[vocalizing] Finally, you're here! Grab a robe and cover yourself in this lamb's blood. [sighs] Gross! What's going on? I have all these snakes you asked me for, and I can't find a kit anywhere. Bad news, Georgia! Wife is possessed! What? I'm not possessed! I read this book she left on my coffee table, and it unleashed an evil force. That wasn't a demonic book! It was Chasing the Moon by Aimee Martinez. It's not evil, it's just not very good! They have arguably better books than their catalog! And then she started singing a demonic chance. Oh my god, it was Strawberry Letter 23, originally recorded by Shovey Otis on the album Freedom Flight, and popularized as a disco cover by the Brothers Johnson. It's really good! See, Georgia, disco! Mmm, evil lives in this house! Okay, so while I don't think it is possessed, can you explain why I had to get all these snakes? That was a typo, I had for cakes. Did you bring butter cream chocolate? [sizzling] Ow, ow, they bite so much! [sighs] Okay, let's get you both to the hospital. [sizzling] [dramatic orchestral music] Welcome to Does This Still Work? The pockets are always gonna ask, "Does this still work? I'm Joe Dixon." And I'm George Romaka, and today we're discussing the evil dead from 1981 and some historical context. Woo-hoo! First, podcast-y stuff. You can reach us at dtswpod@gmail.com on Facebook, Letterbox, and our YouTube channel. Joe is on blue sky at jodixin.bsky.social. Please tell your friends about us. Even the ones who can't keep their fucking eyes on the road because they keep turning around to talk to their friend in a backseat, and leave five-star ratings everywhere. You can pick what we watch and get extra per episode content by funding us on Patreon for as little as a dollar a month at patreon.com/dtswpod. And one more thing, we have a guest. Please welcome back an oft-repeated guest, whose voice closes out the show for non-patrons, and who had the good sense to marry me, Kit Novakwinski. [applause] Hi, Kit! Hi. Hello, Kit. I love you. Hi. Before we get into the pleasantries, I just want to say, the turning ahead while driving, that was a very '80s thing, so don't-- I know, right? It's not me. Talking to your friend in the backseat, while I'm not playing an attempt in the road, very, very '80s, I'm not sure that ever changed. Mm. [gasps] I'm not sure that was ever not stupid. [laughter] Well, things always stupid that, too. Yeah. Remember, we used to drive without seatbelts. Well, we used to drive without those little backup cameras, and now they've taken away the non-blind spot, because they're like, you have a backup camera, and I'm just like, well, you can go fuck yourself. Indeed. Okay, why do you want to guess on this episode? I love Evil Dead. I have, I would love actually slashy puppet. I have an actually slashy shirt now, but I've been a huge fan of the show. I bought myself that shirt. You didn't buy me that. I thought I bought you that. No, I bought me that. Okay. I fucking bought it off the Amazon. [laughter] Show or movie? I know there was an "Ach" versus the Evil Dead, right? Oh, yeah, I just purchased the first season of that. No, I just purchased that for you. [laughter] I didn't get you the shirt, but I did get you the series. Okay. You saying sure, press go on the season. Okay. Yeah, I want the other two seasons, so I'm not gonna argue this. [laughter] No, I'm a big Bruce Campbell fan, and who doesn't love him? Well, do you like him? You in a brow or post you in a brow? Oh, right. By the third movie, he'd finally started shaping his brows, and I didn't notice that. Like, I'm glad you noticed that too, where you're like, oh, he just has the one brow in this one. Yeah, he's a unibrow. He's like, what was it? Bert, Bert from Sussing Street. Yeah, and Ted Rainey is his Ernie, I guess. I guess so. Do you do, okay. But yeah, I know I'm a big fan of a lot of the people involved in these movies here. I didn't realize I was such a, what's such a Rainey fan, but they all grew up together in school. The Canadian, right? Yeah, oh shit, they are Canadian. Fuckin' aye. God damn kidding, and say come to me, and I'll come to take in our jobs. Yeah, God forbid they come down here from the frozen cold with their creativity. And entertainment. I mean, you got nothing else to do in the winter, so I suppose that's somethin'. Yeah, they got their hockey. Let 'em play that. Okay. All right, I'm just preparing for Trump. All right, let's, okay Joe, take us back to 1981. (dramatic music) And that's the way it was. This is when we take place in Tennessee, and I wanna thank Wikipedia for knowing that because if the movie says that's where they are, I totally missed it. Did you guys pick that up? Yeah, he says we just crossed the Tennessee border. Okay, I totally missed that in here. Okay, so we're going to Tennessee for this history corner. The problem is, the film is virtually plotless. The directors only go was to make a gore fest, not create a film