the quilt was recovered by the community's leader, the father of Ryan's girlfriend, who has his own dark purpose for it.
Director:Timothy Bond
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Timothy Bond
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#12 - Badge of Honor
S1:E237/9/1988
An old boyfriend of Micki's, Tim Ayres, shows up in town, and immediately begins acting suspiciously. Ryan, somewhat jealous, believes that Ayres is working with local counterfeiters. It turns out that Ayres is an undercover cop. Unfortunately, the crook he is tracking killed the wife of Russ Sharko, who has the cursed sheriff's badge of Wyatt Earp, and is using it to kill off criminals vigilante-style. In the end, Ayres and Sharko are both killed and the badge is recovered.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#13 - Bottle of Dreams
S1:E267/30/1988
A mysterious messenger brings a Coptic urn to the store, which bursts open when Micki and Ryan take it to the Vault. The gas from the jar puts them into a trance where they are forced to relive their most horrifying moments over and over until they die. Jack calls upon his friend, a fellow mystic named Rashid, to help him enter their trance and free them. To do so, Jack must both overcome the spirit of Lewis Vendredi, who arranged for the urn's delivery to gain revenge, and confront the spirit of his deceased son.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#14 - Read My Lips
S2:E811/25/1988
Micki's college roommate wants her to be bridesmaid at her wedding. However, the woman's fiancee, a ventriloquist, appears to be going insane. He spends most his time talking to his dummy as if it were a real person. A string of murders in his past are also starting to show up. Ultimately the groom goes insane, but a new ventriloquist takes over the dummy. Since there is no antique ventriloquist dummy in the Manifest, the trio aren't sure what's going on. Ultimately they figure out that the lapel flower is the cursed item in question. Unfortunately, the curse hs finally allowed the dummy to animate itself. Ryan manages to pull the flower from the dummy, rendering it inert once more.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#15 - Night Hunger
S2:E101/14/1989
A young hot rodder is given a gift by Lewis Vendredi: a silver key chain that lets him win car races. However, he has to kill those he races against to get the curse to work. His ultimate goal is to beat his rival, Deacon, and show he's worthy of his abusive father's respect. Micki and Ryan try to get the key chain away from him, but only succeed in crashing the rodder's car...and causing the key chain to enter his heart! Ultimately, the boy's father sacrifices himself to stop his son by ramming him head-on during the final race.
Director:Martin Lavut
Writer:Jim Henshaw
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Director:Martin Lavut
Writer:Jim Henshaw
6.0/10(1 votes)
#16 - Scarlet Cinema
S2:E162/25/1989
An outcast college film student is obsessed with werewolves. Mercilessly teased by frat boys and rejected by the girls, he stumbles upon a cursed movie camera. When he films someone with it, he sees them being killed by a werewolf through the viewfinder. The victim is then actually killed by a mystically summoned werewolf. According to the camera, when the student kills three victims, he will get his fondest wishes. He does so, and becomes a werewolf himself. Ultimaitely, he tracks the trio back to Curious Goods, where they kill him by strangling him with the camera's film...made out of silver nitrate.
Director:David Winning
Writer:Unknown
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Director:David Winning
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#17 - The Mephisto Ring
S2:E174/15/1989
A World Series ring for the infamous Black Sox game allows its owner to predict winning games to gamble on...if the owner puts the ring on a sacrificial victim and condemns them to a gory death. A three-time loser gets hold of the ring left to him by his deceased father, and tries to use it to gain wealth.
Director:Bruce Pittman
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Bruce Pittman
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#18 - A Friend to the End
S2:E184/22/1989
This is essentially two half-episodes. In the first, Micki and Ryan are trying to recover a cursed piece of rock, the Shard of Medusa, from a sculptress. Using it, she can kill a victim and transform them into a prize-winning piece of art. The cousins fail to get the Shard, and the sculptress escapes. In the second half, Micki's visiting nephew J.B. stumbles upon a haunted house and befriends a young boy, Ricky, who is living there. It is revealed that Ricky's parents were Satanists who bought a cursed childs' coffin from Lewis Vendredi. The coffin can resurrect a child, but at the cost of an adult's life. Ricky is revealed to be a ghost, and tries to claim Micki's life. J.B. persuades him not to out of their friendship, and Ricky passes away for good.
