MYTHICITY: *good*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *drama*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTION: *metaphysical, psychological*
When Satan tempted Jesus, the devil offered all the dominions of the Earth before being refused. Ash Williams didn't refuse, but then he wanted a much simpler prize from his tempter Ruby Knowby: just to live a bacchanalian existence in Jacksonville Florida with his boon buddies Kelly and Pablo. ln fairness, Ruby also promised the hero that she could control the Evil Dead, which Ash had never been able to do. So his decision was made, at least partly, in the hope that Ruby could control the foul spirits like a Boss of Bosses reining in lesser gangsters.
HOME-- Rather, what Ash wants is a home away from his real home, and Jacksonville fits the bill. While Ash is enjoying a party with Florida residents who all adulate him, he almost scores with a hot mother-daughter pair. But the mother and daughter turn into Deadites and start a riot. It's later revealed that Ruby sent the evil spirits to summon Ash and his friends to aid her, though she's pretty roundabout in the way she tells him to seek her out in his old home town, Elk Ridge. On the way back to Michigan, Pablo, whose visions have been in abeyance since the truce, begins to suffer from his earlier exposure to the Necronomicon. In Elk Ridge Ash suffers the slings and arrows of outraged locals, who believe him guilty of the cabin-murders from thirty years ago. He meets old girlfriend Linda, now married to the local sheriff, and has an acrimonious encounter with his father Brock (a perfectly cast Lee Majors). Team Ash meets a now powerless Ruby, whose demon-children, formerly the base of her power, have turned on, hoping to bring their demon-father Baal to the earth-plane.
THE MORGUE-- For some damn reason, Ruby hid the Necronomicon inside a corpse at the local morgue, so Ash and Kelly go corpse-diving, without even knowing which body to look in, thus leading to lots of ghastly gooeyness. Ruby hints of a ritual that can divest Pablo of his connection to the evil book. Ash spots his old teacher/lover Lillian (Carmen Duncan), with whom he had relations back in high school, but he's aggravated to learn that Brock is now dating her. (Ash hints that his father, being as lascivious as Ash is, tended to steal his girlfriends.) However, at the morgue the hero learns that Lillian's been dead some time, so he and his friends rush to Brock's house to destroy the Deadite. The good guys defeat Deadite Lillian, but Ash makes the boner of leaving the book, so painstakingly acquired in the morgue, inside his car, after which a couple of naughty teenagers steal both car and book.
LAST CALL-- Ash, desperate to recover his car, "the Delta," from the thieves, co-ordinates a big party at the bar of his childhood buddy Chet (Ted Raimi). It doesn't work. The two thieves hang out with some of their friends, including Lacey (Pepi Sonuga), daughter of Linda and Sheriff Emery. and one of them, Amber (Olivia Mahood) gets possessed-- and so does the Delta itself, keeping the other teens imprisoned or killing them. Amber seeks out Ash'party and comes on to both Ash and Brock. Their Oedipal conflict inspires them to compete to ride the bar's mechanical bull, and Ash is humiliated when his father wins. However, when like his son Brock tries to get some nookie in a restroom, Amber tries to kill him. Ash dispatches the Deadite, so that Brock finally realizes that his son really has contended with demons, and that Brock can finally show pride in his offspring. But the bonhomie is short-lived, for the possessed Delta, now carrying Lacey inside it, shows up at the bar and kills Brock by running him down.
DUI-- As much as Ash loves his car, he's obliged to pursue the possessed vehicle. Pablo overtakes the Delta first, and for some unknown reason, the evil auto allows Pablo to join Lacey, keeping both prisoners. Ash squares off against the Delta in a demolition derby arena, at one point getting atop the car's hood and "riding" it as his father rode the mechanical bull (with a hilarious imaginary dialogue with Dead Brock), before smashing the engine with his chainsaw. The car releases Lacey and Pablo, and when Pablo brings the book with him, it comes alive and tells him he can be rid of the tome by casting it into the car's trunk. Sure enough, Ash and Pablo find a portal to hell inside the Delta's trunk, and they consign the book thereto-- which of course does not solve their problems in the least.
