Thanks to Entertainment Weekly, we’ve got our first real image from Starz’s upcoming horror-comedy series Ash Vs. Evil Dead, which finds Bruce Campbell’s chainsaw-handed Deadite slayer returning to his badass ways after a 22-year hiatus. And in hilarious fashion, it reveals that Ash, after all these years, is still just a stock boy facing down dastardly demons when they again menace humanity.
“He was perfectly happy doing basically nothing: telling lies about how he lost his hand in bars late at night,” Campbell tells EW. “That was basically his MO. So, he’s not really the guy who should be dealing with this right now. But…he is. He’s our guy!”
This time around, Ash recruits fellow Value Stop employees Pablo (Ray Santiago) and Kelly (Dana Delorenzo) to help him take on the Deadite hordes.
“It’s The Searchers with carnage and mayhem,” sayss Campbell. “I’m relegated a little bit into the John Wayne mode these days with my team—the young, virile, evil fighters who will pair up with Ash and take on this nemesis: this never ending, ever evolving nemesis.”
Sam Raimi, who directed the original Evil Dead, is still involved as an exec-producer and also helmed the first episode of the 10-episode freshman season. He said of Ash, who’s apparently responsible for once again unleashing the evil dead on the world:
“He’s the only one stupid enough to really tamper with those spirits. And he does. But he’s also still a really good monster fighter. So, he’s also going to be kicking some deadite buttocks, if you’ll pardon the French.”
In Ash Vs. Evil Dead, the Deadites get an added boost of zombie menace, appearing as a plague on humanity that threatens to wipe everyone out. It’s up to Ash, Pablo and Kelly to save the day. Along the way, he’ll encounter a disgraced state trooper (Jill Marie Jones) who blames Ash for her partner’s death, and the mysterious Ruby (Lucy Lawless), who believes Ash is the cause of the Deadite outbreak.
Starz premieres the show this fall.
