Over 40 years ago, director Sami Raimi made one of the most creative and absurd films that irrevocably changed the horror genre with his B-movie wonder, The Evil Dead. Since that first film was released in 1981, Evil Dead has become the gold standard for campy horror and an influential horror franchise that ranks highly among acclaimed films in the genre.
These movies blend horror with comedy expertly. It has some seriously stomach-churning gore in between the bouts of physical, almost slapstick comedy, thanks to the wonderful Bruce Campbell, that make this series stand out. Some of the films lean more into comedy than horror and vice versa, but each entry understands what its goal is and delivers.
The Evil Dead introduced us to the Deadites, which are evil spirits summoned by the Book of the Dead that are hellbent on destroying whoever reads from the book in the most violent ways possible. Since then, the franchise has spawned two direct sequels, a reboot, a TV show, and most recently, Lee Cronin’s Evil Dead Rise, which is currently in theaters. Raimi and Campbell produced the first film with a crew of only 13 people back in ’81, so it’s incredible to see how far this story has come since then.
Each entry in this franchise offers something different from the last while still managing to keep that signature campy style that Raimi created all those years ago. So, where does each installment of this bizarre horror series land in a ranking? Well, that’s difficult to decide considering they are all excellent in their own ways. Nevertheless, here is every Evil Dead movie and show, ranked.
6 Evil Dead (2013)
Fede Alvarez’s Evil Dead is one of the rare cases where a remake actually lives up to the original. Released over 20 years after the conclusion of the original trilogy, this film isn’t so much a remake as it is a sequel and a reboot. It once again uses the cabin in the woods setting and centers around a group of young friends who unknowingly summon the Deadites just as they did in the first film, but it also took place in the present day and had a cast of completely different characters. The film also gives its characters more detailed backstories than the original film did and provides the protagonist with a complicated history.
This is definitely one of the darker entries in the franchise as it takes the evil presence of the Book of the Dead more seriously than any of the previous films and is lacking the campiness of the original trilogy, but it absolutely nails the horror elements. It is actually quite disturbing at times and Jane Levy makes for one of the best final girls in modern horror.
5 Ash vs. Evil Dead (2015-2018)
Chainsaw-wielding monster hunter Ash Williams returns over 30 years after his last battle with the Deadites in the Raimi and Campbell produced television series, Ash vs. Evil Dead. Our favorite fighter of evil has successfully avoided both responsibility and the deadly demons who gave him his chainsaw hand until an act of carelessness unleashes them once again. The show amps up the gore, energy, and fun present in the film trilogy and adds new characters for Ash to fight alongside with. All three seasons were praised by critics and fans alike for their outrageous violence and hilarious absurdity. It is actually the highest-rated entry into the franchise, with a 99% critics score and a 95% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. It was a welcomed addition to the franchise and remains a proud entry that fans still adore to this day.
4 The Evil Dead (1981)
Now, putting the one that started it all in fourth place may be a bit controversial, but this franchise doesn’t have a bad entry in it. Each entry is unique, and we wouldn’t have this extraordinarily ludicrous series without it. The Evil Dead is gloriously strange and delivers both the scares and the laughs. The Deadites are absolutely disgusting, and you wouldn’t want to touch them with a 39-and-a-half-foot pole. Since the budget was low and there were only 13 people working on the film, Raimi had to get inventive with the camerawork. He didn’t have a Steadicam, so he used a “shaky cam” by mounting the camera to a plank of wood and running through the woods or mounting the camera to a bike, giving the film its signature look. Raimi even had Joel Cohen of the Cohen Brothers help with the editing of the film. The Evil Dead launched the madness of the franchise we know and love today, and provided some grueling scares along the way.
3 Army of Darkness (1992)
Listen up, you primitive screwheads! Army of Darkness is without a doubt the funniest, most chaotic, wildly entertaining installment in the Evil Dead franchise. Nothing about the narrative of this film makes a lick of sense and that’s why it works so well. By now, we all know that time is a construct in the Evil Dead universe, and we just follow whatever insanity Sam Raimi’s mind comes up with.
The film picks up exactly where the second takes off, with Ash being transported back in time to the Middle Ages. What’s waiting for him there? More Deadites, of course. Taking our reluctant hero out of the cabin in the woods setting allows him to have some fun and become a leader. Despite a complete lack of thrills and chills, Army of Darkness proves to be too much fun for most Evil Dead fans to care. There were certainly moments of this film that could have been used for gory horror, but Ash’s outlandish medieval misadventures make up for it.
2 Evil Dead Rise (2023)
Taking the story out of the cabin in the woods setting and transporting it to a high-rise apartment complex in Los Angeles might be considered a risky move, but it without a doubt paid off. Lee Cronin’s Evil Dead Rise is already certified fresh on Rotten Tomatoes with a critics score of 84% and an audience score of 79%. It’s outdoing its predicted box office numbers and has fans saying it may be the most terrifying movie of the franchise. This time around, we follow a family of five who soon discover that the apartment building is just as haunted as a cabin and that the Necronomicon has once again unleashed a horrific nightmare.
It is quite possibly the bloodiest yet, which is saying a lot, with an estimated 1,700 gallons of blood used for the film. This film leans into the horror elements full-on and further proves that we are in the midst of a horror renaissance after the incredible year the genre had last year. It stands on its own while still capturing the spirit of the original films, and with Raimi and Campbell on board as executive producers, this is through and through an Evil Dead movie.
1 Evil Dead II (1987)
Trying to decide whether Evil Dead II is a remake or a sequel is useless since we have already established that time is simply a construct in these films. It’s Raimi’s world, and we’re just living in it, baby. Evil Dead II takes the same plot as its predecessor but swaps old characters for new ones. The horror-comedy blend is at full-throttle, and it is the first time in the franchise that we are gifted with truly memorable one-liners. The Deadites bring an even more twisted sense of humor and somehow turn up the violence from the first film. It is within this film that Ash first dons his iconic chainsaw hand and uses it to battle the bloodthirsty demons, as well as inanimate objects, that continuously taunt him. It has some of the most memorable horror scenes as well as some of the most memorable comedic scenes ever put to film, and the pacing makes 90 minutes fly by. It is evident that Raimi is more confident behind the camera by this point and Campbell lets loose in the best way possible.
One of the best aspects of the film is that doesn’t waste time reestablishing what happened in the first film. The cabin, Ash and his girlfriend, and the Book of the Dead are all introduced in the first few minutes of the movie. This allows the movie to kick the action into gear and launch head-first into the absurdity we have come to know and love. Making a requel of a film that was released just six years prior is a bit of a risky move, but it works perfectly here. The Evil Dead franchise is not the type of franchise that has to rely on a fully refined narrative structure in order for the film to work, so Raimi honed in on all the gory comedy gold that makes this franchise one of the best in the horror genre.
Read More:Ranking Every Movie and Show in the Franchise
2023-04-29 23:15:00