Ash vs Evil Dead Season 3 General Discussion Thread

MaidOfKandar

I May Be Bad But I Feel...Good....
Staff member
Joined
Mar 31, 2013
UK is set to receive all three seasons in a boxed set sometime around when the season 3 DVDs drop.
 

Deadite_Scholar

S-Mart Clerk
Joined
Jan 15, 2017
Yikes on the steel book cover. I was hoping it'd get released because I'm currently in the process of switching my entire Evil Dead movie collection to steelbook. I'll probably pick it up for that reason alone, but I wish they would have given us artwork that reflected the horror/serious parts of the show from the back half of season 3.
 

MaidOfKandar

I May Be Bad But I Feel...Good....
Staff member
Joined
Mar 31, 2013
I think it's super interesting that only Rob's doing commentary for the season. Nothing from Bruce, and he even did commentary on the (disastrous) last season of Burn Notice.

I can see what they're trying to do, and Cougie was a striking enough image, but it doesn't really fully exploit the best part of the season at all. They should've used that publicity/key art of Ash shooting down Kandar's throat.
 

Nick el Ass

Hero from the Sky
Joined
Aug 20, 2007
Location
Indianapolis
I think it's super interesting that only Rob's doing commentary for the season. Nothing from Bruce, and he even did commentary on the (disastrous) last season of Burn Notice.

I can see what they're trying to do, and Cougie was a striking enough image, but it doesn't really fully exploit the best part of the season at all. They should've used that publicity/key art of Ash shooting down Kandar's throat.

You would think they would use the image they did most of the advertising with because poor Cougie got all of a few minutes of screen time which makes this an even odder choice for a cover. Now I wouldn't mind owning the costume they are auctioning off, and would wear it around for Halloween... but it doesn't make for the best dvd cover.
 

Kain

Captain Supermarket
Staff member
Joined
Jun 11, 2015
Location
NYC
I'm glad I'm not picking up the season 3 Steelbook this time:

6263796_sa.jpg

What were they thinking?
 
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Sutter Cane

Spinach Chin
Joined
Jul 11, 2015
I did watched again the whole first season a few weeks ago and shared my second thought. I'm currently doing the same with season 2. I just watched the first half.

How can I describe the first half of season 2?...Well, It just feel like watching someone else doing a side quest in a Grand theft auto game. It's violent, it's all over the place, but the main plot is not very interesting. All ingredients are there, with characters, action , gore and everything....but I didn't feel they are on a epic journey. It just like doing a side quest for the sake to tell anyone you completed the game at 100%.

Yes there is some characters developement in the first half. There's also a lot of clever gore and action scenes. A lots of the practical effects are top notch. There's a lots of good elements in S2. But it stop here.

The main problem is that they added more cheesiness. I love Ted Raimi but he didn't help the plot at all. He just added more to the cheese factor. Technically, they also added some cheap FX that didn't help.

Another main problem is now the demons have names and look and act like human being. This is so wrong at so many levels. Ruby and Baal shouldn't be considered as demons. A demon should be a surreal creature. They should have been more like apostles of evil with power. They should belong to a sect, the opposite of the Sumerian knight. They should have developped the second season with apostles of evil who think they can control evil forces. The descendants or servants of the dark ones. Then you bring the Sumerian knight in S3.

If they wanted to bring a demon in a human enveloppe. They should took their inspiration straight from Ghostbusters, MIB 1 (remember that cochroach vilain) or even Howard the Duck. (Yeah I know this is a bad movie.) But do you remember how Dr. Jenning was acting when that creature from space possessed his body. They were just like a creature in someone else clothes. They're out of this world. They should be different. This is the way you can bring some funny moments, some disgusting ones and maybe bring some humanity to a creature from hell.

So we got an ex-romance dispute with Ruby, her children and Baal. So it look like more a everyday divorce story to my ears. That demons relationship fiasco should have been cut out of the Evil Dead universe.

The characters mentionned several times : "We're saving the world", but in fact they are more securing their deal with a not so epic quest.

I should come back with the second half in a few weeks...
 

MaidOfKandar

I May Be Bad But I Feel...Good....
Staff member
Joined
Mar 31, 2013
I'm waiting to see what the rest of the extras are at this point; they announced a few but I wanna know if the steelbook will have any more before I commit.
 

