If you're not aware yet, the Evil Dead franchise has spawned a brand-new movie unrelated to anything that's come before it. But here's the real kicker, it's a really great film!

And you might be thinking, "Didn't they already try that?" and they did in 2013, which served as a remake of the original. Some might feel like it needs a sequel, but disappointed others want to know, how does this new film compare?

Setups

Evil Dead Rise (1)
Warner Bros. Pictures

Evil Dead saw a group at a cabin in the woods trying to help one of the main characters' sister, Mia, dry out from her drug addiction. Things quickly go from 0 to 100 as they find about fifty dead cats all strung up in the basement and what is clearly a burning pyre for some unfortunate soul.

Somehow though, their first reaction isn't to get as far away from there as possible or, at the very least, call the police to report a crime scene. By comparison, the latest entry, Evil Dead Rise, opens with our protagonist Beth coming home to her sister's family after touring in the rock n roll world.

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How Good Are the Characters?

Alyssa Sutherland in Evil Dead Rise
Warner Bros. Pictures

There isn't much to talk about here. Horror has never really been a genre with characters with much more than a rough sketch of who they are. If you remember something unique or distinct about them, that's a win. Evil Dead may be seen as a failure in this regard by having characters who are pretty forgettable.

Other than the best actress in it, Jane Levy, everyone else comes across as pretty flat or one-note without any real memorable traits beyond this is the brother character, and this is the dumb character who reads the scratched-out words for fun. It subverts what you expect by making them such ordinary people you don't remember them in the slightest.

Evil Dead Rise also has outlines more so than distinct personalities. But at least those outlines get used for something related to the plot. Beth is a music tech; she fixes the vinyl that wannabe DJ Danny broke in summoning evil. Family dynamics are at play here that actually get used in the horror sequences instead of being a forgettable plot point.

When Things Get Real

Evil Dead Rise chainsaw
Warner Bros.

Every Evil Dead movie can be considered something of a descent into madness. The real substance of these films is the gore and the memorable lines, which means this is the most important criterion. This film harkens back to the first movie, making you wait for the crazy moments.

Sure, you have your initial possession sequence and the little tease at the beginning of the film, but a lot of the early violence happens off-screen, with your imagination doing much of the work. There's a lot of waiting between big scenes as well that feel like they give time to building a mood and atmosphere that horror movies deeply need.

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Where Evil Dead is heating up as early as the 30-minute mark, giving you a torrent of blood vomit and face-slicing Glasgow smiles, Rise chose to have the deadites play mind games like playfully selecting who gets a tattoo and pretending being drenched in the blood of flatmates is normal. Evil Dead Rise also managed to backload the best stuff in the movie to that final climax.

A reward for keeping with it is an undeniable nod to The Shining and a disgusting body horror mashup that looks vaguely like Squidward from that episode where he gets fused to Spongebob's body. Evil Dead dished out an Alma lookalike who crawls up from the ground and then gets chainsawed in the face in what is definitively the best scene in the movie.

It's not a bad take, but it is a blander one than Rise, where you get that wacky performance on top of the horror in a scene that both amuses and shocks. For a series with Three Stooges jokes and severed hands that flip a bird, the latter fits better with what's been done.

Evil Dead as a series does not benefit from being a rather bland horror film. The outrageousness has always been its strong suit, and this film embraces elements of that with the playful humor of the deadites returning and the rather spectacle feel of it compared to the serious Evil Dead of 2013.

Part of what made the film so creepy was how Ellie played with her victims mercilessly. It's not enough to kill them; she has to torture them first, which is an element sorely lacking in the 2013 film, where the deadites stumble around acting more like mindless zombies than anything more sinister.

All in all, Evil Dead Rise is the far groovier film. It's something totally different. It gets the tone just right, the camera work and lighting are phenomenal, and you should drop everything to see for yourself just how crazy this film is once it gets going.