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popculturebuffet · 2 years

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Screwhead Fiction Double Feature: Evil Dead II: Beyond Dead by Dawn Review: Honey You Got Real Ugly (Comission for WeirdKev27)

Hello all you happy screwheads and welcome back to Screwhead Fiction Double feature, my look at some of the Evil Dead Comics. And since we looked at the beginning of Dynamite comics absolute mountain of Army of Darkness comics, it only makes sense to look at another company who tried to do the same thing but fizzled out for a number of reasons: Space Goat Publishing and their first comic following the other half of the license rights for Rami's goretastic franchise, Evil Dead II: Beyond Dead by Dead under the cut

Bad Goat:

Space Goat was what seemed to be a talent agency that worked with other comic companies and what not before branching into publishing. It's clear on some level Shon Bury

Wanted to do what Dynamite did, use liscened comics as a springboard to get into the game. ANd it worked: from what I can tell Beyond Dead by Dawn was a success and over the handful of years Space Goat published several Evil Dead minis and spinoffs, and they went on to make comics for Terminator and The Howling.

Now you'd likely think that the company simply ran out of gas. Their far from the first comics company to go belly up, nor the first I intend to cover on this blog. For instance if all goes well I intend to start covering the Chucky Comics next year. It's something that happens.

What happened with Space Goat though is far scummier, somehow being both a fairly common story and an entirely bonkers unique one at the same time. I got most of my info and any screencaps from the blog Funk's House of Geekery, which was invaluable and THESE TWO posts. To make a long painful story you can read from someone who actually was there on the ground level short: Space Goat did a kickstarter for a boardgame based on Evil Dead 2. That in itself sounds kickass and were I aware of it I might of backed it as , while I wasn't a horror fan quite yet, EDII is one of the few horror films I saw before diving in deep after seeing IT and one I loved.

I'm glad I didn't as it turned out it was a thinly planned out scam. See after getting the Evil Dead II game backed Space Goat launched ANOTHER campaign for terminator, and fans were understandably uneasy. It's one thing to do MULTIPLE kickstarter campaigns That's fine. Things I love like MST3K, Rifftrax and Team Starkid rely on them , in the latter cases on an annual basis pre covid, to put on shows. But all three are reliable sorts who backers can trust and who have experience and all made good on previous campaigns. Space Goat hadn't done a game before so this was already worrysome for backers. Shon being outed as an abusive shouty mess of a human being didn't help matters.

So not surprisingly it was as shady as it looked: it's theorized that Space Goat did the Evil Dead kickstarter.. but instead of actually making a game, they used the money to get the Terminator license, understandably expensive, and planned to use THAT money to fund both games, and when that went under budget they used it elsewhere and hoped no one would notice. Backers went ignored, infighting started in the comments, things got ugly as they tend to when Kickstarter projects go bad.

Then Shon and co got UTTERLY vile with it by launching a video for ANOTHER crowdfunding campaign to get capital to "expand the business". Which is code for "OH SHIT WE SPENT ALL YOUR MONEY PLEASE HELP US BUT WE TOTALLY DIDN'T DO ANYTHING WRONG GUYS" no one bought it, and the game sadly went unmade while Space Goat burnt up on rentry as it damn well should.

So the question is even with all the grifting, conning and theivery, is "beyond dead by dawn" any good?

Honey, You Got Real Ugly Look I don't judge works based on their parent companies. I try to avoid say buying games from Activision and Ubisoft because their companies suck, but at the end of the day most works of art are the product of the artists and companies generally interfere and do harm (with some exceptions) rather than steer every step of the way. Unless a fault with the work is something the company could correct, it's generally not their fault. The comics faults are it's own.

The premise isn't one of them as once again we have an Evil Dead comic that has a really good idea to continue things just not the execution to actually pull it off. Unlike Army of Darkness: Ashes 2 Ashes which happened when the franchise was in a coma and wasn't coming out of it for at least a decade, Evil Dead II happened while the franchise was still alive as ever: The soft reboot had come out just two years ago and in what I don't remotely belivie was a concidence, Ash Vs the Evil Dead premiered the same year, and the Army of Darkness comics were still going strong. So the time was right for it, but the problem was unlike Army of Darkness which could just pick up where the films left up a combination of not having the rights to that film, said film having already done that and Ash Vs the Evil Dead planning to do the next thing in the queue, follow ash decades later, meant they had to go another route

The route chosen is pretty clever and spiffy, and takes unique advantage of having things the Dynamite Comics simply don't: Beyond Dead by Dawn follows the deutragonist and fan faviorite of Evil Dead II, Annie Knowby after the film. You may be wondering how as she had a bad case of

Last time we saw her. Well this comic follows her into HELL. Yes after having to dance around it due to budget, this comic shows us the Evil Dead version of the underworld, where all the swallowed souls go. Annie is free thanks to the evil dead not having time to deadite her, but is outgunned, outmanned and outnumbered.. but not outplanned. She plans to use the kandarian dagger to absorb souls and free her parents souls allowing them and all the other victims of the evil dead to rest.

The outmanned part is still an issue and since this franchise woudln't be the same without him but we can't use him since present day him is busy on TV, Annie uses the necronomicon to create a simuacrum. Granted it's clearly pulling this spell out of it's ass, but I do like it cleverly using the fact Ash's hand is still there after killing Annie and dead after Ash finally kicked it's wrist, and creates a new ash who only has the memories up to getting cut off and isn't happy to be here but helps anyway.