DeathLivesAgain

Loud Mouth Braggart
Joined
May 17, 2018
In the style of the previous steelbooks (the first had a chainsaw on front and robotic hand on back, second had Kandarian dagger crossed over an axe and shotgun on front with a Welcome To Elk Grove sign with Ruby's demon-children on back cover), it should have been an overhead closeup view of three hands bumping fists:

a blue-sleeved man's fist (Ash),
a purple-coat-sleeved girl's fist (Kelly),
and yellow-coat-sleeved illegal's fist (Pablo).

Resembling the moment they do the Ghostbeaters fist-bump at the end of the first episode of this season, indicating their coming-together one last time for their final adventure. And you could have Cougie on the back cover standing in the hallway (indicating evil distorting Ash's past/lineage).

But that would require a passionate thought when deciding on the design for this artwork.




Maybe one guy had this idea and he was trying to explain it:

Johnson: "I got it... remember after they defeated Cougie together and then they got together and..."

Exec: "Cougie!!! That's it!!!"

Johnson: "No, wait, I wasn't done. I wasn't talking about Cou...."

Exec: "That'll be all, Johnson. We've gotta rush these to print. Great work!" (shoves Johnson out the door)
 

MaidOfKandar

I May Be Bad But I Feel...Good....
Staff member
Joined
Mar 31, 2013
I'm guessing they thought Cougie was their best visual draw at the time; they don't even have any featured material on Brandy and she was the season's most important new character.
 

Sutter Cane

Spinach Chin
Joined
Jul 11, 2015
I did watched again the whole first season a few weeks ago and shared my second thought. I'm currently doing the same with season 2. I just watched the first half.

How can I describe the first half of season 2?...Well, It just feel like watching someone else doing a side quest in a Grand theft auto game. It's violent, it's all over the place, but the main plot is not very interesting. All ingredients are there, with characters, action , gore and everything....but I didn't feel they are on a epic journey. It just like doing a side quest for the sake to tell anyone you completed the game at 100%.

Yes there is some characters developement in the first half. There's also a lot of clever gore and action scenes. A lots of the practical effects are top notch. There's a lots of good elements in S2. But it stop here.

The main problem is that they added more cheesiness. I love Ted Raimi but he didn't help the plot at all. He just added more to the cheese factor. Technically, they also added some cheap FX that didn't help.

Another main problem is now the demons have names and look and act like human being. This is so wrong at so many levels. Ruby and Baal shouldn't be considered as demons. A demon should be a surreal creature. They should have been more like apostles of evil with power. They should belong to a sect, the opposite of the Sumerian knight. They should have developped the second season with apostles of evil who think they can control evil forces. The descendants or servants of the dark ones. Then you bring the Sumerian knight in S3.

If they wanted to bring a demon in a human enveloppe. They should took their inspiration straight from Ghostbusters, MIB 1 (remember that cochroach vilain) or even Howard the Duck. (Yeah I know this is a bad movie.) But do you remember how Dr. Jenning was acting when that creature from space possessed his body. They were just like a creature in someone else clothes. They're out of this world. They should be different. This is the way you can bring some funny moments, some disgusting ones and maybe bring some humanity to a creature from hell.

So we got an ex-romance dispute with Ruby, her children and Baal. So it look like more a everyday divorce story to my ears. That demons relationship fiasco should have been cut out of the Evil Dead universe.

The characters mentionned several times : "We're saving the world", but in fact they are more securing their deal with a not so epic quest.

I should come back with the second half in a few weeks...

Ok I did watched the second half of season 2...

The whole asylum moment is still enjoyable. Except from bad dialogues and bad sex jokes, the whole sequence is still creepy. There's flaws but the Asylum part is still "The highlight" of the second season. The only disapointement I have is, all this lead to nowhere...I'll explain later.

Then the characters go back in time to save Pablo....So here we go again, a big compilation of everything they already done in the previous movies in the last two episodes.

I'm not going into detail of the whole cabin arch. It's a mess. They tried very hard to add a twist and a give us a big reveal with Pablo's Death, but it just missed the target. They put everything and everyone available to make it as big as possible. Unfortunately too much is just like not enough. Too much recycled ideas from the previous movies, too much characters, to much repetition. It's a poor's man Evil Dead II with elements of AoD : Simply unoriginal and bland. It's not even nostalgia, simply bad rip off.

They even repeated the deal idea from S1 and oh! Don't forget to add a scapegoat that will eventually die. In S1 it was the camp girl and S2 the student.

Now I think I kinda explain the time travel mess. It's not explained at all but everything was about THE DEAL They went back in time to change it but instead it turn into another deal. So they did win the deal, save Pablo (Because this is what the deal was all about) and went back to their OWN timeline. The deal was not about anything else, so they send back everyone where they belong. I know it still a mess, and not is fully explained because of bad writing, but it's the most logical thing I've found.