Director:David Morse
Writer:David Morse
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Director:David Morse
Writer:David Morse
6.0/10(1 votes)
#19 - The Butcher
S2:E194/29/1989
While Micki and Ryan are on vacation, Jack has nightmares of his World War II experience when he was captured by the Nazis and nearly killed by Rausch, a commandant known as The Butcher. The Butcher used a garrotte made of barbed wire to kill his victims. Jack was saved by the rest of his battalion then, but now in the modern day his surviving friends are being killed off one by one with a barbed-wire garrotte. It turns out that an escaped Nazi, Mueller, is using a mystic talisman, the Amulet of Thule, to resurrect Rausch. Rausch, masquerading as a right-wing radio talk-show host named Walden, is seeking revenge on Jack and the others. Although the Amulet is not an antique, Jack must recover it to defeat Rausch and send him back to the grave.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#20 - The Prophecies (1)
S3:E110/7/1989
Part one of this two-parter features Jack travelling to Marie-Mere in France on the trail of a cursed tome, Lucifer's Bible. The town is a holy site, with a fountain that cures the sick and dying. However, a priest of Satan, Asteroth, has the Bible and is using it to fulfull a series of prophecies that will culminate with the arrival of Satan on Earth. Meanwhile, Ryan is re-united with his mother, and the two deal with the death of his brother years ago over which Ryan is still guilty. The episode ends with Jack knocked through a window and put into a coma after a confrontation with Asteroth.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#21 - The Prophecies (2)
S3:E210/7/1989
Micki and Ryan get word of Jack's injury at the end of the preceding episode. They travel to Marie-Mere with Johnny Ventura to investigate and try to recover Lucifer's Bible. Asteroth uses the Bible to take control of Ryan, who must then kill an innocent child to fulfill the final prophecy that signifies Satan's arrival upon Earth. Ultimately, Jack recovers and he, Micki and Johnny manage to thwart Asteroth. However, the ritual turns Ryan into a 10-year old permanently. He leaves with his mother, and Johnny takes his place.
Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Unknown
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#22 - Hate On Your Dial
S3:E711/18/1989
Johnny inadvertently screws up when he sells a box of junk to a retarded neighbor without checking the Manifest. A cursed antique car radio is among the items sold. The retarded man's brother, a car repairman and a racist, discovers that the radio can be used to travel back in time when smeared with a murdered victim's blood. He plans to travel back to the 50's in the South and prevent his father from being arrested and killed on murder charges, by killing the black lawyer his father tried to kill. Johnny and Jack, holding on to the car during the racist's second trip, travel back in time with him and manage to stop him. Ultimately, the racist ends up being burned at the stake by his father and other KKK members, who mistakenly think he is working with the black civil rights lawyer he was trying to kill.
Director:Allan Eastman
Writer:Unknown
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Director:Allan Eastman
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#23 - Year of the Monkey
S3:E111/27/1990
The trio track a cursed tea set to a samurai, Musashi: an honorable man, but one who refuses to give them the antique unless they aid him in recovering a mystical set of oriental monkey statues (which represent See No Evil, Hear No Evil, Speak No Evil). A wealth Japanese industrialist, Tanaka, has them, and they reward his honorable behavior with success in business. Now he is almost ready to die, and the magic of the statues require that he use them to test the honor of his three children to see which one will inherit. Each monkey gives a child magical powers, but the two sons abuse their power and fail to act honorably. Forced to choose seppuku (ritual suicide) they refuse, and the monkey statues then kill them. each death further reinvigorates Tanaka. The daughter passes her test, but is then required to use the statues to kill her father. She refuses, and kills herself. Musashi then confronts his old friend Tanaka and tricks him into killing the unarmed samurai. Having acted dishon
Director:Rodney Charters
Writer:R. Scott Gemmill
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Director:Rodney Charters
Writer:R. Scott Gemmill
6.0/10(1 votes)
#24 - Repetition
S3:E142/17/1990
In this unusual episode, none of the main characters appear except Micki very briefly at the beginning and end. A newspaper columnist accidentally hits a young girl who was wearing a cursed cameo. The silhouette starts harping at him in the young girl's voice to free her by killing someone else. The columnist then kills his ambitious, obsessive mother which frees the girl...but then the mother's voice starts haunting him. He kills a homeless man to bring her back to life, but then is haunted by that man's voice. Ultimately the columnist tries to reverse the curse by killing his mother and then the girl again, and ends up killing himself. At the end, a social worker stumbles across the locket and turns it over to Micki.
Director:William Fruet
Writer:Unknown
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Director:William Fruet
Writer:Unknown
6.0/10(1 votes)
#25 - The Long Road Home
S3:E152/24/1990
In the first few minutes, Micki and Johnny recover a yin-yang amulet that lets the user switch bodies after killing someone. They steal it from a wife and her lover trying to kill her husband, and manage to escape. But, on the way back they run out of gas and stumble on a home lived in by two brothers. The brothers are psychopaths who have stuffed their family to keep around the house, and they want Micki. Johnny breaks his leg, but uses the amulet to switch places with the younger brother. He eventually convinces Micki of who he is, and they eventually manage to restore Johnny to his original body. The younger brother is killed, and the other dying brother uses the amulet to inhabit the stuffed body of one of his family members. However, Micki and Johnny manage to puncture enough holes in the animated body that all the stuffing is blown out by the high winds of a storm.
Director:Allan Kroeker
Writer:Carl Binder
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Director:Allan Kroeker
Writer:Carl Binder

Worst Episodes Summary

"The Charnel Pit" is the worst rated episode of "Friday the 13th: The Series". It scored 3/10 based on 3 votes. Directed by Armand Mastroianni and written by Jim Henshaw, it aired on 5/26/1990. This episode scored 0.3 points lower than the second lowest rated, "Midnight Riders".