“You shouldn’t have touched anything from that basement.”
– Mia (Jane Levy) in Evil Dead
There are certain tenets one must abide by if one wants to survive a horror film: don’t go alone, don’t say “I’ll be right back,” don’t touch the box, don’t read the forbidden words, and, of course, don’t go to the cabin in the woods. But audiences don’t necessarily go to see horror films for the characters to make the smart choice. Sometimes they go for the mayhem itself. With a brand-new entry in the Evil Dead franchise unleashed in 2026 (Burn) and a new one coming in 2028 (Wraith), it makes sense that some may want to revisit the starting point (of sorts) for this new era of bloody mayhem in director Fede Álvarez’s Evil Dead. Originally released in 2013, an uncut edition released in 2018 via Sony Pictures Home Entertainment and is now being re-released with all the previous legacy featurettes.
In a bid to get clean once and for all, Mia (Jane Levy) gathers her estranged half-brother, David (Shiloh Fernandez), his girlfriend, Natalie (Elizabeth Blackmore), and their friends, Eric and Olivia (Lou Taylor Pucci and Jessica Lucas, respectively), at the family cabin deep in the woods. The plan is for Mia to quit heroin cold turkey with the assembled individuals providing support throughout. While gathering with the best intentions, old resentments left to fester cast a pallor over the endeavor made even worse by the discovery of hidden objects left by unknown individuals who had used the cabin without the family’s knowledge. One such item: the Naturom Demonto from which no one should read and, of course, someone does.
The following home release review is based on a retail copy of the 2-disc Blu-ray provided by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment via Allied Vaughn Entertainment.
If you’re familiar with the Evil Dead series created by writer/director Sam Raimi (Send Help; Darkman), then you’re likely aware that these films are in a bit of a rights nightmare that has prevented any sort of all-encompassing collection to be released. The closest anyone’s gotten is the Evil Dead Groovy Collection which featured the first two films and the three-season television program on 4K UHD and Blu-ray from Lionsgate. Meanwhile, Shout! Studios/Radial Entertainment has been handling the 4K UHD edition of Evil Dead (2013) and the past 4K UHD release of Army of Darkness (1992), while Warner Bros. Pictures has Rise (2023), Burn, and Wraith. In October 2026, StudioCanal is releasing a brand-new 4K UHD edition of Evil Dead complete with physical bonuses and one new on-disc extra (others, of course, differing from the U.S. Blu-ray release). In short, there’s likely not going to be an option for one massive set, so it’s best to grab what you can where you can. If you’ve seen Evil Dead and have yet to add it to your collection, this 2-disc edition is the easier way to go and gets you more for your money than the Shout! edition. No fancy art or 4K UHD presentation, but you do get all the previously available bonus features from the past U.S. edition release *and* the uncut edition on its own disc. Speaking as someone who’s owned multiple copies of the original trilogy over the years, if you like one edit, it’s been fun to check out the others and see where the differences lie (sometimes presentation of violence, sometimes changes in dialogue). At present, the available U.S. 4K UHD editions don’t have the uncut edition in that format, so this is the only method of gaining access to this cut. The upcoming 4K UHD edition from StudioCanal reportedly does, but you’d have to import that in order to screen it. Until then, Blu-ray it is.
If you decide you want to stay with what’s available, be advised that the 2-disc set is the theatrical edition on one disc and the uncut edition on the other. The former has official art on the disc (a stylish hand-drawn-looking design), all the supplemental on-disc materials, and previews to open before accessing the menu. The latter is just the uncut edition with no materials of any kind. It’s pretty minimal as a presentation, but the highlight here is access to the different cut — pretty straightforward. The cover features a terrified Mia with the whole cover in red, a change from the cover featuring Mia wrestling with the tree branches or backframed in front of the cabin. It’s all pretty minimal, but gets the job done. As mentioned, this is a re-release of the 2018 edition, so don’t go into this expecting anything new with the momentum of Evil Dead properties growing. It’s what was already available and nothing more.