As I told earlier, everything lead to nowhere. The biggest flaw of the season is there's no real consequence. I mean they fought Baal. They should have gain or lost something along the way. Baal left no heritage. Someone should have gain a power, be cursed, or anything that should affect them on season 3. Baal is just a forgetable character that left no trace in S3. Yes they get Pablo back but he still the guy with the Necronomicon power. Nothing more.

S2 is not worthy just because of that. Because the writers push the reset button at the end of the season. So only half of the season have some valuable information for S3. The rest didn't really happened. Just like every sitcom. Everything must be exaclty the same at the end of the story.

I'm not going to watch S3 soon. It's still fresh and I'll wait a bit before watching it again....

Season 2 = few good moments, that's all.
 

Mardeadite

Loud Mouth Braggart
Joined
Sep 9, 2007
I think I enjoyed series 2 much more than you, Sutter Cane* but I agree the asylum part was probably the best part of the series, and they should have done more with the time travel stuff and Baal.

I've still yet to see Season 3! I held out for the Blu-ray. That long wait is almost over. So wish I'd got to discuss it on an episode by episode broadcast basis with the rest of you, though.

*Actually, I pretty much enjoyed it, period, but I accept it could have been better.
 

DeathLivesAgain

Loud Mouth Braggart
Joined
May 17, 2018
Ok I did watched the second half of season 2...

The whole asylum moment is still enjoyable. Except from bad dialogues and bad sex jokes, the whole sequence is still creepy. There's flaws but the Asylum part is still "The highlight" of the second season. The only disapointement I have is, all this lead to nowhere...I'll explain later.

Then the characters go back in time to save Pablo....So here we go again, a big compilation of everything they already done in the previous movies in the last two episodes.

I'm not going into detail of the whole cabin arch. It's a mess. They tried very hard to add a twist and a give us a big reveal with Pablo's Death, but it just missed the target. They put everything and everyone available to make it as big as possible. Unfortunately too much is just like not enough. Too much recycled ideas from the previous movies, too much characters, to much repetition. It's a poor's man Evil Dead II with elements of AoD : Simply unoriginal and bland. It's not even nostalgia, simply bad rip off.

They even repeated the deal idea from S1 and oh! Don't forget to add a scapegoat that will eventually die. In S1 it was the camp girl and S2 the student.

Now I think I kinda explain the time travel mess. It's not explained at all but everything was about THE DEAL They went back in time to change it but instead it turn into another deal. So they did win the deal, save Pablo (Because this is what the deal was all about) and went back to their OWN timeline. The deal was not about anything else, so they send back everyone where they belong. I know it still a mess, and not is fully explained because of bad writing, but it's the most logical thing I've found.

As I told earlier, everything lead to nowhere. The biggest flaw of the season is there's no real consequence. I mean they fought Baal. They should have gain or lost something along the way. Baal left no heritage. Someone should have gain a power, be cursed, or anything that should affect them on season 3. Baal is just a forgetable character that left no trace in S3. Yes they get Pablo back but he still the guy with the Necronomicon power. Nothing more.

S2 is not worthy just because of that. Because the writers push the reset button at the end of the season. So only half of the season have some valuable information for S3. The rest didn't really happened. Just like every sitcom. Everything must be exaclty the same at the end of the story.

I'm not going to watch S3 soon. It's still fresh and I'll wait a bit before watching it again....

Season 2 = few good moments, that's all.

It's a shame that anyone didn't enjoy this season or any of the series or thought that it was a waste of time.


There were consequences, there was meaning.

Ash discovered/realized/remembered that he wasn't responsible all those years ago for unleashing the evil through that book, it was Knowby. That's gotta be somewhat of a relief of burden on his mind/psyche. That this wasn't all completely his fault, that maybe he can move on from this.

It wasn't just about getting Pablo back. It was about undoing everything from that point forward (1982) before him and his friends went to that cabin. Fighting Baal led to the cabin burning down and a lone evil Ruby (that killed the Good Ruby).
They did change things and did not go back to their old timeline (remember the burned down cabin in Season 3 and the ending of Season 2). But Fate remains very similar. There is a prophecy to fulfill and it always finds a way. Ash and his friends still went to the cabin (in Tennessee, as seen in the first film, because the one they were going to go to in Michigan burned down). So things play out very similarly. And now, Ruby is surveilling Ash instead of looking for him (like in the last timeline). She's preparing and we see the results of that in Season 3.