CONFINEMENT-- Ash is arrested for having killed Amber, and the whole town believes him a serial killer, except possibly Linda. Emery locks up Ash and Chet. However, Ruby's traitor children have succeeded in summoning Baal to Earth, and he invades the jail by flaying the skin from a local cop and wearing it. (Why he can't just use simple illusion like other Evil Dead spirits, I do not know.) Ruby, Pablo and Kelly hold everyone in the jail at gunpoint trying to figure out Baal's identity. However, when Ruby separates from the group to retrieve the magic dagger Ash acquired from the cabin, Baal meets her and beats her down. Baal apparently leaves and so do the heroes, but in truth Baal has turned Emery into a vessel of his will.
TRAPPED INSIDE-- The allies return to Brock's house to attempt exorcising the book's influence from Pablo, with the aim of also defeating Baal. But through the vessel of Emery, Baal has convinced the whole town that Ash is a murderer, and the people gather outside the house, demanding Ash's surrender. For good measure, Baal revives Ash's sister Cheryl (Ellen Sandweiss) as a Deadite, even though her remains ought to be back in the forest. Since one of Brock's resentments of Ash stemmed from the belief that Ash murdered his own sister, this was obviously done to break the hero's spirit. Instead, Ash enthusiastically chainsaws the simulacrum, in such a way that the townsfolk learn that Ash really is a demon-slayer. However, Baal assumes another human guise and knocks out Ash.
DELUSION-- There's nearly no transition between the last episode and this one; Ash simply wakes up in an asylum and meets Doctor Peacock, who claims that all of Ash's experiences have simply been psychotic delusions. Peacock even shows the disbelieving hero a puppet made in Ash's own image. Ash also sees illusory versions of Pablo, Kelly and Ruby in the asylum, while on the outside the real allies are converging on the building. Ash is finally broken by the brainwashing and swears to re-acquire the book for Baal.
ASHY SLASHY-- The trio enters the asylum and meets Emery, who has made a deal with Baal to free his daughter Lacey. However, Lacey shows up at the bughouse as a Deadite and breaks her father's neck. Ash collars Pablo and forces him to go before Baal, who thinks he can use the book's imprints upon Pablo's body for his own purposes. Ash then reveals that he was never mentally dominated, he wanted Baal and Pablo in the same room so that Ruby could exorcise the demon. However, though Baal is apparently expelled, in taking his leave he manages to cut Pablo in half, killing him.
HOME AGAIN-- Broken hearted at the loss of Pablo-- whose bagged remains Ash keeps in his car-- Ash hits upon a solution. Since he previously used magic forces to travel to another time in ARMY OF DARKNESS, why not travel back to the past and stop his younger self from ever unleashing the Evil Dead? Ruby makes this possible, and soon they're back in the early 1980s. However, when the heroes arrive in the forest, Ash finds that Professor Knowby is now seeking to control the book's power, which has already possessed his wife and which the prof hopes to channel into the body of Tanya, a college student. Ash foolishly releases possessed Henrietta Knowby, resulting in chaos in the cabin while outside Ruby and Kelly seek to prevent their suffering the fate of Original EVIL DEAD: being raped by trees.
SECOND COMING-- Knowby doesn't escape, as he's killed by the Ruby of 1982-- whose surname of "Knowby" was apparently nothing but a jape, as the two are not related. Kelly and the 2016 Ruby arrive at the cabin. 2016 Ruby tries to tell 1982 Ruby that both Baal and Ruby's children will betray her, but 1982 Ruby simply kills her later incarnation. Ash and Kelly flee, but they get evidence of timeline-change when Ash regrows his missing hand. Also, Pablo comes back to life-- but wait, it's really Baal, who hid his essence in Pablo's corpse. Baal resumes his usual form and lets Ash and Kelly watch as Baal and 1982 Ruby seek to unleash all the Evil Dead upon Earth. Ash buys time by challenging Baal to a fistfight, and the amused demon consents, knowing that he can always cheat as he pleases. But Ash and Kelly turn the tables, banishing the demons to Hell and reviving Pablo for real. The season ends with Ash being feted by the citizens of Elk Grove for his deeds, though somehow 2016 Ruby is still around and planning more trouble for Season 3.
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