Mears was born in Bakersfield, California. He performed improv comedy at ComedySportz in Bakersfield. He graduated from Highland High School in Bakersfield in 1990.[1] Early on in life, Mears had a severe case of the auto-immune disease alopecia, causing him to lose almost all his body hair.[2]
Mears had his breakthrough lead role in the 2009 Friday the 13th film. He was recommended to the producers, Brad Fuller and Andrew Form of Platinum Dunes, by make-up and special effects guru Scott Stoddard, who created the new look for Mears' character, Jason Voorhees. Due to Mears' height at 6 ft 5 in (1.96 m) he is one of the tallest actors who have portrayed Jason, beside Ken Kirzinger, who stands at a similar height to Mears. He was nominated for an MTV Movie Award in the category for Best Villain for his portrayal of Voorhees, but lost to Heath Ledger as the Joker in The Dark Knight.
Mears did a lot of research on child development to flesh out the role of Camp Crystal Lake's notorious resident serial killer:
In the script, Jason watches his mother die in front of him. So I did research on, when you're that age how do your cognitive processes happen? How is the child supposed to be developing? I found out that at that age you're starting to be integrating into society, whether it's through group sports or group activities so that you find out you're not alone. I discovered that he missed that aspect. He was already an outcast from society for looking different and being disfigured, and his only connection to love and reality is his mother.[3]
He is contracted to return for either another Friday the 13th sequel or another film by Platinum Dunes.[4] If Mears reprises his role as Jason, he will be only the second person to portray the character more than once, next to Kane Hodder.[5][6] He portrayed a Predator[7] in the 2010 science fiction horror film sequel Predators.[8]
On June 5, 2013, it was reported that Warner Bros. had relinquished their film rights to the Friday the 13th series to Paramount as part of a deal that allowed Warner Bros. to co-produce Interstellar.[12] One week later, Mears revealed that Paramount was working with Platinum Dunes to make a new installment "as fast as possible".[13]
In a series of adverts for the insurance company Direct Line shown in 2021, Mears portrayed the character RoboCop.
Episodes: "Pee Wee Herman Wears a Halloween Costume" "Patton Oswalt Wears a Black Blazer & Dress Shoes" "Lizzy Caplan Wears All Black & Powder Blue Espadrilles"