Evil Dead was part one of a trilogy, part two on its way

After unveiling itself to the world with some absolutely crazy trailers, Evil Dead had a lot to live up to. Not only did it have to be able to stand with Sam Raimi’s films, but it needed to justify that crazy awesome tongue-splitting makeout session thing. If the review from our boys over at South by Southwest is any indication, the team succeeded. I am extremely excited for the film’s wide release.

And now they’re going up against the big one. Sure, The Evil Dead was an awesome film, but The Evil Dead 2 is really the film that everyone remembers. As it turns out, this new vision of the crazy cabin escapades is part of a trilogy, and the writing duo of Fede Alvarez and Rodo Sayagues Mendez are already hard at work on the sequel. There isn’t much information about where things are going to go from here, and I can’t speak to how open the film’s ending is, but I can’t say I’m unhappy with this. 

Which is really kind of weird, actually…

The idea of films being made with the intention of creating trilogies is a sketchy one, and it’s something that we’ve been talking about a bit behind the scenes since the news broke about  the already-in-production Oz. The guaranteed franchise-ization of properties is one of the signs that Hollywood (as well as the games industry, for what it’s worth) is falling to creative pieces, but there’s something about this is particular that just feels fine.

Maybe it’s because this isn’t a Hollywood film, and it’s made by people who really care. I mean, Sam Raimi doesn’t even want to return to direct an Oz sequel, but the company will charge ahead anyway. I really don’t like that at all. But maybe it’s because there is already a trilogy that this is emulating. The Texas Chainsaw reboot went all kinds of crazy with adding prequels and sequels and whatever, but there wasn’t really a precedent for that (though Tobe Hooper’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, given its comedic slant, could actually been seen in the same vein as The Evil Dead 2). Here it feels more natural.

Or maybe it’s just that the film sounds really awesome (and Oz the Great and Powerful does not). I don’t really know. 

It will be interesting to see if Alvarez and co. follow the same Horror->Horror Comedy->Comedy structure that Raimi did. I don’t know if that would be good, but it would certainly be interesting. I’d like to know how Alvarez and Mendez would add in comedy. I’d like to know if that’s something they’re even capable of making comedy. But it would probably be best if they kept to their own devices and just made it better and better horror. I mean, we’ve already got Army of Darkness 2 on the way anyhow. Do we really need another one?

Trick question, by the way. The answer is yes. Hell yes.