With the series picking up a year after the tragedy, Pam’s grief is surrounded by a vivid portrait of the titular small-town and its colourful characters, from the stoic sheriff, Levon Brooks (William Catlett), to his oafish partner, Dorf (Cameron Scoggins), from the bubbly Rita (Joy Suprano) to the “Crazy” Ralph (Nick Cordileone, playing the iconic harbinger-of-doom character from the first two films). There’s also the late Jason’s only friend, Grace (Gwendolyn Sundstrom), a young girl who Pam grows close to as she misses her role as a mother. Angered by how the town has moved on from Jason’s death — a frustration compounded by the re-opening of the summer camp — Pam can’t shake the feeling that her son, whose body was never recovered, is still alive. Moreover, a disastrous chain of events is set into motion when a pair of strangers turn up at her door with questions about her past.

As a character study of a slasher villain, Crystal Lake belongs to a fabulous Linda Cardellini, who balances Pam Voorhees’ duelling personas of sweet mother and psycho killer with aplomb. William Catlett is another standout as the noble sheriff trying both to woo Pam and solve a string of murders, while Devin Kessler also impresses as Levon’s journalist sister, Briana, whose storyline steers the series into paranoid thriller territory.