With the future of the Friday the 13th franchise currently embroiled in a legal battle, there’s now been an update on just what is at the core of this dispute.

As per an excellent breakdown from The Hollywood Reporter, the main issue revolves around Victor Miller’s claim to the franchise.

Miller was the original movie’s scriptwriter, although he claims that he wasn’t actually employed when he penned the film and so is looking to terminate a grant of rights and reclaim ownership to the series. Due to a change in copyright law from the US Congress in the 1970s, it looks as if Miller could well actually have a strong case.

What this potentially means it that the franchise could be torn to shreds in the future, with any new Friday the 13th films that are released in the US having to move forward without Jason Voorhees, although this isn’t the same for international releases. So basically, Jason is fine to slice ‘n’ dice in sequels so long as they are released outside of the US, but for anything within the United States it means Jason will have to keep away from the action.

All a tad bizarre, right?

As ever, expect to be hearing a whole lot more on the Friday the 13th franchise as this legal issue continues to develop and hopefully comes to some sort of definitive resolution.