Bruce Campbell Talks Evil Dead and What He Thinks of the Remake!

It's been a long road for Evil Dead fans. Every couple of years there would be grumblings of a fourth picture and then...nothing. When the remake idea was first tossed around, it seemed like a bad Idea, Bruce Campbell being irreplaceable and all. It was easy to cry foul with something so close to our hearts until reality sets in. Do we really want an Evil Dead 4 after all these years? Don't bite my head off for this one, just being honest. Hell, look at Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls. All I'm saying is that sometimes that window of opportunity passes us by. There were a lot of names rumored to be attached to the role of Ash,  but I have to say, I did like the idea of Sean William Scott. Alas, Sam and the guys figured that any replacement characters would be met with resistance so they came up with new characters and set out to remake their classic. Bruce Campbell has watched the rough cut and speaks his mind about the film that holds a special place in our hearts.

"There's none of the original characters. We didn't want to compare apples with apples. It's a contemporary movie - just like Evil Dead was contemporary in 1979, this is contemporary for young adults now. It's basically five new kids who are going to have a really bad night with a brand new director - Fede Alvarez, who was handpicked by Sam Raimi. I've seen it already; I think it's definitely fabulous."

When asked about the fans and their possible reactions, Bruce had this to say; "We're really excited and really behind it, [but] it's going to take a bit to get the Evil Dead fans behind it. We know we've pissed a lot of them off. We appreciate that and we appreciate their anger and their zeal, but the only thing we want to impress upon them is that we didn't screw it up. This is going to be just as memorable as [the original] Evil Dead without being the same movie. You don't want to remake something shot-for-shot. I can't believe they remade Psycho - what the hell kind of a waste of celluloid is that? It's a creative medium."

So has Bruce Campbell said goodbye to Ash forever? Not necessarily, but he's straight forward about the possibility of playing Ash again. "I'll be honest with you, I don't know if I could - the last one was 1991. I was a virile young man; I'm 54 years old now so I'm not sure 54-year-old guys need to be doing that shit anymore. But if Sam wants to lace the boots back on and do something that makes sense, that's fine. We may need to do the movie one day, if our careers fly off the tracks and we crash and burn, we might look at each other and go 'Let's make an Evil Dead movie'!"

Bruce has a whole lot more to say. Get over to Digital Spy and check out the full interview.

Other Horrific Musings:

Everything old is new again: Evil Dead 2 25th Anniversary Disc

Closed for repairs: Hollywood’s dream factory shuts down

A lot of unhappy endings: MALEVOLENCE (2004)