Evolution of the Dead

The Evil Dead: (1982)

.

Evil Dead 2: (1987)

.

Army Of Darkness: (1993)

.

Three of the most popular cult movies in horror film history, The Evil Dead series have evolved into a franchise that has to date released t-shirts, video games, action figures and...a musical?!? Without doubt however, the finest items provided to the public by the Evil Dead series are the career's of Bruce Campbell and Sam Raimi. Bruce Campbell has gone on to star in such films as "Bubba Ho-Tep" and "The Love Bug" as well as tv's "Brisco County Jr.", whereas Raimi has gone on to be a hugely successful director, creating the likes of "Spiderman" and "The Quick and The Dead" for the big screen.

.

The Evil Dead:
Went into production in 1979, after a number of outings in the short movie department from Raimi and his small production company which consisted of a small group of his friends and his brother Ted Raimi. After the success of their short films, the group decided to make their first feature film, which was initially to be called "The Book Of The Dead". In order to raise funds for the film, the group took off into the woods near their home in Michigan to create a short film entitled "Into the Woods" to wow investors in the hopes that they will give the feature idea their financial backing. The story for Into The Woods was that, Bruce Campbell's character becomes possesed by an evil force and one by one,he kills off all of his friends in the dark woods. Ooooooooohhh scary. Once the film had been backed by investors, the group went into the woods to shoot the gore fest. If you have only seen the most famous of the three movies, "Army Of Darkness" then you may not be aware that Bruce Campbell's "Ash" character was not always the arrogant, zombie ass kickin' dickhead that he appeared to be in that movie. As a matter of fact, In the first movie, he is the exact opposite. HE IS A TOTAL WUSS!!! However the movie shows his transformation from pant wetting moron, to stand up for yourself...um...moron. Although it wasnt until 1987 and the release of Evil Dead 2 that he became the coolest son of a bitch horror movies have ever seen.

.

Evil Dead 2: (Dead By Dawn)
What was essentially a remake of the first one, with a much larger budget, Evil Dead 2 ended up spawning a further sequel and even the possibility of an Evil Dead 4 has not been ruled out yet. This movie had some of the most kick ass cheeseball moments and gruesome, grotesque action sequences ever seen, with the hero cutting off his right hand after it became possessed and attempted to kill his ass. He then proceeds to replace his right hand, which had become nothing more than a mere stump with......A CHAINSAW!!! YEAH BABY now we're talking. This movie is mindless violence at its best.
Anybody who's seen the movie has got to remember the now infamous Bruce Campbell mutter of the word "GROOVY". Tar, syrup, blood, milk, goo, guts, sludge, eyeballs in the mouth...are all elements that were combined to make a friggin' hilarious and yet, mind blowingly violent movie that is noted by many to be the greatest "zombie" movie of all time. Forget Dawn of the Dead and all that guff, this movie is where it's at.

.

Army Of Darkness:
A movie that ended up being entirely different when it hit cinemas to what it was originally intended to be, Army Of Darkness was still a major success. Sam Raimi had been handed an enormous budget by Universal to make the movie, but in order for the movie to be regarded as completely acceptable, a few subtle changes were first to be made. First of all the name "Evil Dead 3" was not permitted and so Sam Raimi had a plan to name the movie "The Midevil Dead" which would have been great. He chose however, to call it "Army Of Darkness". The original ending was frowned upon also as it was considered to be too depressing. For those of you who have only seen the theatrical release, the original ending saw Ash end up in a post - apocalyptic world that we can assume...i guess had been destroyed by what Ash calls "the deadites". In the version that most people saw, Ash got back to his own time, shot an ugly bitch a coup'l hundred times in the chest and looked shit cool while he did it. It was a great ending also, although most Evil Dead fans believe both would have worked.

So now that the release of an Evil Dead remake is apparently close at hand, looking back at the three movies that launched the careers of two of the most talented individuals to come out of independant film making, it is quite possibly going to be the case that, without Raimi and Campbell on hand to do their thang, the movie could suck. BRING ON EVIL DEAD 4.