And while fighting Baal, Ash faced the guilt of his family/friends dying: Chet, Cheryl, and Brock.



Regret (and Betrayal) are the themes of the season. Also, paranoia and fear. And the past.

Ruby - "Part of me is already regretting calling you here."
Ash - "Get used to that feeling."

It starts with Fear, the obvious.
Fear of the past.
Fear of the town that Ash ran from.
Fear of the place that betrayed Ash due to paranoia.
Fear of Kelly not having a purpose/path.
Fear of Pablo's future that he sees where he's constantly killed (by his own friends).
Fear/paranoia of what's inside Pablo and if he'll turn on them and betray them.

Baal symbolized the enemy within: Regret/Fear/Paranoia/Betrayal (hiding inside all of us).

Just as Ruby regrets getting involved with Baal (leading to betraying him), Ash regrets going to that cabin and finding that book, he regrets how things went down with his father, how he couldn't save Cheryl or Chet or any of his friends.
Just as Ruby regrets who she was, she regrets having those kids (who betrayed her).
Kelly regrets following Ash.
Brock comes to regret not believing Ash.

Which leads to fear/paranoia.

The town fearing Ashy Slashy and Ash fearing himself and what he's done (very much explored in the asylum).

Ash fearing his failure as a son and a person (driven home in the bar episode).
Kelly fearing an aimless path (again, the bar episode).

Pablo was their voice of encouragement for both Ash and Kelly in that bar.
Which is why Pablo is what saves them in the asylum when all hope seemed lost.
Which is why Pablo is what they seek in the end of the season:
Pablo represents their courage/innocence-lost.
He's paranoid and full of fear throughout the season, but then is courageous and literally kills that Regret/Fear/Paranoia/Betrayal (Baal).
Hey, BAAL is hiding within BetrAyAL.
It's what he does best.


Which leads to the betrayal within them all.

That time Kelly sees herself (the evil version) telling her that they don't need Ash.
Kelly always reminding Ash that it is his fault.
Pablo having visions of betrayal.
The Delta betraying Ash.
Ruby betraying her kids and killing them.
Emery betraying his wife.
Hey, we find out that Cheryl betrayed Ash by locking him in the trunk.
So Ash gets her back by killing her again in front of everyone.
Ash betraying and killing Pablo and Kelly (their imagined counterparts) in the asylum.
Then Linda betrays Ash to get her daughter back.
Kelly initially betrays Linda by lying about her daughter dying.
Ash seemingly betraying them all as Ashy Slashy.
"Pablo" seemingly betraying them by refusing to take them back home to 2013 (though that was Bill).
Knowby betraying the student from Wisconsin.
Henrietta betraying Ash.
Ruby betraying Ruby because she finds out that she betrayed her kids who betrayed her because of Baal, who she betrayed.
Ash, in a way, betraying Kelly at the end by using her life as a bargaining chip. (Baal also means 'dominion' or 'husbandry'; to take a wife; ownership)
Ruby betraying Baal once again.
That's after Baal betrayed Ash by not honoring the deal.
Which happened after "Chet" reminded Ash that he betrayed him and let Cheryl kill him.
And then Ash betraying his "father" by drowning him.

There are many examples of this, even with minor characters, throughout the season.

Ash even betrays and punches Pablo in the face after he saves the world. But then he apologizes.

Even ends with a hint of foreshadowing betrayal from Kelly, who looks at Ash and Pablo with sly disapproval when Ash says they are here to stay in Elk Grove (she leaves them, as we discover in Season 3).

And this even reverberates to the plot of Season 3: Ruby betraying Brandy to manipulate her into betraying Ash, as well as using Kelly's body (Kaya) to betray Pablo and Ash.


So there's your heritage, pal.
 
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Kain

Captain Supermarket
Staff member
Joined
Jun 11, 2015
Location
NYC
Got my season 3 Blu-Ray earlier today and holding it in my hand really makes me miss this show. I was one of the few that absolutely loved it.

Lucky! Amazon has delayed pre-order twice this week. I was supposed to get it yesterday. Now it looks like I won't get it until next week sometime. I talked their customer service and they're going to refund the full amount but still send it to me next week.
 

Kevin

Loud Mouth Braggart
Joined
Dec 12, 2016
Lucky! Amazon has delayed pre-order twice this week. I was supposed to get it yesterday. Now it looks like I won't get it until next week sometime. I talked their customer service and they're going to refund the full amount but still send it to me next week.

Well that's still super cool that you're getting essentially a free copy. Sounds like a win! :)
 
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