about the human condition. So I'm gonna address this issue by just finding rendo shit from 1981 that gets us as close to this film as possible. Okay, the first story takes place in a cabin. Just like this movie, singing, see how I'm doing it? Yep, George, read this headline from the Johnson City Press. GOP group meets in log cabin. I don't give a damn about this story. I linked it in the show notes, but I'm not gonna read it. Instead, George and Kit, I wanna ask you both. How awesome would it be if Donald Trump, J.D. Vance, Ted Cruz, Rhonda Sanchez, and Clarence Thomas were in a cabin where this stuff in the movie happened? Which would you want to survive? I'm rooting for the couch, fucker. Really, J.D. Vance, why? Because, sadly enough, I relate to the situations I see him in, where he like wanders into a donut shop, tries to make awkward, small talk, and then is like whatever seems human, man, that's something I would do. I don't agree with this politics, but I feel bad for the guy and I'm like eh, it's kinda like how I feel about Michael Scott, you know? Okay, how about you, George? I have been keeping myself fairly uninformed on new shit. Like, I only knew about J.D. Vance fucking a couch because I'm a mod in a Facebook group. What does that guy do for a living? He's the senator from Ohio. God damn it. Nothing to do with Vance refrigeration. Nothing to do with Vance refrigeration. Was that where you were going Vance refrigeration? Well, since I've made George repeatedly watch the office, he hears Vance and immediately his brain is like a Vance refrigeration. Oh, okay. Oh, God. That's such a horrible slate of people that-- Yeah, I know. Like, they all are demonstrably horrible for the world in terrible, terrible ways. I think Clarence Thomas is probably the closest to dying already. Yeah. So I'd want him to survive because he's going to kick off soon anyway. I would like to see him in Trump fight. To the death. Yeah, fight to the death. All of their guts. Mutual. And then Ted Cruz and Ron DeSantis. You know what? I give Ron DeSantis like near the end because he is from Florida. And that's like little Australia. So we can take a lot of damage. Like I said, I feel bad for the inhuman flesh blob that is JD Vance. I think I would want DeSantis to get out to him because he's-- Oh, fuck your face. It was just a lot of fun. It's a bashing on him when he was running for president. And I'd like to do that again. It is not fun for everything he's done to the state of Florida. Not anything these people have done is not great or fun. I know that. That's true. To be fair, I also chose JD Vance because I have no idea what he's actively done. And he can't be any worse than any of the other politicians in Ohio. I had the chance to actually watch some local Ohio ads. And I was like, it's really great. All these slanderous ads, it lets me know who to vote for. Basically, the people they're slandering, they're like, this guy, he likes immigrants and tax reform and giving food to the hungry. Fuck that guy. Indeed. Don't let him be in government for Ohio. And I'm like, that guy is great. That is one way to be informed. Oh, they're against him? I must be foreign. Yeah, yeah. Exactly. OK, let's move on. There was a demonic possession story from 1981. Unfortunately, it happened in Danbury, Connecticut. But let's go back to Johnson City Press to tell us about it. Headline, George. Demonic possession defense fails for Connecticut teenager. Do you old out there remember this? It was a big story back in the day. The prosecution said two drunk guys got into a fight and one stabbed the other. The defense said, no, no, no. My client was possessed by the devil. So does Laura lined up experts on demons and this was supposed to be a unique defense never before tried in the US courtroom. But eventually the judge said, no, we're not going to do that. The devil made me do it. Motherfucker, please. Is that a direct quote for the judge? That's not a direct quote. I'm just-- OK, you put quotation marks there. My question, George and Kit, had this attorney got away with this stunt, do you think it would have worked? Yes, because you just said he would have gotten away with it. Yeah. By definition, that means it would have worked. Your grammar has foiled you. What do you mean I said he would have gotten away with it? Had this attorney gotten away with this stunt, do you think it would have worked? Yes, if he got away with it, it would have worked. You mean to say that if he had-- Would this guy get an acquitted had he done this? Had he managed to fit on that defense? Well, I mean, basically it's an insanity defense, which is what he should have done. It's up to you, you know, that's a mental health. But you actually can't make a mental health issue nowadays, because if you say that you did something because of Jesus or the devil, they're not allowed to be like, that's a psychological problem, because that's religious. Also, the ACLU would