Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood is the seventh installment in the original Friday the 13th series. It also marked the first appearance of Kane Hodder in the role of Jason Voorhees. The film took in $19.1 million at the domestic box office, making it the fourth lowest grossing entry of the series.

The film was originally hoped to be a clash between Jason Voorhees and Freddy Krueger. Plans fell apart when Paramount Pictures (who held the rights to the Friday the 13th series at the time) and New Line Cinema (who held the rights to the Nightmare on Elm Street films), failed to come to an agreement. The film was made possible when New Line bought the rights to the Friday the 13th series, but did not see release until 2003.

Seven year old Tina Shepard heard her alcoholic father physically abusing her mother. The emotional trauma unlocks Tina's previously latent telekinetic powers, which result in her father's death at the bottom of Crystal Lake. About nine years later, Tina is still struggling with the guilt surrounding the death of her father. Tina's mother, Amanda Shepard (Susan Blu), takes her to the same lakeside residence so that her powers can be studied (and unknowingly exploited) by her psychiatrist, Dr. Crews (Terry Kiser). Dr. Crews begins a series of experiments (verbal assaults) designed to agitate Tina's mental state, forcing her powers to become more pronounced. After a particularly upsetting session with Dr. Crews, Tina runs from the cabin and runs to the dock thinking about her father's death. While thinking about him, she accidentally breaks the chain around the neck of Jason Voorhees (Kane Hodder), the undead Crystal Lake serial killer. Tina's torment from her powers is increased as Jason's reign of terror descends on the area once again.

All existing home video versions of this film, including the box set released by Paramount Home Video have the infamous "sleeping bag death" cut to one hit, whereas the original theater-shown version had the uncut, six-hit sleeping bag death scene, with blood all over the sleeping bag, intact.

Several explicit scenes of gore were cut in order to gain an R rating, including: Maddy's death, who originally had a scythe jammed through her neck; Ben's death, which showed Jason mashing his head into a bloody pulp; we see Eddy's head hit the floor; a shot of Russell's face splitting open with a large blood spurt; Dan's original death had Jason ripping out his guts; Amanda Shepard's death originally showed Jason stabbing her from behind, with the resulting blade going through her chest and subsequent blood hitting Dr. Crews; Dr. Crews' death showed Jason's tree-trimming saw violently cutting into his stomach, sending a fountain of blood and guts in the air; Melissa's original death had Jason cleaving her head in half with an axe with a close-up of her eyes still wriggling in their sockets.