Sam Raimi Hints at EVIL DEAD’s Return to Movies

After the series finale of Ash Vs. Evil  Dead — and the announcement of Bruce Campbell’s retirement from the role of Ash Williams — fans assumed that would be the end of the beloved horror franchise. At least in the form that we’ve known it. However, original Evil Dead creator Sam Raimi has teased that maybe this isn’t the end after all. So all you loyal Evil Dead-Heads out there now have reasons to remain hopeful that your Deadite fix will be satiated.

In an interview with Bloody Disgusting promoting his new horror film Crawl, Raimi dropped a pretty big nugget of info about the future of the franchise. Here’s what he had to say:

“I’d love to make another one. I don’t think TV is in its future but we’re talking about – Bruce[Campbell], Rob [Tapert] and myself – one or two different ways to go for the next movie…We’d like to make another Evil Dead feature and in fact we’re working on some ideas right now.”

Raimi also added that they have two different options, should Campbell choose to leave Ash in retirement: “I would be thrilled if Bruce Campbell changed his mind about retirement, would come back for the original Evil Dead line. But if not, I’m very happy to work with Fede [Álvarez] should he come back and make the sequel… but he’s such a big shot now. He’s so successful, an artist in demand, that I don’t think he’d want to do that.” Raimi added that he regarded the remake as “a part of the Evil Dead universe, but not part of the Bruce Campbell storyline.”

This basically confirms that the 2013 Evil Dead remake is not just a remake, but another story that happens to exist within the universe of the original film. Or at least the multiverse of the original film. The post-credits sting of Bruce Campbell as Ash would seem to confirm this fact. But where could the franchise go from where left things off, in either the television series or the last film?

The finale episode of the show, ‘The Mettle of the Man,’ finds  Ash waking up from cryosleep in a post-apocalyptic future. But his fate, and the fates of several other characters, are all still up in the air in that finale episode. Although the end is very reminiscent of the original cut of Army of Darkness, so longtime fans had a bit of deja vu with how the show ended.

So would a movie follow up from the end of the show? Certainly a movie about an older Ash fighting in a post-apocalyptic world overrun by Deadites is something we’d start lining up for now. If any story would merit a feature film budget, that could be it. Mad Max meets Evil Dead is something fans have wanted to see since they learned of the original Army of Darkness ending years ago. And we still want to see it!

If it follows up the reboot from 2013 instead, it could continue the story of that film’s “final girl” Mia Allen (Jane Levy). Certainly the movie hints that the evil from the Naturom Demonto is still out there. Even if director Alvarez doesn’t come back, we could see Mia return and go full Ash on us and kick some demon ass. But we are hoping for the coolest option for a continuation; could we see an Evil Dead film that’s a sequel to both the original series and the reboot? We are definitely down for that one!

Images: STARZ / Universal