Evil Dead

‘Evil Dead Rises’ is headed to HBO Max.

Making one movie is hard enough — making three is almost impossible.

Director Sam Raimi hopes Bruce Campbell will star.

That famous chainsaw is officially out of gas. Starz has confirmed that Evil Dead sequel series Ash Vs. Evil Dead will not return for a fourth season, and will wrap for good with the coming finale.

The first season of Starz’s Ash Vs. Evil Dead wonderfully picked up with the title character after decades of absence, and Season 2 will expand the history of our aging stockboy lothario even more. A new inside look at Season 2 takes Ash and co. back to his hometown of Elk Grove, picking up a bit of history left behind by the original Sam Raimi films.

Ash Vs. Evil Dead had plenty of history to draw on for the Starz take on Bruce Campbell’s chainsaw-wielding champion, though rights issues prevented any reference to the medieval Army of Darkness. Then, producers claimed Season 2 was free and clear to pay homage to Ash’s past adventures, but according to groovy Bruce himself, those reports were exaggerated.

The rich history of Sam Raimi’s Evil Dead informed a great deal of Starz sequel series Ash Vs. Evil Dead, though producers had earlier noted that rights issues prevented any formal reference to Ash’s medieval third adventure, Army of Darkness. Now, said legal red-tape appears to have been cut for Season 2, which itself will specifically reference the third film.

If there’s one thing the Evil Dead franchise has taught us, it’s to be wary of things that look too good to be true. The zombies in this series love to disguise themselves as the reanimated friends and family of the film’s heroes. And then, when the good guys let their guard down, the monsters strike.

Ecstatic altogether though we are to have ol’ Groovy Bruce back in the saddle for Starz’s Ash vs. Evil Dead, one can’t help wonder if Ash might cross paths with the rebooted Evil Dead world. We’ve heard Sam Raimi say as much before, but are Ash and Mia going to be vs.-ing the Evil Dead any time soon?

In the tradition of ScreenCrush series like You Think You Know Movies and You Think You Know TV comes a new YouTube series: Top Five! Each week (or so; we’ve got a lot of other stuff going on), ScreenCrush editor and critic Matt Singer will count down a particular topic from the world of movies (and probably write these introductory posts in the third person).