***THIS REVIEW WAS ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON THE NERD BLITZ PATREON***
Currently, I have the 1st Dynamite Army Of Darkness omnibus and, probably because of the game & the new movie, I’ve been getting that Evil Dead itch lately.
So strap in, gang, cause I’m gonna be cracking this roughly 400 pager open and taking a look at each arc of it for your reading pleasure!
Evil Dead/Army Of Darkness, without a shadow of a doubt, is my absolute favorite horror franchise, I think this is well established.
But sometimes the shit we love doesn’t always translate well to a new medium, especially something like Army Of Darkness that is so specifically crafted on camera by Sam Raimi.
So how will this flick translate to comic form?
I say we take the dive together and find out.
Alright, Mr. & Mrs. Fancypants, this is your official ***SPOILER ALERT***
Covers by John Bolton: While all of them are cool, 1 & 3 are standouts for me.
The grittiness of 1 with the skeletons and shadows is so damn eye-catching.
And then with 3 you get a great horror fantasy mash-up with Ash in almost full armor battling evil Ash.
I’m really surprised we didn’t get the poster or a repaint of it for a cover, but I’m glad Bolton decided to go for all new images and make a couple more stand out images.
Art by John Bolton: It’s an interesting style that feels like charcoal or pastel repaintings on canvas of stills from the movie.
It’s not quite as big as the movie, performance wise, though.
It some how feels a bit more personal and intimate to me.
There’s a lot of great shadow work, which may lead to some of that intimacy.
Overall, Bruce and all of the other actors are represented well and it has a great vibrancy, so I dig it.
Story by Sam & Ivan Raimi, Adapted by John Bolton: We all know the story of Army Of Darkness, how Ashley J. Williams was transported through time at the end of Evil Dead 2 to the middle ages and bungled some goofy ass words leading to a small fiefdom being attacked by a horde of demons.
But what makes this comic adaptation unique is that it takes us inside of Ash’s head for some previously unknown internal monologues that give a great insight into who Ash REALLY is.
Particularly his complete and utter disdain for rich kids!
Not much is missing from this adaptation, the only thing I could really peg is the boiling water bit with the mini Ash.
I felt I needed to point this out to illustrate how faithful these three issues are because, looking back, Army Of Darkness is a fucking DENSE movie and it had to be hard as hell to condense it down.
But, in an impressive display, John Bolton did just that.
The only major difference of note is that the original ending, where Ash ends up in a bombed out shithole future, is present here.
Which is interesting, because I believe that this comic was published after so there appears to have been time to use the correct ending.
But I’m glad it ends this way, because it was years before this ending was actually avaliable to watch so it gives it a weird swerve that you don’t see coming.
I’ve not yet run across an Army Of Darkness or Evil Dead comic that I hated, and this one sticks true to form.
There are some good jokes, we get a strong insight into Ash, and it all comes together well.
If you can find this, singles or collected, and you dig the franchise, you’d be a real primitive screwhead to pass it up.,
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