Ash vs. Evil Dead - "Bait"

Welcome back! It’s week two of our Ash vs. Evil Dead recap and Ash is fully back in sardonic hero mode. After things really went to hell last week, Kelly and Pablo have no choice but to believe Ash and now they have to decide what to do with that information. The three end up at Kelly’s parents house where her mother, missing and presumed dead for months, has returned home claiming that she’s been living in a homeless shelter with amnesia. Could this unlikely story be true, or is the Evil just toying with Ash? Meanwhile, Amanda Fisher, a suspended officer on a mission to figure out what happened to her partner, makes her way to the trailer park that Ash has been living in and talking to his neighbors about the mysterious man who abruptly pulled up roots and left some pretty gnarly bodies in his wake.

There is a lot to unpack this week starting with the new dynamic that this plot has afforded to Bruce Campbell by being stuck with his young compatriots. In Kelly, we have a young woman who is not impressed by Ash’s charm (or lack thereof) and isn’t going to take his shit – a distinct departure from most of the female counterparts in the previous films. With Pablo, we get a prodigy relationship in a way that only Evil Dead could do it. Ash may impart wisdom and advice, but all of it is delivered with what has come to be signature sarcasm and cynicism. The plot of this show, and the broad reach of the Evil means that fans get to see typical Evil Dead setups happening in locations that are wholly normal, bringing the story out of the cabin in the woods. This creates for some absurd situations where we get to watch the “real world” run headlong into what we love from the movies.

The scene where Fisher goes to the trailer park is just one such scene and allows us to check back in with her character, a wholly new element in a somewhat familiar story. Here is a character who has just come face to face with the Deadites but doesn’t quite understand them yet. When she talks to neighbors they describe Ash as a real jerk and once a sketch is made up one neighbor comments, “He looks way dumber in real life,” playing on Bruce Campbell’s goofy charm and looks.

The finale of the episode is really where Ash vs. Evil Dead gets to do what it does best and pulls reference after reference to the original films. Our hero knows right away that Kelly’s mother is a Deadite, but his two prodigies refuse to believe him. In his efforts to convince Pablo, he speaks to his “conflicting emotions” when he was younger, no doubt referring to his difficulty killing Linda once she had been changed. Kelly’s mother, similarly, changes back and forth and tricks Kelly into trusting her even after she has become a Deadite before them all. The camera work during the finale is also reminiscent of earlier work of Raimi’s with shots that twist and contort, holding the character just off balance at the center.

We’re 2/2 so far, let’s see if they can keep it up!

Lasting thought:  We learn through a throwaway line that the movie is set in Michigan which, you may remember is where Ash and his friends were from (think Linda’s Michigan State sweatshirt and Mia’s sweatshirt in the remake). Michigan State is also Raimi’s alma mater.

Sophie

Contributor

Sophie's introduction into the magic that is the horror genre was watching Halloween at a party in high school, and since then she's never looked back. She may be the wimpiest horror fan you have ever met, but she won't ever let that stop her!