[rating=9.00] “El Jefe”
Ash is back, and holy hell, is it groovy to see him.
The Evil Dead series is one of the more remarkable works of modern camp classics, with an ever expanding base of fans that welcome more and more members into its fold with each passing year. It’s timeless in every sense of the word, and three generations of horror fans have now been caught in its delightful grip.
It’s a cultural touchstone, with its amazing effects, brilliant direction, incredible gore, and unparalleled hilarity. Rare is the film that transcends its low-budget nature to become a classic, but Evil Dead and its sequels have become just that, serving now as a sort of rite of passage for adolescents and cool kids the world over. Now, with the premiere of Starz’s Ash vs. Evil Dead, which had already received the greenlight for a second season before the first episode ever aired, you can expect that the series will be around for yet another generation to fall in love with.
Note perfect. That’s the phrase that came to mind not even three minutes into the series premiere, “El Jefe,” and it stayed with me throughout the entire episode. Despite being three decades removed from the original, everything you ever loved about Evil Dead is brought to life once more. This isn’t just a great follow up to the original Evil Dead series, it’s the most Evil Dead thing I’ve ever witnessed, becoming the very apotheosis of creator Sam Raimi’s masterful vision.
With “El Jefe,” we’re introduced to two separate stories which, I’m sure, will come together as the series progresses. The first is centered around Bruce Campbell’s Ash, who’s 30 years older, 30 pounds fatter, and just as lovingly pathetic as he’s ever been. The second involves Detective Amanda Fisher, a cop who has just survived a horrifying encounter with the deadites.
Ash lives alone in a trailer park, trying his best to hide out and lay low lest he call the deadites’ attention. He drinks juice from boxes, works in a shitty retail job (not S-Mart, but an even lower class shitty retail job), and trolls dive bars picking up women with stories about losing his hand rescuing an 8 year old boy from the path of a speeding train. (“In a lot of ways, he saved me,” he says to an unsuspecting barfly.) One night, after an evening of stoned revelry with a low-class beauty, he reads from the Necronomicon Ex Mortis in an attempt to show off his knowledge of poetry. Now, his worst fears have come to life.
Thinking he can just run away from his problems, he attempts to pick up his paycheck and high tail it out of town. Thanks to an over-the-top “bad guy manager” however, he’s forced to work one last shift before he can leave. Here, we meet Pablo (Ray Santiago), a young man who idolizes Ash as “the coolest part” of the job. Pablo is dismayed to learn that his hero is on the way out of town and implores him to stay by telling him that he just got his neighbor hired, giving Ash one more ally in the fight against their hardass manager.
His neighbor, Kelly (Dana DeLorenzo), immediately incites Ash’s romantic interest, and he tries to pick her up, telling her to thank her mother for passing down her perfect genes. Her mother apparently died 6 months ago, however, and she quickly puts Ash in his place and lets him know that she’ll have no problems cutting off his other hand. She’s pretty much perfect, actually. She’s strong on her own and has no time for bullshit. While her role in “El Jefe” is decidedly slim, it should be fun to watch her grow as the series progresses.
In the stock room, where Ash is dutifully doing what he can to avoid working, the deadites have finally zeroed in on our hero, causing a hilarious showdown between our hero and a possessed “Little Lorrie” doll. This is a scene that’s as packed with Evil Deadness as any scene in the entire saga. On the one hand, it’s hilarious to see a grown man have a fight to the death with such a tiny creature. On the other, Little Lorrie is actually scary as hell as she bites his nose, attempts to gouge his eyes, and runs at him with a box cutter. Just as she’s about to make her killing move, Pablo saves the day by smashing the doll into a bloody pulp with a shovel. Having nowhere to turn, Ash finally tells his tale.
Aficionados will note that Ash’s recap seems to combine elements of both Evil Dead and Evil Dead 2, retconning the whole they’re-basically-the-same-movie problem that we, as fans, tend to just not talk about. They’ll also note that no mention is made to the events of Army of Darkness in his recounting. In fact, there’s only the slightest reference to the events of that movie early on in the episode when Ash notes that his fake hand was “crafted by Italian artisans.” I wonder if we’re getting to this later, or if we’re just ignoring that it ever happened? We’ll find out as the season moves on, I’m willing to bet.
After hearing Ash’s tale, Pablo tells a story about his uncle, El Brujo, who used to preach that one day evil would rise to take over the earth, and that only one man, known as El Jefe, would stand up to fight their forces. Ash wants nothing to do with any of this, however, and runs from the store in order to just leave town.
Kelly, meanwhile, is on the phone with her father, who’s freaking out because little signs are popping up around the house that her mother has returned to him. When their phone conversation is abruptly cut off, she and Pablo take it upon themselves to try to save him, narrowly escaping as the deadite forces that descend upon the store, finally taking care of their hardass manager.
Pablo and Kelly arrive at Ash’s trailer, much to Kelly’s dismay as she views Ash as just a hapless jackass who can’t do anything right (well, she’s not really wrong). As the deadite forces surround their trailer, Ash finally takes his call to heroics to heart, and for the first time we see Ash as we remember him: a badass, shotgun wielding, chainsaw handed monster slayer who has no problem blowing the heads off undead forces with a witty quip and a smile. El Jefe has arrived.
On the other side of the story, we meet Detective Fisher and her partner as they investigate a call to a dark house in a dark forest. There, the two find a couple of bodies and one survivor. The survivor is the same girl Ash had previously tried to impress with his “poetry” earlier in the episode. Immediately, we know this won’t end well. The survivor quickly sheds her normal appearance and twists her head and arms completely backwards and runs at the detectives. This is one of the creepier images of the entire episode and it’s chock full of Raimi’s unique style and joie de vivre. Fisher’s partner is impaled upon a set of giant antlers, leaving Fisher alone to contend with the monster in the house. Just as she wins that battle, she finds her partner has been possessed by the same forces.
This is the impetus of one of the most imaginative and creative scenes in the entire episode, nay, the entire Evil Dead series. During her scuffle with her now deadite partner, she drops her flashlight on the floor and it begins to spin. This creates a rather unique slow-strobing effect that perfectly heightens the tension and fear of the scene. It’s a testament to the creative genius of Raimi, who really ought to be working more than he is of late. He’s a director who makes the best use of his tricks and, as a result, gets away with a lot more than he should.
Fisher is put on leave as her superiors investigate the shootings, and may have to undergo a psych evaluation to determine her suitability for police work. Like any rational person, she doesn’t believe what she has seen, but deadites appear to her in random visions—for instance, taking over a little girl in a diner where she has breakfast. She can’t believe her eyes, she tells a random stranger, who worries over her nervous look. “Sometimes what you think you saw is exactly what you saw,” the stranger, played by Lucy Lawless in an as yet nameless role. (Also? HOLY SHIT LUCY LAWLESS AND BRUCE CAMPBELL ARE REUNITED OMGOMGOMG!) This inspires the old investigative spirit in Detective Fisher, who journeys back to the house and determines that, yes, what she thinks went down is actually what happened.
It was an amazing first outing for Ash vs. Evil Dead and portends great things to for the new series. Raimi’s distinctive flair is felt all over, recalling the most memorable aspects of the first two films while creating a few more in the process. So far, this is a series that fans will adore but it manages to be introductory enough to allow the uninitiated to jump in without context. It’s a fine line to walk, but Raimi and co. walk it beautifully to create a stunning new entry into the Evil Dead series. Grab your boomsticks and strap on your chainsaws, ladies and gentlemen, you’re in for a wild ride.
