Lee Cronin’s “Evil Dead Rise” makes us privy to a gorefest and, in a way, lives up to the expectations of the fans. It has to be said that the special effects and visual effects’ teams have outdone themselves, and their efforts will truly blow you away. The only problem I have with the film is that it lacks a strong storyline, and though we understand that the director wanted to use a lot of tropes from the earlier films of the franchise, the narrative in itself does not come out to be very captivating. Apart from that, the film is entertaining if you are a fan of the genre or the franchise, and you shouldn’t miss the chance to watch it on the silver screen.
Spoilers Alert
A Fateful Incident In The Woods
Caleb, Jessica, and Teresa had gone on vacation, and they hoped to spend some leisurely time in the cabin near the lake. All of a sudden, in “Evil Dead Rise,” Jessica started feeling unwell, and Caleb gave her some medicine and asked her to rest. Teresa decided to go back into the house and sit with Jessica for a while until she woke up. Teresa was reading a novel when she saw that Jessica, who was facing the other way around and sitting on the bed, started saying the lines from her novel. Teresa didn’t understand what was happening, and she got a bit spooked out by what Jessica was up to. Jessica fell from her bed, and when Teresa went to help, she tried to choke her. Jessica was clearly possessed by some evil spirit, and she was not in her senses. Before Teresa could call Caleb for help, Jessica pulled her hair with such brutality that even the skin of her scalp came out, and she started to bleed profusely. Teresa managed to reach the lake to tell Caleb about what had happened. Jessica came after her, and first, she cut herself with Caleb’s drone, and then jumped inside the lake as if she wanted to commit suicide. When Caleb jumped inside the lake to save her, Jessica killed him. We see the film’s title rising up in the most emphatic and nerve-racking manner in the background while Jessica levitates in the air, completely under the control of the evil entity.
Beth Realizes She Is Pregnant
We believe that evil stems from hatred, and it has the power to rot your core and make you do things that you never thought you were capable of. There were things that were kept hidden for a reason, and no individual should have ever meddled with them. After the incident with Caleb, Jessica and Teresa, “Evil Dead Rise” takes us back to the previous day and makes us privy to a guitar technician, Beth, who, while on tour, realized that she was pregnant and other than her sister’s place, didn’t know where to go. Ellie, Beth’s sister, lived with her two daughters, Kassie and Bridget, and her son, Danny. Ellie’s husband, Jay, didn’t live with them any longer, and he believed that as long as he was paying child support, he was fulfilling his duties as a father. Ellie had tried to contact her sister when Jay left them, but Beth was on her tour, and amidst a hectic schedule, she wasn’t able to check on her messages. Ellie was mad at Beth for not being there when she needed her the most. Ellie had sent her children to bring pizza as she wanted some alone time with her sister. Danny, Bridget and Kassie were parking their car when an earthquake sank the ground, exposing a hole, and Danny noticed that an underground room existed beneath their parking lot.
What Did The Book Of The Dead Do?
Inquisitiveness often leads to trouble, and in “Evil Dead Rise,” we got proof of it when Danny decided to search the underground room. He found a strange-looking book and a few records that he brought with him. It felt like the book had a life of its own and that it could feel and see things. Meanwhile, Beth and Ellie were getting paranoid about where the kids were. They were just about to go searching for them when the kids came back, and Ellie and Beth took a sigh of relief. Bridget was not sure if they should keep such a relic in their home, and she asked her brother Danny to put it back in the underground room. There were strange and horrific pictures drawn in the book, and it felt like it told the story of the supernatural realm and how to connect with Satan himself. After Bridget left, Danny played those vinyl records, and he got to know that the book was one of the three volumes of Naturom Demonto, i.e., the Book of the Dead. The book was given to Father Marcus Littleton by foreign missionaries, and clergymen from all over the world gathered there to witness the unveiling.
The most terrifying fact about the book was that its binding was made out of human flesh and instead of ink, blood was used to write down the incantations on its pages. Father Marcus wanted the church’s approval to translate whatever was written in it. Father Marcus believed that it would help them unravel the mysteries of the spiritual realm and make contact with supernatural entities. But the clergymen voted against it and asked for the book to be disposed of immediately. But Father Marcus had a curious mind, and he couldn’t just discard the book without knowing what it said. So together with Canon Damien Shanahan and Father Hugo Cortez, Father Marcus started translating the verses and divulging the secrets that no human should have ever known. Danny heard one of the incantations that the clergymen were reciting through the vinyl records, and almost instantaneously, evil was resurrected once again from the gallows and immediately made its presence felt.
‘Evil Dead Rise’ Ending Explained: How Did Beth Kill The Evil Spirit?
The clergymen who had secretly tried to translate the Book of the Dead realized what a blunder they had committed, but the damage had already been done. They said that the Naturom Demonto couldn’t be destroyed, and whoever found it in the future should bury it deep inside their secret vault. The body of the human started rotting from the inside once the demonic entity took hold of them, and that was exactly what was happening with Ellie. After Ellie attacked her own sister and children, Beth realized that if they didn’t do anything quickly, they would be killed. To make matters worse, even Bridget got possessed by the malignant spirit and started wreaking havoc on Kassie, Beth, and Danny. The possessed people didn’t die no matter what you did, and the only way to get rid of them was to mince their bodies into several pieces so that the body parts were not able to regroup.
Danny was killed by Bridget, and eventually, he also got possessed by the evil entity. In his last moments, Danny apologized to his little sister, as he wasn’t able to save her. A petrified Kassie saw her entire family embody these evil spirits in front of her eyes. She didn’t know whether to mourn their loss or run to save her own life. What made it more difficult for Beth and little Kassie was witnessing their own family members trying to kill them. Towards the end of “Evil Dead Rise,” we saw that the bodies of all the dead people, including Ellie, Danny, Bridget, and all the neighbors, got fused together, and they started chasing Kassie and Beth, who were trying to escape from the building. Beth was able to kill that evil entity, or at least she thought she did, by pushing it inside a scrap grinder machine. Beth and Kassie escaped, and they believed that their nightmare was over.
But as it was said by the clergyman back in 1923, Naturom Demonto could never be destroyed. The girl who we saw killing her friend at the beginning of the film came to that same parking lot after the massacre had happened and got possessed by the demonic spirit. The malignant spirit is still pretty much alive and present in the mortal realm and will keep wreaking havoc unless and until the Book of the Dead is put inside the secret vault under the influence of a strong magic spell. Beth was, in a way, looked down upon for the kind of choices she had made in her life. We believe that she would still have to fight the stereotypes once her baby was born, as the father of the baby didn’t have any clue that Beth was pregnant, and society wouldn’t cut her any slack and would inevitably question her character. Beth didn’t need to give birth to a baby to prove her worth, and irrespective of that fact, she was a good woman for whom her family meant everything. If there is a sequel to “Evil Dead Rise,” we will probably see Beth and Kassie returning to put an end to the story that began in their house and ruined their entire family.