probably get involved. And I don't know what they would do about it. But yeah, no, it's something that wouldn't have happened. But if they were allowed to get away with this stunt, yes, it would have happened. And it would be a miscarriage of justice. Yeah, it would. I'm sure in 1991, it wouldn't 100% have been acquitted the judge had said, no, no, no, no, because this is the back of the day where they thought little kids were being molested and satanic rituals. Well, they didn't believe in the Satan. They were-- there was a bunch of hypnotherapists that actually, like, they worked kids and people into-- Think of this as no worries. Yeah. Into testifying against their parents. They weren't jailed because of actual demonic things happening. They were jailed because their children were accusing them of, like, physical and sexual abuse for the sake of, like, satanic ritual. And those parents stayed in prison as, like, child abusers and sex offenders for a long time, even after it was proven to be untrue. Yeah, this is called the satanic panic. And there's a lot of research on it. Yeah. Yeah, 100%. I am chock-full of stuff about it. Yeah, I just disagree on one thing. I do think people outside of the courtroom did believe it, that it was definitely Satan. Well, I mean, there are people that believe, you know, every evil thought you have is Satan. So people are stupid. I was one of them. Yeah. And I'm just saying, that's the way it was. Mm-hmm. And that's what's in our open. It says, that's the way it was. And it was. But you can say that's the way it was. But, like, at one time, we had, you know, people in government who were, like, we can't have the church being involved in our state, you know? And now we have people much dumber now in the year 2024 who were like, we were always a Christian nation. Yes. We only became a Christian nation when communism happened. Yeah, exactly, God damn commies made us finally go, "Oh, we need God all over the goddamn place." Anyway, we couldn't just say, "Oh no, we're capitalist." Mm-hmm. No, that's, that's never enough. And finally, this last one is unrelated to our story, but it happened in the state capital of Tennessee, Nashville, in 1981, and it does involve evil and the dead. So, maybe not so unrelated. This is brought to us by the Tennesseean headline, "Kit." Four bystanders shot in market hold-up, two deaths laid to officer, escapee. Now, imagine your place of work gets held up. You managed to escape only to have the cops shoot you, mistaking you for the criminal. See how guns keep us all safe? I will read. A rookie police woman and an escape convict who once murdered for $30 killed two innocent bystanders Saturday night, police said, "As bullets and tear-cast bombs flew in a bazaar, kidnapping and market hold-up." Two other innocent bystanders were wounded in the series of incidents that began as sheer chance and ended in disastrous mistakes by the rookie officer trying to thwart the robbery and rescue a hostage. She thought the man was a suspect. Sir Lieutenant Sherman Nickens, saying officer Joyce Allen had to make a split second decision to fire. Kill were Harry Walden, manager of Johnny's sack full market, 1401 Woodland Street, and James D. Fakston, 26, of 1320 Cummings Drive. Woman over David B. Hayes, 27, Gartlin Avenue, and Anthony C. Graves, 20, of 2010 Woodland Street. C. Graves said he fled the market, obeyed police orders to halt, raised his hands and was shot by an officer. Police said C. Graves and Walter disobeyed orders to stop and was shot by officer Joyce Allen. Two witnesses across the street said they saw police shoot people with their hands up. - End quote. - You know, I think actually both statements are probably true. I think because they were running, they couldn't stop on a dime. So they put their hands up, but kept moving forward because they couldn't stop. And the police were like, "You didn't disobey physics, bang!" - I guess, but like, I can stop and drop real fucking quick. But you know, it's 1980s, you have a bunch of cops that are probably keyed up on cocaine. (laughing) It's Tennessee, there's nothing to do. (laughing) - I mean, play stupid games get stupid prizes. - Okay, well, I mean, I suppose officer can be given credit for hitting her targets in New York in 2024, but cops just start firing regards of whether they figure a suspect or not. - Were these not suspects? - No. - Oh, they weren't the people? - No, we were right there. - Yeah, my brain's shut off. (laughing) - By the way, when witnesses and the person's shots say their hands were up, when the cops fired, but the cops say they weren't up, rest assured the cops are lying. - Yeah, it's like, if I know if I'm ever in a car accident with a cop, if it's before like when they had their cameras on and be like, "Oh, well, 'cause who's getting charged with this?" You know, cops aren't gonna take, without those body cams and car cams, they're not gonna take responsibility for