As I said the setup isn't bad: Ash and Annie have to fight through hell and free her parents. But that's when the problems start. Kicking it off we have the fact that hell is BORING. Yes.. .really> hell. That hell. The setting dozens of shows have made interesting versions of> That one. The fire and brimstone. It's not remotely intresting. I'ts just a brown cavern like endless expanse with the ocasoinal fleshy structure while only the demon with the souls in it, which is supposed to be some kind of god looking KINDA interesting nd kinda is pushing it. It's a green thing that just dosen't have the horror or power you'd expect for one of the gods behind the necronomcion. Add in the fact the demons are almost all just red winged guys, which while not ab ad look is generic and you get the problem. You have a wonderful setup for a truly unique evil dead work but no effort put into actually making it feel unqiue. It's generic in a franchise that dosen't really.. do generic.

Each film feels unique, interesting and has awesome makeup and gore effects. 3/4 of the films only have the one setting, the setting is one of the most iconic in horror for a reason, being perfectly run down, claustrophobic and inescapable as if you go within the woods your dead.. but staying inside is just as fatal and Army of darkness gleefully gives us a castle, a dark graveyard, a small shack with tiny people and more to play with. The monsters inside are some of the most awesome looking in horror with the deadites having a simple shriveled up look yet also having some impressive ones like the cellar woman, the giant monster, or evil ash.

This comic just doesn't have that creativity: it's got a creative premise, but it doesn't continue to innovate BEYOND that. A good hook is fine, but you have to be able to bring it WITH that hook or no one's going to care. Say what you will about Ashes 2 Ashes, I certainly did, but it at least had fun set pieces, took the series global and while the first half was weak and off tone, it made up for it. This book just doesn't have the time or patience to really get into things or fine fun things to do. This story could've easily gone over a few minis but for some reason is crammed into three issues. It has no room to breathe and as such chokes; The characters don't really feel fleshed out or like people with Ash literally being a copy of himself and ANnie despite ENDLESS narration, and I do mean it they do not let up for the first two issues, not really growing much beyond the first film and when she does it's because she's apparently soul bonded with ash. Oh yeah they apparently share traits thanks to being bonded. This goes nowhere other than one of the worst pms jokes of all time

Next up we have tonal issues. Look like last time I get it, it's hard to strike the right ballance with an evil dead proprety. II did such a good job it's hard to match that tone. It's why even if I prefer EDII to Army of Darkness, I didn't mind it going broader or the remake going back to the originals grim tone. Those films have problems sure, but trying something new and exciting isn't one of them.

But you have to HAVE a tone and the comic can't decide if it's an action piece, horror or a comedy. As such the comedy that does show up comes off flat, with said PMS joke.. seriously this was 2015 I can forgive some of the less savory parts of the originals for being of their time but come the fuck on man. This was 2015. Stupid PMS jokes like that shoudl've been on their way out, not in this comic and on modern family. It's a thing that happens not something that turns you into the hulk.

But we also have Annie tryign to find a virigin to stab.. which makes her come off heartless as she's trying to murder someone and the comic didn't make it clear she was just going to.. release the soul later. We also get fat jokes at a guy's expense because the writer of this comic is twelve and his parents shoudldn't of let him see Evil Dead II much less write a comic about it for a get rich quick scheme cleverly disguised as a publishing company. She could just.. ask to kill them telling them they'll be set free but that might be too many steps.

Outside of tone character wise it feels flat. Annie is trying to rescue her parents, but it's hard to tell who she is outside that. The movie did a decent job showing her as an ensastic person who geninely loves this research and out of the five people in the cabin was the only one besides ash holding the brain cell. So i'd love to see more of her but the writer can't really decide what to do with her other than have her ramble in the first person a lot. She's not obnoxious but it's disheratning ot see a character with a lot of potetial brought back to just be kind of vauge and not move much up from where she was at the end of evil dead 2: sh'es about the same. As for Ash it feels like just.. the basic beats for Ash> There's no real character stuff on being connected spirtually to someone else, any feelings for annie, the people he just lost (since being in the same continuity as vs the evil dead, the original film is once again canon), or anything> He's just army of darkness ash but Ashes 2 Ashes at least gave that ash an emotoinal moment.

Artwise it's decent with Oscar Bazulda doing a really good job, having it be mildly stylized but realistic enough to land. Again monster design isn't great, but comics are colabrative and writer Frank Hannah could've put more focus on working with Oscar to make a good monster design instead of jokes about Ash having PMS.

Beyond Dead by Dawn ends with our heroes unswallowing the souls, putting them in a knife and escaping setting them free and setting up the sequel as apparently not ALL THE spirits freed are exactly peaceful. And I am kinda curious to see if this get sbetter so maybe, just maybe.. we'll read from the necronomicon again some day.

For now though Beyond Dead by Dawn.. is disapointing. It has a truly fantastic premise, but rushed pacing, a lack of creativity beyond the basic premise, and a lack of a real tone of any kind sink what coudl've been an excellent sequel before the other sequel. A lack of effort leading to a real loss of potetial.. kinda sums up Space Goat as a whole huh? Thanks for reading screwheads. Follow for more, consider joining my patreon and i'll no doubt see you within the woods again… thanks for reading.

#evil dead #evil dead II #space goat publishing #ash williams #annie knowby #beyond dead by dawn #sam rami #bruce campbell #comics #horror #halloween

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