The character names Pamela and Jason are a reference to the Voorhees family from the Friday the 13th franchise.
During a Q & A at the 2022 Toronto International Film Festival, John Hyams explained what motivated him to make the movie: "When I read the script, one of the things that jumped out to me was just how kind of stripped down it was, which I loved. One of the coolest things to me about the movie is, and Kevin Williamson said this many times, it doesn't really have a 2nd act. It kind of has a 1st act and it goes right into an extended 3rd act. I never particularly had any desire one way or the other to do a slasher movie, but to me this one was like a thriller in disguise as a slasher movie. You kind of set up all these slasher movie archetypes, but suddenly then it became this extended chase... Once I got to the kitchen scene where Parker is fighting with one of the killers, and how that whole scene unfolded, and then the second guy shows up, and I just thought 'Wow, I really just have a smile on my face just reading this' and I kinda want to play out this action scene that never ends."
The snake story told by DJ is the same story told in the "Friday the 13th" episode of season 1 of 90s teen drama Dawson's Creek, also written by Kevin Williamson.