I guess you could have some fun . . .

Rating: 5/10 (2 September 2008)

Evil Dead 2, to be blunt, lacks anything and everything that made the original good. That is not to say that it's bad, because it's not, but compared to the original this just looks like a pathetic attempt to rewrite what was already done. If I hadn't seen the first oneand it really doesn't matter if you have or not because there is no plotI would have liked this a lot more, but because I have, this looks, as I said, pathetic.
I don't think Sam Raimi realized that the original was the perfect comedy because it didn't try to be a comedy. His obvious attempt to make this a comedy made it less funny than the original. He lost the element of surprise, which is disappointing. Instead, this movie plays out like a mix between Ghostbusters, The Evil Dead, and an episode of Tom and Jerry. It no longer stands on its own two feet, which is another reason it isn't nearly as good as the first.
Another major flaw is the lack of gore. What happened? I'm a gore-hound. I've seen the goriest movies ever made, and camera cut-off scenes make me mad. The original was easily one of the goriest movies of the 80's, and it could even hold up to some of the top-gore movies of the 2000s. But then Evil Dead 2 comes along and the only on-screen gore is a bloodless decapitation. After that, EVERY gore scene, every limb severing, everything is off-camera. Sure, you see a bit of blood every now and then as an aftereffect, but why couldn't they show decapitations and limb severing on camera anymore? Once again, the lack of gore is so obvious it had me screaming at the screen in rage. What happened? What was Sam Raimi thinking? With all that said, I'm not going to deny there were some purely awesome scenes in the beginning and somebut very fewin the middle and end. Dead by dawn, chainsaw for and arm, the laughing houseit was great to see how all those clichés originated. Apparently this film is more groundbreaking than I had known.
But then again, this seems so safe compared to the original. So clean. Everything that made The Evil Dead laughably disturbing is noticeably gone (like the tree rape). As I said, the violence is noticeably gone. All the cheese-creepy visuals, like the amount of zombie-demon-things on screen laughing, are gone. What's left is pretty much a safe attempt at black comedy, minus the black. And that's disappointing.
As much as I trash it, I still think it's worthy of being watched, though not a worthy sequel. Just grab your girlfriend or your 12-year-old son or a group of best friends and try to have the best time you can. But if you can't have that fun because you realize this movie isn't even deserving of licking The Evil Dead's bloody boots, I can't blame you.
5/10