Pamela Voorhees

"Kill her mommy, kill her! Don't let her get away mommy, don't let her live. Kill her mommy, kill her. She can't hide, no place to hide. Get her mommy, get her!"

- Mrs. Pamela Voorhees as her son.

Pamela Voorhees (born. 1930 - died. June 13 1979) was a female serial killer and the main antagonist of the original "Friday The 13th" from 1980 by well known director Sean S. Cunningham. During the original film she was known as simply Mrs. Voorhees. She is the mother of Jason Voorhees, whose drowning death as a child drove her to murder those who she deemed responsible.

Mrs. Voorhees liked to terrorize her victims by propping up dead bodies and throwing them through windows, also using various weapons to get the job done.

She was portrayed by the late Betsy Palmer, who reprised her role briefly in the 1981 sequel "Friday The 13th Part II".

Friday the 13th
In the original "Friday The 13th" Mrs. Voorhees was responsible for the murders at Camp Crystal Lake. In 1957 a young boy known as Jason Voorhees drowns in the lake of Camp Crystal while two Camp counselors named Barry and Claudette sneak away to make love and not pay any attention to the mentally disabled Jason, son of the camp cook, Pamela Voorhees. After Jason drowns, the two try to sleep together again only for Pamela to catch them in the act. As revenge for her son's death, which would have been prevented had they been looking after him, she murders the two with a machete.

After the murders, the Camp is closed and appropriately nicknamed "Camp Blood" by the locals. Later while attempting to re-open the camp, Pamela poisoned the water and set cabins on fire to prevent it. In 1979 Steve Christy re-opened the camp with the help of his friend Alice Hardy. Friends of Alice; Ned, Jack, Brenda, Marcie, and Bill came to help. Also Annie, another camper, hitchhikes to the camp by getting a ride in Mrs. Voorhees's Jeep CJ. However, when Annie realizes that Voorhees has no intention of driving her to the camp, she jumps out of the speeding vehicle only for Mrs. Voorhees to stop and chase her into the woods where she corners her by a tree and slashes her throat with a bowie knife. In the time following, Pamela Voorhees stalked the counselors and killed them all, although she wasn't revealed as the culprit until the film's climax.

She killed Ned by slitting his throat. She killed Jack (played by Kevin Bacon) by grabbing his head and forcing an arrow through the back of his neck, piercing through his throat and killing him. Marcie was killed when Mrs. Voorhees slams a felling axe into her face. Brenda came outside to close the windows on her cabin when she hears what seems to be a child's voice calling for help. She is lured onto an archery range where Mrs. Voorhees kills her off-screen. Steve Christy came back and was greeted by getting stabbed in his stomach. After Alice and Bill investigate, Alice sleeps while Bill heads out to the generator room. Bill gets killed by slitting his throat and pinning his body with arrows. When Alice came back to the Camp as the only survivor, she panicked after finding Bill pinned through the door with arrows. Realizing that everyone was dead, she barricades the main cabin, while in the process finding Brenda thrown through one of the windows. After Mrs. Voorhees throws her corpse, she drives into the camp, having Alice thinking it's Steve that comes. She is greeted by Mrs. Voorhees, who began telling Alice about the story of young Jason who drowned.

"Did you know that a young boy drowned, the year before those two others were killed? The councilors weren't paying any attention, they were making love while that young boy drowned. I was working the day that it happened, preparing meals here. I was the cook. His name was Jason. He wasn't a very good swimmer. Jason should have been watched..every minute! See Jason was my son and today is his birthday. My sweet Jason, my only child. My sweet, innocent, Jason. You let him drown! You never paid any attention! Look what you did to him! Look what you did to him!"

- Mrs. Voorhees to Alice Hardy, preparing to kill her

Suddenly, when Mrs. Voorhees pulls out her bowie knife from her holster (hidden under her sweater), Alice realized that she was the killer. She attacks Mrs. Voorhees with a fireplace poker before fleeing. Mrs. Voorhees soon finds her again and they fight once more. After Alice supposedly kills her with a frying pan, she appears and attacks Alice with a machete. The two struggle, with Mrs. Voorhees trying to overwhelm Alice. While Alice frees herself and gains control, she decapitates Mrs. Voorhees with her own machete, she then pushes a canoe out onto the lake and falls asleep in it. Having her son Jason Voorhees witnesses the demiese of his own mother, he takes the corpse of his mother, including her head and her machete. He brings it into a custom-made shack that he has been inhabiting in, onto an altar with her sweater and the machete placed onto the altar, with Jason now seeking revenge for his mother's beheading.

Aftermath
Mrs. Voorhees was portrayed by Betsy Palmer, in which soon became even more famous though to her role, however her character does not return in the sequel (since the character was decapitated). In Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981), Jason tracks down Alice and places her head in her refrigerator, before killing Alice with an ice pick after finding her head. Later in 1984, the altar was first seen by a policeman, before killed with a hammer. During when Ginny flees from Jason Voorhees, she finds her remains on the altar in his shack. Betsy Palmer reappears in a distraction hallucination while Ginny (wearing her clothes) uses her psychology skills to convince Jason that she is his mother.

In Friday the 13th Part III (1982), Pamela Voorhees was in a dream hallucination from Chris Higgins, in which she grabs Chris from behind a canoe and drags her into the water. In Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter (1984), Mrs. Voorhees's tombstone is seen.

In Freddy vs. Jason (2003), Freddy Krueger appears as Pamela Voorhees in order to convince Jason to help him murderer the residents of Elm Street. In 2003, Betsy Palmer was asked to reprise her role in Freddy vs. Jason, but she turned it down due to how the role part was too small.

Remake Timeline
Pamela makes a small cameo at the beginning of the 2009 remake of Friday the 13th, in which she is seen chasing female camp counselor and explains to the woman about Jason. When Pamela is about to kill the counselor, she is decapitated by the counselor. Jason was later revealed to have never really drowned and attempts to avenge her mother by killing anyone who enters Camp Crystal Lake. As an adult, Jason kidnaps a woman named Whitney Miller and keeps her as a prisoner due to her bearing resemblance to Pamela.

Trivia

 * Betsy Palmer was interviewed about the role in the documentary's "His Name Was Jason" (2009) and "Return To Crystal Lake" (2003).
 * In 2004 Sideshow Collectibles released an 12" action figure of Pamela Voorhees. This highly detailed figure comes with an axe, a hunting knife, a machete and a bow and arrow.
 * An action figure of Pamela Voorhees was also released in "NECA Friday The 13th 25th Anniversary Box Set" together with a Part II Jason figure.
 * Debbie Loomis from the film Scream 2 and Roy Burns from the film Friday the 13th Part V: A New Beginning share a few similarities to Pamela