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Evil Dead Rise is finally upon us, and as much as fans are excited to see how the new installment will fare against its predecessors, they might be disappointed to that it doesn’t use any elements from the Ash vs. Evil Dead.
Cronin has a valid reason for avoiding the popular plotlines from the series, as he mentioned in an interview with ComicBook that he wants the movie to be a part of a straightforward continuity with Sam Raimi’s original.
“Giving you a really candid answer, I intentionally didn’t pay any heed to the television series, even though I’m a big fan of it and a big fan of everything. I really was just looking at the canon within the movies, that’s where my focus was. From that point of view, it’s not impossible equally that the story in Ash vs. Evil Dead is taking place somewhere else without an awareness in terms of my story.
For me, it’s actually quite simple, and I went to Sam Raimi and said, ‘There’s three books as shown in Army of Darkness. You’ve used one book, Fede [Álvarez] used one book. I’m going to take the third book and open up that other avenue.’ Sam really liked that idea because at least it drew a line between the existence of this third book and its appearance in this story in Evil Dead Rise back in time. So there is that connection there.”
The Necromonicon covers three volumes, which is a new addition to the lore made in Evil Dead Rise, which Cronin revealed creates a direct connection throughout Raimi’s trilogy and the 2013 remake, tying the franchise together like never before.
“I look at it in terms of Sam’s movies, you’ve got 1 and 2 followed by 3, which is back in time but on that same stretch of timeline. Then you jump forward to 10 years ago, you’ve got Fede’s movie and then you jump another 10 years forward and you’ve got this movie. So to me, they’re in a straight line, and it’s referenced in the movie by the priest, Littleton, on the vinyl and his awareness that they found one of the three Books of the Dead.
They’re aware of the lore, but this particular book, we don’t know where it’s appeared in the past and it’s certainly been locked away for many, many years until this point in time when it appears post-earthquake and when Danny uncovers it. So to me, it’s happening not alongside, it’s just happening in the here and now, but everything that’s happened before could also have happened and taken place.”
Whatever might be the reason, the film’s connection to the franchise sounds more gripping and haunting and it would definitely be worth the watch.