When he began work on the score for "A New Beginning", Manfredini created a theme just for the character of Tommy Jarvis. The idea was to suggest that there was "madness afoot", which he believed helped to "'point the finger' at various characters [...] to suggest that things were not as you might expect". For "Jason Lives", Tom McLoughlin instructed Manfredini to create a score that would not alert the audience about what was happening or about to happen, "but instead allow the audience to do it to themselves". McLoughlin took this idea from John Carpenter's 1978 film "Halloween", which would always follow any shock in the film with Carpenter's "Eeeeeeee!" sound. McLoughlin wanted something more subtle, with a "Gothic" resonance.