“Took 36 Hours Straight”: How Underrated Evil Dead Sequel Created Its Undead Army Detailed By VFX Supervisor (2024)

Army of Darkness VFX supervisor William Mesa explains how the Evil Dead sequel made its undead army. Marking the third installment in Raimi's cult horror franchise, Army of Darkness was released in 1992, following Bruce Campbell's Ash as he is transported back to 1300 A.D. where he must battle evil forces once more in order to retrieve the Necronomicon and return home. The film, even more so than its predecessors, features a great number of visual effects-driven sequences, especially since an army of skeletal monsters plays a large role in the story.

During a recent appearance on Corridor Crew's "VFX Artists React" series, Mesa recalls his experience working on Army of Darkness, in particular how challenging it was to bring the movie's skeleton soldiers to life.

Mesa reveals that many of the skeletons in the foreground were filmed using stop-motion, but motion control and "mechanical rigs" were often used for skeletons in the background. The VFX supervisor agrees with co-host Niko Puerginger's assessment that many of the background skeletons were essentially "little robots" that were designed to move their arms, wave a sword, adjust a gravestone, and other motions. Check out a comment from Mesa below regarding just how much time some Army of Darkness shots took:

“We did have some of these shots that took 36 hours straight. They would marathon it. They would take a break and that sort of thing, but they knew it was a huge amount of pressure and work.”

Will Another Army Of Darkness-Style Movie Happen In The Evil Dead Franchise?

This Unique Sam Raimi Tone Should Return

While each of the Evil Dead movies is unique, Army of Darkness is truly an outlier due to its setting and tone. The film's medieval setting is a drastic change from the cabin in the woods of prior installments, and the action, in general, is less contained. After Raimi's 1992 entry, the franchise ultimately lay dormant until 2013's Evil Dead remake, which returned to the cabin in the woods setting. 2023's Evil Dead Rise took the action instead to an apartment building, but it was a similarly contained film.

After Evil Dead Rise, there are currently two projects in development in the franchise, one from director Sébastien Vaniček and another from director Francis Galluppi. While Vaniček's film has been described as an Evil Dead spinoff, Galluppi's is said to be an original idea. Plot details regarding both films are under wraps, but Raimi will seemingly serve as a producer on both.

So far, the strategy with the two recent Evil Dead movies is to keep things contained to essentially one location, and both movies also lean more into horror than comedy. To keep things fresh for the franchise while also calling back to Raimi's original work, it would be interesting to see one of the two new Evil Dead movies try something a little wackier and a little more bold. It remains to be seen whether an Army of Darkness-style tone will ever return to the franchise, but it would certainly be exciting to see an undead, skeleton army.

Source: Corridor Crew

Army of Darkness

4.0

R

Horror

Comedy

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The third film in Sam Raimi's Evil Dead trilogy, Army of Darkness, is a horror comedy film that sees Bruce Campbell return to the role of Ash Williams. Sucked out of his timeline and tossed to 1300 A.D., Ash is found and thrown in a pit after he is believed to be a spy against King Arthur. After proving himself and slaying a supernatural Deadite creature, Ash is freed and told to return home; he must find the Necronomicon and dance with the dead again.

Director

Sam Raimi

Release Date

February 19, 1993

Studio(s)

Renaissance Pictures , Dino De Laurentiis Corporation

Distributor(s)

Universal Pictures

Writers

Sam Raimi , Ivan Raimi

Cast

Bruce Campbell , ian abercrombie , Embeth Davidtz , Marcus Gilbert , Richard Grove

Runtime

81 minutes

prequel(s)

The Evil Dead (1981) , Evil Dead 2

Budget

$11 million