Fred McFeely Rogers lived a life of charity and goodwill. He touched millions of lives, and left a great legacy behind. And like the douchebag that I am, I am involving him in a satire that involves slapstick violence and the possible taking of one or more lives. I'm a small man with small desires. One of those small desires is to pit the beloved Mr. Rogers against Jason Voorhees, the main character/villain of the Friday the 13th series, in a fictional fight to the death. If you think a ballistic maniac like Jason will have an easy time with Mr. Rogers, though, you might want to think twice. That old man is a lot tougher than he lets on.
Round One:
Round Two:
Round Three:
However, Mr. Rogers doesn't allow the battle to go any further. He takes a good long look at Jason Voorhees, and sees that underneath the angry man with a machete is a neglected and deformed child that was horribly drowned in a lake. Mr. Rogers extends a hand toward Jason, and the mass murderer is overcome by that strange fuzzy feeling that everyone seems to have around the guy. Somewhere miles away, I retch. More importantly, Mr. Rogers succeeds in appealing to the last shred of humanity left in Jason, and the pair go on to repair the destruction he has wrought. Somewhere in the afterlife, they are now produced posthumous episodes of Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood with a reformed serial killer in a hockey mask leading children on off-beat tunes and having meaningful conversations with sock puppets. I'm pretty sure Mr. Rogers has some sort of voodoo mind magic going on there. Round Three and the fight go to Mr. Rogers.
Talk of the Tape:
Mr. Rogers (It takes a while, but wait for it. He's in there. And it's worth watching anyway.)
Jason Voorhees: To tell you the truth, I'm not really a Friday the 13th buff. Does he do anything but snarl and kill people?
Jason Voorhees goes on another one of his murderous rampages, this time tearing through the Kingdom of Make-Believe. Mr. Rogers immediately begins sheltering the frightened inhabitants of the kingdom, but some of them choose to respond to the violence with more violence. Chief among the resistance, fittingly enough, is King Friday the XIII, who leads an army of puppets after the mass murderer. Mr. Rogers tries to convince his friend not to partake in the bloodshed, but to no avail. The puppets naturally stand no chance against Jason, and poor Mr. Rogers has to watch as his beloved friends are chopped to bits in Jason's crazed rampage. Round One goes to Jason Voorhees.
The slaughter before him drives Mr. Rogers almost to the edge. However, he is a strong-willed man, and rarely acts in the heat of passion without considering the consequences. It doesn't take him much thought, though, to realize that Jason must be stopped. He walks out to meet the madman alone and seemingly unarmed except for a canteen of water. Jason gives Mr. Rogers a growl and stalks toward what he believes to be his newest victim. However, at the last second, Mr. Rogers pulls out a quick surprise. Drawing upon his training as a Presbyterian minister, he blesses the canteen of water and hurls it toward Jason. The resulting splash delivers righteous holy vengeance upon the hockey mask-wearing psychopath. Jason's skin begins burning. He drops his machete and begins writhing in pain on the ground, scorched by Mr. Roger's holy might. Round Two goes to Mr. Rogers.
With Jason on the ropes, Mr. Rogers has a perfect chance to finish him off once and for all. However, I'm pretty sure that Mr. Rogers simply doesn't have it in him to take another human life (the Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny not withstanding). I've looked over his life as far as any public record I can find allows, and I seriously haven't found any indication that he was ever anything but the upstanding, gentle man who appeared every week on Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood. That seriously throws my cynical world view out of whack, and also seems to indicate that Mr. Rogers will hesitate and allow Jason the opening he needs to end this fight.
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