More Bruce Campbell than Evil Dead

Rating: 6/10 (21 December 2019)

Evil Dead is one of my top 10 horror movies of all time and Bruce Campbell as Ash in that was brilliant. Period. Evil Dead 2 did catch me off guard a little with its humour but it was an excellent sequel. I saw Army of Darkness upon its cinematic release back in 1992 and I recall thinking back then that in my opinion it just wasn't an Evil Dead movie, rather a fantasy that stars Ash and uses elements from the original story.
Don't get me wrong, Army is a well made movie. Wonderful sets (though that castle obviously is not English!), lots of action, great effects (more than a nod to Ray Harryhausen) and no end of humour (Monty Python's Holy Grail sprang to mind). This is a horror/fantasy comedy. And that is my problem. Too much of it in my opinion, this movie is all about Bruce Campbell and how much he can squeeze out of Ash. Fans of the character will delight in this but for me he quickly became more tedious than funny. I feel somewhat bad about awarding this 6/10 when I am such a fan of the original but had Ash been somewhat less in your face then I would have scored it higher.
Just finished watching the Director's Cut. I liked the additional material plus the ending (even though it has been ripped from a very well known sci-fi movie!).
It transpires that there are several releases of this cut which vary tremendously in picture quality. My DVD is awful, looks like a poor VHS transfer, but thankfully a high quality print was recently screened here in the UK.