October 26, 2015

Do you guy realize that we’re a mere few days away from the premiere of ASH VS EVIL DEAD on Starz?! If you’re fixin’ to see where we last left Ashley J. Williams (the great Bruce Campbell), the fine fiends over at Scream Factory have got you covered.

Now available on a 3-disc set is the ultimate Blu-Ray collector’s edition of ARMY OF DARKNESS, complete with 4 (!) different versions of the movie, all of the commentaries and special features from all previous editions carted over, and most importantly, a brand-new 97 minute documentary courtesy of Michael Felsher’s Red Shirt Pictures, edited by TALES OF HALLOWEEN co-director Andrew Kasch.

If you’re a collector, then no doubt you’ve seen the Red Shirt logo come up at the end of some of your favorite special features and MIDEVIL TIMES: THE MAKING OF ARMY OF DARKNESS is among one of their best!

As much as I know about this franchise as a die-hard EVIL DEAD fan, there’s always plenty of fun new things to be discovered. Here are just 5 little tid-bits we learned from the feature length doc on the disc.

‘ARMY OF DARKNESS’ WAS ORIGINALLY MIDEVIL DEAD & INTENTED TO BE THE 2ND MOVIE

In a new interview, Bruce Campbell reveals that the idea for ARMY OF DARKNESS was always intended to be their sequel to EVIL DEAD. It was far too ambitious at that point in their careers to tackle what they referred to as MIDEVIL DEAD, so that’s why EVIL DEAD 2 is in essence a remake of the original. That film did well overseas, and Sam Raimi had just started a great working relationship with Universal hot on the tails of their success together with DARKMAN that they finally decided to bring MIDEVIL DEAD to life in 1992. The title changed from MIDEVIL DEAD to EVIL DEAD 3 to finally ARMY OF DARKNESS. Campbell notes that he finds it hilarious in retrospect that a major studio was willing to put $11 million dollars into a movie with the character like Ash as the lead considering he’s terrible at being a hero. (But hey, he ended up being the king, so hail to the king baby.)

TED RAIMI PLAYS 4, MAYBE 5 ROLES IN ‘ARMY OF DARKNESS’

It’s pretty much a given that Sam Raimi’s little brother Ted Raimi always pops up in his movies. He endured lots of torture at the hands of Sam during EVIL DEAD 2 by playing Henrietta! Alas, even as savvy a fan as I am, I once counted 3 roles for Ted during the course of ARMY OF DARKNESS. Turns out there’s 4 on screen characters he plays. He points out he’s the S Mart stock boy, one of King Arthur’s men fighting by his side with an eye patch, then he’s frightened Lieutenant. In another scene, he’s brave Lieutenant saying, “you can count on my steel!” And he also voices several of the skeletons in the “army” during the climactic battle, so technically that’s 5 roles!

BILL MOSELEY ONCE WROTE A FAN LETTER TO SAM RAIMI

Unless you really look at the credits, it’d probably be difficult to spot famed horror celebrity Bill Moseley in ARMY OF DARKNESS. But he is Evil Ash’s right hand man. How he got the role? Moseley confesses to being a huge fan of EVIL DEAD 2, citing it as pretty much the greatest movie ever. (I agree with you, Bill!) He wrote a letter to Sam Raimi at the Universal offices while he was working on DARKMAN just saying what a fan he was and that he’d love to work with him in any capacity in the future. Turns out, Sam was also a fan of Moseley’s iconic performance as Chop Top in THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE 2. So, when ARMY OF DARKNESS came around, he offered him a role.

BRIDGET FONDA WAS ALSO A BIG EVIL DEAD FAN

By the time we get to the opening of ARMY OF DARKNESS, we are once again treated to a truncated version of the events from the first 2 EVIL DEAD movies, but we’re also introduced to the third Linda in the series! That’s right, 3 different actresses have played Ash’s girlfriend in the series. But for ARMY, it’s none other than Bridget Fonda, who apparently was a huge EVIL DEAD fan and simply requested any role in the new EVIL DEAD movie, no matter how small. Low and behold, she became Linda!

SAM RAIMI COMES UP WITH ASH’S ONE LINERS ON THE SPOT

Just judging from some of KNB’s amazing behind the scenes footage on these shoots, it’s fairly obvious that Sam Raimi likes to play. And considering his long term friendship with Bruce dating back to high school, he knows he can get away with a lot. Howard Berger claims that Bruce will do anything Sam asks on set, no matter how outlandish. Unfortunately for Bruce, Sam just loves to torture him, sometimes forcing the actor to do things that will never actually end up in the movie. However, when it comes to Ash’s quick-witted dialogue, that’s something that comes up while they’re rolling. While everything is of course scripted, Sam likes to keep the camera rolling and will often come up with crazy phases and lines for Bruce to say as Ash on the spot. And a good portion of the time, these lines not only end up in the movie, but become fan’s favorite and most quotable and memorable parts of the film.

I’m literally only scratching the surface on all the fun revelations regarding ARMY OF DARKNESS. As I mentioned previously, the documentary runs a good 97 minutes, so there’s plenty more to discover for yourself. Be sure to check out Scream Factory’s new Blu-Ray of ARMY OF DARKNESS before Starz unleashes ASH VS EVIL DEAD!