Who doesn’t love Bruce Campbell? Maybe all of my co-workers who didn’t know who he was when I said I was going to see him? Okay, probably them. But you, the nerd reading this, adores the man, as you very well should! After stealing our hearts as Ash in the Evil Dead films (and TV show, if you’re into that sorta thing), he also broke our hearts when, after cancellation of said TV show, Bruce said he was retiring from playing the handless bonehead.
However, last night in Milwaukee, after a screening of Evil Dead II, I got to ask the horror hero a question during the Q&A: Are you voicing Ash on that previously-announced, non-VR Evil Dead video game, since portraying Ash isn’t the same as playing Ash? To my surprise, he confirmed that he’s going to be voicing “every single syllable that comes out of Ash’s mouth.” Cue the room exploding.
Mr. Campbell also offered up some smaller details about the still-in-the-works game, saying that it’s “PC based” and that we’ll see it “certainly within a year.” He genuinely seems excited about the product and being able to voice Ash, too, as he told me he “needs to protect that idiot.” He then riffed a bit on players who search the same area for too long, and how he’ll get to yell “there’s nothing there!” in-game to those folks.
It should be noted that looking back at our previous coverage of the game, Bruce had said that it was also coming to consoles, so perhaps there’s been some sort of change along the way. Or maybe the actor’s just confused?
Whatever the case, I’m pretty excited to step into the role of Ash myself. The previous games based on Sam Raimi’s ambitious series have been fairly consistent in quality, and that quality was sub-optimal. It’s fun hearing Ash might pop up in a Mortal Kombat or whatever, but to play the man himself on his own turf would be the absolute best. Telling a deadite to “swallow this” while shoving that sawn-off in their demonic gullet sounds like a hell of a Friday night to me.
As always, we’ll be sure to let you know as soon as we hear more about this new Evil Dead game, but in the meantime, if you ever have the chance to see Bruce Campbell live, go for it. He’s effortlessly charming, barbed, but not mean, and sincere. He really is the embodiment of “groovy.”