shit. - Not at all. - 'Cause why would they? Their friends work with them, they don't wanna get in trouble. - Now, how many both of you handle a situation like this when law enforcement is likely to kill you and the criminals are likely to shoot you? - I'm gonna die, Joe, that's what's gonna happen. (laughing) - Like I said, I'm pretty good at doing a straight drop, so like, even if the cops think I'm just like, I'm on the ground, man, I've got my hands next to me. I'll drop, you know, if they're gonna shoot me while I'm going to the ground, great, but too bad. They will shoot you while you're on the ground. - Yeah, they'll just shoot. - You know when I care about it at that point? Nothing, 'cause I'm dead. (laughing) - Well, you know the story I'm referencing right in 2024 here, in the city, these dumb cops, this guy supposedly comes out with a knife, they didn't never found a knife, and they just told they'd get us a shooting, and I think they did hit him, but they also hit a bunch of other people on the train. - Mm, I'm sure. - They probably shouldn't be firing a train anyway. - That's why a lot of cops have non-lethal force now. That's why a lot of cities require them to have non-lethal force, and they instead, like, if it's not a gun, they instead are supposed to use their tasers and things like that, or the beanback guns. - Yeah, yeah. - They should, but they don't because they-- - Well, like I said, it depends on like, what is provided to them, and how they are trained. Like, unfortunately, a lot of, I don't know if, like, it came out in like BLM that like cops training was faulty, and they were actually training them based on like military tactics, instead of like dealing with civilians appropriately. - And trying to de-escalate it. - Yeah. - 'Cause you don't de-escalate during the war. - No. - You're killing the other people. - Yeah, and you know, it really got effed up. Like, I live in a place in Clearwater, and the cops started getting twitchy, and like, UT SWAT teams run around, and they'd be like real aggressive to people who were just like, mining their own business, like, "Hey, are we safe?" And they're like, "Get in your house, "you look like a suspect." And I was like, "Wow." But then again, Clearwater, please suck dick. - Yeah, they all do. Okay, George, tell us about the Evil Dead. All righty, this was written and directed by Sam Rainey, whose work I've seen in Spider-Man, the 2002 version, Spider-Man 2, Spider-Man 3, a simple plan, and Evil Dead 2. Plus, Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. Actually, I saw Evil Dead 2 before, I saw this movie, and I mixed them up in my head. - I saw everything that Joe saw. I also saw Army of Darkness and The Quick and the Dead, which apparently he was cut out of the theatrical version. So I did not see him in The Quick and the Dead, but it was on his IMDB. - All righty, Blurbs, IMDB, and Amazon, say five friends travel to a cabin in the woods where they unknowingly release flush-possessing demons. - Don't you hate when that happens? I hate when that fucking happens. - You know, usually it's the non-flesh-possessing demons you deal with? - Yeah. - So, the film opens unceremoniously to Fog and the title. The Fog is in some swampy, Tennessee backwoods, and the camera is the first person viewpoint of a nameless, faceless evil, as it wanders around looking for things to evil at. That camera work for the evil thing was mostly Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell with a camera on a two-by-four running through the forest. - Of course. Yeah, this is, I think, before they get the steady cams. - Yeah. - No, and you know what? It's great, and it stuck with them through all of the evil deads. - Yep, yeah, they kept doing it like that. Yeah. - Yeah. - And it's better with the steady cams. - 'Cause it's intense. - Yeah. - So, we go to the back roads where five Michigan State University students have just crossed the Tennessee border in a 1973 Old Mobile Delta 88 Royale that belongs to our main protagonist, Ash Williams. - So who? - Who isn't driving for some reason? - Ashley, Ash J. Williams is played by Bruce Campbell. We have all seen him in Spider-Man. That's one with a Tobey Maguire. - Yep. - Yep. Joe has seen him in Spider-Man 2 and Spider-Man 3, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, and The Adventures of Briscoe County. Good on you for that. - I like that show. - George and I have seen him in bubble hotep, cloudy with a chance of meatballs, escape from LA, Hercules, The Legendary Journeys, and Xeno Warrior Princess. On that show, he played The God of Thieves. - You have a crossover character between the two shows? - Well, not a crossover. They're all the same characters. It's just, he's playing himself in both shows, yeah. I have seen Bruce in the Evil Dead, Evil Dead 2, Maniacop, sundown, The Vampire in a Treat, my gift to Eli Bosnick for performing our wedding, Army of Darkness, The Hudsucker Proxy, a McHales Navy, Spider-Man 1, 2, and 3, Sky High, The Woods, Aquatine Hunger Force, colon movie film for theaters, Cars 2, Oz the Great and Powerful, Black Friday, not a good movie. