This is an attempt to fanedit Army of Darkness to my personal liking, as I feel that none of the official cuts represent the best possible way to follow-up Evil Dead II and end-cap the Evil Dead Trilogy.

(NOTE: I originally planned to use “The Medieval Dead” as the title of this edit, but I ultmately decided to keep the original title for a few reasons: 1. I can’t animate. 2. Changing the title would create confusion when referencing the film in conversation if this edit was a person’s definitive cut. 3. Irvin Shapiro suggested the “Army of Darkness” title during the production of ED2, and I think it is fitting to leave the title in honor of the help he provided to Raimi & co.)

UPDATE: 13 JANUARY 2017 (Friday the 13th!)

Okay, I’ve re-watched the Director’s Cut again, and I now have a short cut list. It’s a lot shorter than I expected it to be. I guess I remembered being bothered by more things than I really was (regarding things that I can actually edit, that is).

New opening - Created from both the finished and original openings.

New title card - “THE MEDIEVAL DEAD”

Color correct beginning segment to resemble the end of Evil Dead II.

Reinsert deleted scene outside the windmill.

Cut handstand shot in “Little Ashes” scene.

Possibly replace “I ain’t that good” with “Good. Bad. I’m the guy with the gun.”

I decided to keep the “Boom Stick” speech, but I’m having second thoughts about replacing “I ain’t that good.” After looking back at both lines, I actually like the delivery of the original line more, despite the re-shoot line sounding better on paper. So, it may be even closer to the DC than I originally planned.

One thing that I really want to change in the film is something that I absolutely can’t edit. That is, Ash should’ve used his chainsaw hand in the final battle with Evil Ash. But, he didn’t, and I can change that just as much as I can take five inches off the end of his shotgun (which I also really want to do, because the double barrel shotgun in Army of Darkness is longer than the original; I honestly can’t figure out why).

Original First Post

I’ve started working on a fanedit of Army of Darkness, with the goal of making it fit a little better as an “Evil Dead III” like it should. That’s what it is, after all. I’m sure others have done the same sort of thing in the past (I know of “The Fan Cut”), but I want to tackle it myself with my own ideas.

As the thread title says, I’ll be using one of the original working titles during production, The Medieval Dead, which was supposedly preferred by Raimi. I thought about using the more conventional title, Evil Dead III: Army of Darkness, but I figured it didn’t sound as good.

The Director’s Cut will be the main source, with maybe a couple of replaced shots from the two theatrical cuts (all from the Shout! Factory 3-Disc set). I’m using Sony Vegas Pro 11 to edit.

I’ve started some tests on the opening, which is where my edit will differentiate the most. I want to create a blend of the finished opening and the original opening, using as much footage from Evil Dead II as I can.

An issue I’m having trouble figuring out is the opening scene. I want to use the “RENAISSANCE PICTURES PRESENTS” card, continuing through the shot of Ash’s lonely eyes as he begins to narrate exposition (from the original opening). This scene has never to my knowledge been released in HD, meaning that I would have to use upscaled SD footage with a grainplate. I think that the 1080i upscaled footage on the Shout! Factory release would be my best option, but I’m not certain.

For the title card, I’m going to have to re-animate the new title over a clean background of the vortex. This is going to be a difficult task as animation of any form is not my strong suit, and I don’t think either of the films show more than a couple seconds of empty vortex at any given time for me to repurpose. As of now I’m not sure even how I’m going to approach this, and I’m thinking that I’ll just leave it on the back burner and worry about it after the rest of the edit is finished. I’ll have to figure out my options.

After the title sequence finishes, I want to use the end of Evil Dead II rather than negating it like Army of Darkness originally did. This brings me to my biggest issue I’ve been having in my editing tests:

I can’t smoothly transition from the end of Evil Dead II to the beginning of Army of Darkness without removing the music from the scene. But, Evil Dead II has mono audio, and the 5.1 surround, as far as I can tell, is just that mono track distributed among the front channels with music and sound effects on the surrounds. So I can’t remove the music as far as I know.

I haven’t completed a cut list yet, but I generally just want to remove anything that I feel doesn’t belong, whether it’s because it’s just too corny (like the handstand shot in the “Little Ashes” scene), or if it’s because Ash is acting out of character, etc., add back in the deleted scene showing Ash go outside the windmill during the night, and replace the original “I ain’t that good” line with the US theatrical reshoot line, “Good, bad, I’m the guy with the gun.”

Once I have some time to sit down and watch through the film again I should be able to edit this post with a completed cutlist.

Any help (or interest of any kind) would be appreciated. 😄