Army of Darkness (Evil Dead 3)

Ok. I was pissed. The 3rd installment of the Evil Dead trilogy started out wrong. Way wrong. Allow me to clarify.

Dead At Dawn ended with Ash being catapulted through time along with his car, both of which landed violently in 1300 A.D. His Olds was trashed, and Ash? Well, he was about to be spear steak until he validated himself by blowing the head off of a people eating zombie/demon/pterodactyl type thing-y with his boom stick. Suddenly he was their savior.

End Chapter 2.

So here I was. At the start of Army of Darkness, and what do we get on screen?? For starters, in the recap of the previous two, we find his girlfriend played by Bridget Fonda. That in itself did not bother me as the original crew wanted nothing to do with the sequels, however do you think they would have at least given her a wig to cover up her short hair? Hello! Linda did not have short hair! Then to top it off, in 1300 A.D. the trashed Oldsmobile is no longer trashed, and Ash gets framed for having killed some local dude and gets dragged of the "Pit" where he has to fight both humans and Deadites in order to stay alive.

Huh???? I thought he killed some people eating zombie/demon/pterodactyl type thing-y with his boom stick and was dubbed a savior????

Ok..... so I knew I had to get over it. This kind of maneuver is not uncommon for Hollywood, so I blocked these little annoyances from my lil' pea brain (less risk of becoming zombie food with a pea brain) and continued to watch the movie like a kid waiting for cotton candy to form..........

Army of Darkness, although very entertaining, takes campy to cheesy, to slap-stick silly, and tops it off with a new definition of corn. In fact, some parts are so slap-stick, that many references to the Three Stooges have been made. If I had never seen the first two movies, I probably would not have had the tolerance for this one, which is saying something since I do so love the cheese factor of B-movies. Every once in a while though, you find one that goes above and beyond, and while Army of Darkness goes far beyond, it does it convincingly.

From mini-me Ash's, to Evil Ash forming inside Regular-Guy-Ash and then separating himself in a "conjoined at birth yet parted sans operation" sort of way, to the double barrel Remington 12-gauge shotgun (his "boom stick") that never needs reloading, to the rubber face Ash.... and lest we forget, the mechanical hand that Ash manages to engineer, even though it's the year 1300 A.D. and the supplies needed probably would not exist. A "Groovy" mechanical hand with insane strength that even RoboCop would be envious of. Yes, its all cheese and corn, and its all good!! (I can't believe I just said that.......)

 

Movie Synopsis

After redeeming himself in "The Pit" Ash is called upon to help the kingdom battle the evil engulfing their land by obtaining the dreaded book, the Necronomicon ex Mortis. Being as the book is the only way Ash can return home to his 6 figure prestigious job at S-Mart (that's a joke, guys) he agrees to help. Unfortunately, he manages to screw up the plan (imagine that) and releases an evil army of skeletons known as the "Army of Darkness."

This trilogy is awesome. I am hooked. In searching to see if Sam Raimi is planning on any future installments, I found that they are apparently (yet again) remaking The Evil Dead to be released sometime in 2009. I can't imagine they could find an actor better suited to play Ash than Bruce Campbell, but I suppose I should keep an open mind and let myself be (hopefully) pleasantly surprised. Time will tell.

What do you guys think? You think anyone out there can pull off Ash any better than Bruce?