When Evil Dead first released, it was advised to me by EoM Editor Crystal Davidson that I not see it, that it was entirely too violent for me to handle. I frequently describe myself as “three chickens in a trenchcoat” when it comes to horror, so that makes sense. However, since 2020, I’ve immersed myself in horror so much that I regularly confront the darker sides of humanity and the spectral forces that may or may not surround us — though I do have a tender spot when it comes to trauma-based violence. So, yeah, Evil Dead is not at all a good time and it’s not one that I’d put on for “funnsies” in the same way that I would the original trilogy. This isn’t to imply that the original films are fun. In fact, the original The Evil Dead (1981) is quite dark, the violence coming for Ashley Williams (Bruce Campbell) and his friends, seeking them out well before they reach their cabin, and it doesn’t stop until they’ve all been consumed by the Deadite forces. What’s fascinating about Evil Dead is that it’s the closest in tone to the original since the original. Written by Álvarez (Alien: Romulus; Don’t Breathe) and Rodo Sayagues (Alien: Romulus; Don’t Breathe), and produced by Raimi’s Ghost House Pictures, this film is almost entirely cruel and it revels in it. Just as the first film is mostly humorless, so is this entry (originally touted as a remake/reboot and now treated as merely an extension of the larger Evil Dead universe of films). It cleverly finds a new reason for this crew to come to the isolated woods, as well as a reason to stay longer than they should (the possession of Mia believed to just be withdrawal symptoms at first), and even spins the expectations of the story by transforming the Mia-as-Cheryl and David-as-Ash dynamic into Mia-as-Ash by the end. However, the path to get there is mired by inconsistency and stupidity that defies internal narrative logic. It’s an Evil Dead film, so violence is coming and it’s going to be gnarly (at least it can be in the darker toned iterations), but there’s usually both intelligence and permanence. Here, Eric is the one to doom them all because finding something wrapped in heavy plastic and barbed-wire should absolutely be opened and read from, versus Ash and Scott (Richard DeManincor) who decide to play the record they find. One required a great deal of work to access, thereby committing them all to grisly deaths vs. starting a record which is simple an action that teases their curiosity, itself the thing that dooms them. The point is that it makes zero sense for Eric to do this as the signs are quite clear why one shouldn’t — yet, stupidity wins. The other issue is the lack of permanence to the violence the deadites inflict. I’m not talking about Natalie cutting off her poisoned arm a la Evil Dead II (1987), dying as a result of this and other wounds, but about Mia, who rises from the grave David places her in, freed from possession, and seemingly healed from all the wounds she caused herself while possessed. Even for Evil Dead, it’s a little hand-wavy. These choices are among the many within Evil Dead that convey a greater interest in mayhem hung upon the name of Evil Dead than in telling a story. So, yeah, the special effects are great and it made my skin more than crawl watching the mutilations caused intentionally or out of a need to survive, but it’s otherwise empty and uninteresting — which is the worst thing an Evil Dead story can and should be.
Despite the gruesome joy of Evil Dead Rise and the bleak destruction of Evil Dead Burn generating some real heat for the series, Evil Dead barely musters interest because it fails to do anything remarkable with the opportunity. It borrows on nostalgia by gathering similar characters at a familiar location wherein unsightly, horrible things happen to them, yet pushes things not at all. Truly, the only things going for it is that instead of a figureless, malevolent force, it introduces the concept of the Abomination, a Deadite being to be raised to cause destruction (similar but quite different from both Possessed Henrietta (Ted Raimi) and Evil Ash (Campbell)) *and* gives us Mia as a badass final figure. These are moments of expansion that push what Evil Dead is known for and make one excited for what comes next. It would just be great if we could be excited about what we *have,* too. To that end, if you are among the fans of the 2013 entry and you don’t yet have this 2-disc edition, you won’t be dissatisfied with the experience. Just pick it up while you can, where you can, because each new edition that drops makes the older ones harder to track down.
Evil Dead Theatrical Cut Special Features:
* Commentary featuring stars Jane Levy, Lou Taylor Pucci, Jessica Lucas, Director Fede Alvarez and writer Rodo Sayagues
* Directing the Dead – Director Fede Alvarez re-imagines a cult horror classic
* Evil Dead the Reboot – Cast Rehearsals, Bruce Campbell, Deadites AND MORE!
* Making Life Difficult – The Intense and Physically Exhausting Creation of the Film
* Unleashing the Evil Force – Exploring the origins and design of the new Book of the Dead
* Being Mia – The Physical and Psychological Transformation into Evil Mia
* Sony Pictures Previews
Available on 2-Disc Blu-ray October 23rd, 2018.
For more information, head to the official Sony Pictures Home Entertainment Evil Dead webpage.
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Categories: Home Video, Reviews, streaming
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