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. I've also seen him in Ash vs. Evil Dead, Robot Chicken, Jack of All Trades, and The Adventures of Briscoe County, Jr. - Oh, so we both watched that show. We were with the team. - Yeah, yeah. Cowboy movie or cowboy TV show when I was a kid? Yeah, me and my daddy are watching that. - You know, I remember a story, a TV guy where he was trying to promote the show and they fully sent them to a rodeo and they hated him there. Like, it's not that, it's not even though it's a western, it's really more of a comedy and they showed us something to a comic con or something. - Yeah. - No one in the show flopped the market if people didn't know what they were doing. - Well, so Ash is in the driver's side back seat, acting as navigator using what looks like a tourist map at a magazine. - Beside him is his girlfriend, Linda. - Linda is played by Betsy Baker. I've seen her in this movie, Oz the Great and Powerful and Lake Erie. - On the passenger side back row is Cheryl, Ash's sister. - Cheryl is played by Ellen Sandweis. I've seen her in Evil Dead and Oz the Great and Powerful. - Is that a sequel to Wizard of Oz? - It's like a movie about like a magician that goes, it's a cute Oz retelling. - Okay. - It's not like with Dorothy or anything like that. I couldn't tell you at all, it's been a minute. But I was like, yeah, I have seen that one 'cause I looked at some of the screenshots and I was like, oh, I fucking remember this. - Yeah. - Oh, I remember the plot. Yeah, it's a guy goes in and he becomes Oz. He's like a fucking magician. - Oh God, is this like a prequel to Wizard of Oz? - Kind of, yeah. - It's like a fucking story about that. - I think so. You know when it's not terrible, it's cute. - The driver is Ash's good buddy and all around asshole, Scotty. - Mm-hmm, what a dick. Scott is played by Richard Domenonkor. What a name. - What a fucking name. - And I don't think I have seen him in anything. - None of us have seen him in anything. - And finally, in the passenger seat is Scotty's girlfriend, Shelly. - And Shelly is played by Teresa Tilly. - I've seen her in this movie and Oz the Great and Powerful. - And that is it for the cast. - Mm-hmm. - There were a bunch of fake shimps. And that's because-- - Ted Raimi was a shimp. - Yes. - It's a jockser from Zina Warrior Princess. - What do you mean shimp? What are you talking about? - So they're all credited as fake shimp and it's because after Principal Filming wrapped up, they had to go and redo a bunch of stuff. - Yeah. - So he brought a bunch of other people into basically body doubles. - Body doubles. - Yeah, we're monster doubles. - Yeah. - And since Ted was available and these were a bunch of kids, like these people met in high school and they were like filming on super eights and stuff like that. They actually made a short film, I forget what it's called, but they made a short film that was like this, but just, you know, kids in the woods. - Right. - And that's how they got the funding for this and then they lost funding and had to get more funding. Yep. - All right, ready. Well, Scotty can't keep his eyes on the mountains winding dirt road and they almost collide with a pickup truck. Scotty claims it was the car's faulty steering despite Ash having had its service just yesterday. Linda asks about the place they're heading to and I cannot believe they hadn't had this conversation before they left. - Well, the guy that's written it says it's an old place. Little run down, but it's right up in the mountains. And the best part is we get it so cheap. - They take turns preemptively opining on what is effectively a super cheap Airbnb. - Okay, it's called a vacation rental. There are plenty of other vacation rental platforms in the world. People need to stop bitching about Airbnb. - I wasn't bitching about anything. - Stop it, stop branding them as Airbnb. It's not the Band-Aid event vacation house. - It's just a cultural touchstone that I can reference in a super-- - It needs to stop. - My thing is, I don't know much about Woodland Lythman and I know people who live very far from each other but it seems odd that this guy's written in a wooden cabin and there'd be no other wooden cabins nearby. - That's super normal. - That's super normal. - Is it, I don't know. - It's called being in bum fuck nowhere. It's called getting away from other people. Plenty of people want to just rent a cabin where they don't have to see anyone for miles. They can hunt, they can hike, they can burn shit. They can murder a bunch of people. That's the whole point of renting a cabin that's remote. - And they can injure themselves and then where are they gonna get a hospital? Where are they getting food? - Exactly. And then you're on like, I shouldn't have survived the