First off I must say this. Anyone who is an Evil Dead fan NEEDS to see this film. There is so much attention to detail and references to the original films that it was enough to make me geek out so hard!!!

Now to address the elephant in the room, no there is no Ash character in this movie. No one is named Ash, has the last name Williams, nothing. However the traits of Ash are spread throughout the main characters. The character David shows Ash's resourcefulness, and the character of Eric has Ash's near inhuman ability to take a LOT of punishment, to name a couple.

The effects in this movie were EXTREMELY well done practical effects with only one or two instances of CGI that I noticed and even then it was so little that I didn't even care because the way the scene was shot it needed the CGI. I can tell you that I have gotten so sick of CGI in my horror movies that I can't tell you how relieved I was that it was used only when needed in this movie.

So with that in mind, just go see this movie. If you love Evil Dead or are just looking for a GENUINELY scary horror movie then this is the perfect film for you. I HIGHLY encourage you hard core Evil Dead fans to stick around after the credits for a "groovy" surprise

Also at the premiere of the movie, the director Fede Alvarez announced that a sequel is in the works. In addition, Sam Raimi confirmed plans to write Evil Dead 4 with his brother and has specified that this film would be Army of Darkness 2.

Also for those of you unable to attend the panel at WonderCon last month, Bruce Campbell and Alvarez stated that their ultimate plan is for Alvarez's Evil Dead 2 and Raimi's Army of Darkness 2 to be followed by a seventh film which would merge the narratives of both the original series and this new take. Can anyone say "Return of The King"?

Counterpoint time!

This movie, in a word, disappointed me. It has this excellent setup (in the drug detox) that would work wonders to make it its own thing, only to go ahead and sideline all that once things get rolling. It takes a few cursory scenes (with some dreadful exposition) to set up all our characters with backstories and relationships and all that, and goes essentially nowhere with them (beyond basic lip service). I won't say the characters of the original were all that deep, because they weren't. But at least they had, well, character. Really, the whole thing played out in a somewhat... dull manner. There were too many bits of fanservice (which got extra weird when it started going to Evil Dead II territory, despite this film never even trying to stray down the "goofy/splatstick" path. It was far too serious for that) that just got grating, and it never seems to even try to be scary. There were jump scares, sure, but it all played out in some pseudo-grimy manner that's all too common with studio horror these days, and as a result none of it really sank in. It was just there. Even when the ending threatens to get interesting (after displaying several shockingly stupid swerves in the story, even if one did have a thankful character swap), it soon falters and just generally meanders around (and is further restricted by another grating bit of fanservice). Albeit meanders about in a kickass blood rain and some fantastic gore.

And on that note, for a plus side, I will say the gore delivers. Seriously, this is the goriest wide release since Piranha 3D (and that's not counting whatever stuff they had to cut to dodge an NC-17). And I applaud them for going practical for as much as they did. The few digital bits didn't stand out too badly (and when they did, I blame the general digital overlay the whole film carried rather than the gore itself), and there was plenty of stuff to cringe at. Well, maybe. On that point I must return to the above points about the movie not being engaging enough, because the gore on display works as just that: something on display. It's great to look at, but never sucks me in, so I never react to it. The tongue bit should've had me reeling, but instead I just sat there. I'm not trying to play myself up here, either. At the aforementioned Piranha 3D I was squirming left and right throughout. No dice here.

I dunno. I'm likely being harder on this than I should be. It's likely the brand. Where this an original release, I'd probably have much less to gripe about (beyond wondering how a movie like this could even function in this post Cabin in the Woods world of ours). But it's not. It's a remake that's far too empty, and far too confused about whether it wants to be its own thing or service the original (while simultaneously misunderstanding what made it work so well in the first place).

Counterpoint to my counterpoint: most folks do seem to be digging this one. The audience at my screening certainly ate it up, including several good friends of mine who are all longtime fans of the franchise. And honestly, I'm glad folks are liking it. Because at the end of the day, it's a super-duper-hard R horror movie, of which we do not get enough.

Of course, getting more like that that are also original would be the real treat, but I digress.

Also, I will admit that I was wrong in the previous thread about there being no Evil Dead 4 (or rather, Army of Darkness 2) in the works. Hats off to Mr. Raimi there.

Assuming it gets made, of course. Because I don't need my heart broken over this sort of thing.

854760 That's a fair critique of the film, not one that I agree with though I've already established that with my review.

I have to say this though, even if they didn't go all out for fanservice(I'm actually glad they did ), the fact that it managed to scare me makes me love this movie so much. I stopped getting scared by horror movies years ago and up until this movie all I ever got was creeped out or unnerved just a bit. This movie scared me to the point I was holding my girlfriend for entirely different reasons.

854767 I can see it now, the Deadites are running amok in a small town in the middle of nowhere. There's chaos in the streets. Suddenly the roar of a chainsaw cuts through the sounds of mayhem. The undead hordes turn to see a silhouetted man with a chainsaw for a hand standing in front of a car with the high-beams on. He pulls a sawed off shotgun from a holster on his back and says

"Come get some ya screwheads!"