Bruce Campbell turned down chance to play Ash again in new Evil Dead sequel

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

Warning: If you haven't watched the series finale of Ash vs. Evil Dead yet, there are SPOILERS in this article.

After playing demon-slaying hero Ash Williams in three feature films (THE EVIL DEAD, EVIL DEAD II, ARMY OF DARKNESS) and three seasons of a television series over the course of thirty-nine years, Bruce Campbell announced he was retiring from the role after Starz cancelled the Ash vs. Evil Dead show last month. It looks like he's serious about sticking with this retirement, too. So serious that he has even turned down the chance to make another EVIL DEAD film with franchise creator Sam Raimi and producer Robert Tapert.

Tapert shared that information during a Q&A at the Motor City Comic Con this past weekend. When asked by the moderator to discuss the Ash vs. Evil Dead series finale and the future of the franchise ("Is there any more from this universe that we could ever hope to see, or other incarnations?"), Tapert answered,

We knew going into the third season that there was a chance (of cancellation), the ratings had been trending down, it's hard to change that. Starz had been a good partner on Spartacus and in picking up Ash and pretty much letting us do whatever we wanted. It was probably just not the right outlet for it, but they waited until the ratings came in on the third season and said, 'No, it's just not working for them'. It did incredibly well when they sold the rights to the first two seasons to Netflix, but they won't let a competitor have something… which I kind of understand, it's been unfortunate.

We felt that through the third season the series kind of leaned in where it wanted to go and we had a really great idea to where it was going to go in the future, and it was something Sam had been talking about in rebooting a movie, what that scenario could be. Then Bruce wrote to Sam and I one day and said, 'If they don't (renew Ash vs. Evil Dead), I'm retiring from Ash.' We went, 'Wait! Bruce, what about a movie?' 'I'm done, I'm retiring.'

So… we'll see. Sam and myself have been talking about what a new incarnation could be."

The series finale of Ash vs. Evil Dead found Ash waking up in a post-apocalyptic future, just like the alternate ending of ARMY OF DARKNESS did. The idea of Ash continuing to fight Deadites in such a setting is obviously one Raimi would like to explore, since he keeps trying to put him into the situation and was talking about making another movie that would deal with that scenario. It's disappointing that Campbell isn't as keen on the idea as Raimi and Tapert are.

But maybe there's hope. Tapert was joined on the Motor City panel by his wife Lucy Lawless, who played the character Ruby on Ash vs. Evil Dead, and when Tapert mentioned Campbell's retirement she chimed in with, "I don't believe that." Tapert then joked that Campbell will get tired of retirement soon enough.

So, as he said… we'll see.