Army of Darkness (1992)
Let's get the heresy out of the way immediately: I have never quite understood the rabid, unquestioning devotion to Sam Raimi's Evil Dead franchise. While the world collectively worships at the altar of cabin-in-the-woods terror, I've found myself consistently underwhelmed by the lot. I said as much when I wrote about The Evil Dead (1981) and again when I covered Evil Dead II (1987). So when I say that Army of Darkness is the best of the trilogy, please understand that this is a backhanded compliment of the highest order.
What Raimi has essentially done here is shrug his shoulders and decide that if a haunted cabin in the woods worked twice, flinging the protagonist into a medieval castle might do the trick. It is a bold creative pivot, I'll grant him that. Whether it's a particularly successful one is another matter entirely.
The narrative is, to put it mildly, entirely ludicrous. We follow Ash Williams, played with his trademark chin-jutting bravado by Bruce Campbell, as he blunders through the Middle Ages in pursuit of a magical book. Rather than leaning into the genuine, claustrophobic dread of its predecessors, the film pivots hard into broad, slapstick fantasy. The acting across the board is remarkably poor, feeling less like a cohesive ensemble and more like a group of people desperately trying to out-shout each other. Campbell is game, certainly, and his committed physical comedy does carry the film further than it probably deserves. But even he can't entirely mask a script that frequently reads like a rough, unpolished draft of a Monty Python sketch, without quite landing the wit that comparison implies.
If there is a solitary redeeming quality to this chaotic romp, it lies in the practical makeup and special effects. The stop-motion skeletons and rubbery demonic prosthetics possess a certain tactile, handmade charm that modern, weightless CGI so often lacks. There's something genuinely appealing about effects you can feel the craft behind, however imperfect. Yet even here I have to temper my praise. The effects are merely serviceable, occasionally looking a bit cheap and unconvincing under the flat lighting of the soundstages. They provide a fleeting moment of visual interest, but they're hardly the groundbreaking wizardry the film's cult status would have you believe. Raimi would go on to demonstrate a far more confident command of spectacle when I think about what he achieved with Spider-Man (2002) a decade later, a film that shows just how much he grew as a director of large-scale, effects-driven storytelling.
What frustrates me most about Army of Darkness is precisely the thing its fans celebrate most: the gleeful, anarchic looseness of it all. I can appreciate that Raimi isn't taking any of this seriously. The problem is that the jokes need to actually land for that approach to work, and more often than not they don't. The comedic timing is off, the pacing lurches awkwardly between setpieces, and the whole thing has the slightly exhausting energy of someone doing an impression of a fun film rather than simply being one.
I can see why it has its defenders. There's a freewheeling spirit here that's at least preferable to a film that takes itself too gravely, and Campbell's sheer physical commitment to the role is never less than watchable. But for me, Army of Darkness remains a glaring example of a franchise that is arguably the most overhyped in horror history. It trades tight, suspenseful dread for a sprawling, disjointed adventure that rarely hits its marks with any real precision. Mildly diverting, yes. Fundamentally hollow, also yes.
Three stars.
Rating: ★★★ | Year: 1992 | Watched: 2026-08-01
Where to watch
Watch in the UK
Stream: MGM Plus Amazon Channel
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