With the past two movies taking a separate approach to keeping the franchise alive, director Sébastien Vaniček is careful about addressing whether the new Evil Dead movie will connect to previous installments. The French filmmaker, who recently made his feature directorial debut with the spider-focused horror movie Infested (titled Vermins in France), was announced as the next helmer of the Sam Raimi franchise in February 2024, nearly a year after Rise broke multiple records. In addition to directing, Vaniček will also be co-writing with his Infested partner Florent Bernard.

During a recent interview with Screen Rant for the Shudder premiere of Infested, Vaniček was asked about the development of his Evil Dead movie. In addition to praising Raimi’s willingness to give him full creative control and break the rules of the franchise, the co-writer/director was cautious in responding to whether the spinoff will connect to any previous installments, confirming that everything is on the table for them, but that they are in “the early process of the writing” and, as such, are still nailing down the specifics of what the movie will be. See what Vaniček shared below:

I would love to answer this question, but we are in the early process of the writing, so we have so many questions. We just wrote stuff with my co-writer, it’s the same co-writer I wrote Infested with, so I’m working with my team, I’m really glad. But we are in the process of building our story, our characters and everything, and we are chatting with each other. There’s so many ideas coming from everywhere. For the moment, we are in the sandbox, and we haven’t started to build a castle, we are just gathering the best sand, and as soon as I have the best sand, I will start to build a castle.

The Next Evil Dead Movie Should Continue Rise’s Best Trick

Though Ash vs. Evil Dead ultimately returned the focus to Bruce Campbell’s iconic horror hero, the franchise’s return to audiences has largely leaned on focusing on new characters within the world, all of whom discover the terrors that lie within the Necronomicon Ex-Mortis. Some audiences lamented the loss of Ash as the focus character, and yet, still ultimately approved of the new stories expanding the universe of Raimi’s creation. Check out how the various Evil Dead Rotten Tomatoes scores compare below:

With a variety of potential directions to choose from, Vaniček’s best path for the new Evil Dead movie would be to follow in Rise‘s footsteps. The 2023 movie confirmed the existence of multiple Necronomicons in the world, as previously teased by Army of Darkness, and a variety of people in the past who had encountered them. Evil Dead Rise writer/director Lee Cronin even previously indicated that Bruce Campbell’s vocal cameo in the movie could have been Ash himself, thanks to the character’s time-traveling shenanigans:

There is a Bruce Campbell cameo, and that cameo potentially is actually Ash Williams. Think about how time works for Ash as a character, and that voice that you may hear is captured on something that was recorded 100 years ago. And the fact that his particular line is a warning showcases somebody that knows more than the other people in the room… I know that sounds very cryptic, but it’s supposed to.

Where the 2013 movie sought to reintroduce the franchise to new audiences and establish the potential for Campbell to return in an Army of Darkness 2 and crossover with Jane Levy’s character, Evil Dead Rise smartly did away with any of these direct sequel setups and left things more open to audience interpretation and hope. Should Vaniček avoid making his Evil Dead movie directly connected to any previous installments, he could continue this path of telling new and subversive stories for the franchise that keeps the door open for other up-and-coming filmmakers to bring their take to the property.

Evil Dead

Created by Sam Raimi, Evil Dead is a horror-comedy franchise that began with the release of the original film, The Evil Dead, in 1981. The series follows protagonist Ashley “Ash” Williams as he and his friends venture into a cabin for a vacation only to discover it harbors a demonic book that can summon terrifying creatures known as Deadites, hell-bent on torturing and slaying them all. As the series progresses, Ash becomes more of a masculine B-movie action hero until the soft reboot helmed by Eli Roth occurs, which shifts the franchise deeper into its horror roots.

Cast

Bruce Campbell , Jane Levy , Shiloh Fernandez , Lily Sullivan , Nell Fisher , Ray Santiago , Dana DeLorenzo

Character(s)

Ashley Williams , Mia Allen , David Allen , Bethany Bixler , Kassie Bixler , Pablo Simon Bolivar , Kelly Maxwell

Video Game(s)

Evil Dead: Hail to the King , Evil Dead: A Fistful of Boomstick , Evil Dead: Regeneration , Evil Dead: The Game