When news broke that Sam Raimi is potentially working on an EVIL DEAD 4, I was extremely excited. Everything I have seen regarding the EVIL DEAD remake has me happy that the series is returning to the big screen, but my heart will always reside with the Bruce Campbell trilogy. So, to get an EVIL DEAD 4 was something I long had dreamed of.
While our expectations have been tempered since the initial story, it has not stopped everyone from asking those involved with the franchise about their feelings regarding continuing the classic series. Bruce Campbell himself was recently asked about it by Geek Tyrant and he had this to say.
EVIL DEAD IV, ARMY OF DARKNESS 2… however you want to slice it. It’s random ideas in Sam’s head. Let’s not go crazy here. He’s just finished doing Oz, and he’s going to take some time off and he says he’s going to work on it this summer with his brother. He could be smoking cigars at a lakeside cabin for all I know, or he might actually be working, who knows?
I don’t know why it never occurred to me that this would actually be a sequel to ARMY OF DARKNESS. That film took the story away from the cabin in the woods and gave us so much more. I love ARMY OF DARKNESS without fail, but it really is almost a different movie entirely than THE EVIL DEAD. So, if this is really going to be ARMY OF DARKNESS 2, where would Campbell take the story?
I would think the post-Apocalyptic because it gives great possibilities for an Omega Man movie, and who he might be fighting against. It would be a very interesting world. But I’m fine either way. I’m sure Sam will concoct some ridiculous story and an outrageous journey, so I don’t really care where it starts and ends.
Campbell is referring to the alternate ending available on pretty much every version of ARMY OF DARKNESS on Blu-ray and DVD. I prefer that ending, and if they somehow work it into the new movie, it would be a way to explain Bruce Campbell‘s advancing age. Ash could have potentially spent years fighting the Deadites and emerges Obi-wan Kenobi style to finish them off. That would be awesome.
Bruce Campbell stresses he would not portray Ash for anyone except from Sam Raimi, which is the way it should be. Whether it be the post-apocalyptic setting or something in line with the ARMY OF DARKNESS theatrical ending, I am all for ARMY OF DARKNESS 2.