MTV special. - Okay. - The final leg of the journey takes them over a bridge. One of the car's wheels breaks through the wood planking giving them all a scare before they finally arrive at the cabin. - Yeah, the Sam Raimi was really ramping up the, let me have horror right at the beginning. Oh, the truck, oh, the bridge, ooh, scary. - I mean, it sets it up so like that's your main way out and so you already know that you're stuck on this mountain. So I say smart fucking move, Mr. Moccasaurus. (laughs) - Okay, the music is eerie and the sound of a porch swing banging against the wall echoes through the forest. Scotty goes to the door and gets the key from above the doorframe. Spookily, the swing stops banging at that moment. ♪ Dun, dun, dun ♪ - Yeah, and it goes on for a minute too. - That, come, come, come, it's good. - Inside is dark and smoky. Well, dark until Scotty flips a light switch. Where the fuck does the electricity come from for this thing? Good question, George, yeah. - There's this thing called generators. - Yeah, I don't hear one running. - Well, yeah, true. - Yeah, they never mentioned one. - That is true. I mean, it could be further from the cabin. You just need to run a line. - I didn't see a line. They have to be buried cable through a forest, which is a really tall order. - I don't know. - All things considered, it's a nice little cabin. It wasn't a nice little cabin. The niceness was actually the film crew made it nice, but part of their, the terms for renting it was they had to restore it back to its original state when they left, so you had to get rid of all the nice. The only thing that stayed was the fireplace that they had built for this. - That is so weird. - Yep. - I guess you know what they probably thought the people were renting the cabin. They probably thought they were going to fuck it up. (laughs) - Aw. - A shed outside has lots of rusted saws and such with bones hanging from the ceiling. - Perfectly, Donald. - Yep, the friends unpack their car and settle in for the night. Cheryl sits in what I'll call the study, sketching a clock on the wall. - Why? - I mean, if you get a draw or something, it's on the sketch. - Mm-hmm. - At 5.52 PM, I don't know why. I like wrecked my brain trying to figure out what significance that time would have. I couldn't come up with anything. - Mm. - I wonder if it's like a passage in the Bible that we just didn't. - Maybe. - Did you check? - Nope. - I thought it's the first thing that I would check. - My guess is it doesn't mean anything. - Yeah. - Well, you know what actually that clock comes back in the next, like, it's pretty important in the next movie. So I'm sure there's some underlying reason for it that we haven't been-- - Yeah, maybe they revamped it when back, but I'm sure, initially, they just like, I love it, it's not a 5.52, who cares? - The pendulum stops and Cheryl seems hypnotized. The wind picks up and her hand becomes possessed drawing a crude, blocky book with a face on it. As she finishes, she gains control and is somewhat horrified by what she's drawn. Then a trapped door starts banging and shaking before it, too, calms down again. - That's the way those cabins work. - Mm-hmm. - All that banging and a shaking. And not the people. - Later, Scotty gently ribs Cheryl about her experience as the friends gather for dinner. Ash makes a toast and the trapped door slams open. They go to investigate. Scotty is an asshole to Cheryl for her suggesting that it might be an animal. - Well, now he's like really rude to her about it. - And he's like, oh, I don't know, what are you an idiot? - Like, yeah, I'm an asshole. - He says that's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. Really? That's the stupidest thing that statement right there is the stupidest thing you have ever heard. - And what is stupid about it? What an animal would be in the woods? That's not ridiculous. - He takes their flashlight and heads down. After a bit, Ash calls after him and he doesn't answer, so Ash goes down. - Now this is, I guess this just shows how much more of an asshole he is. 'Cause obviously your friends are concerned. Just yell up, oh yeah, it's good, it's good. I'm just looking down here, it doesn't say anything. - He's an asshole. Ash explores tentatively with an oil lantern before Scotty jumps out to scare him. He draws attention to a table, containing a tape recorder, a shotgun, a strange grotesque book, and a dagger with a bone and skulls handle. So they bring those things upstairs. - Because why not? - Yeah. - I would, I'd be like, let's get out of this dirty basement and bring all these cool things up top. I can read in the lights. They sit around the fireplace and play some of the tapes that they found. - It has been a number of years since I began excavating the ruins of Kanda with a group of my colleagues. Now my wife and I have retreated to a small cabin in the solitude of these mountains. Here I continued my research undisturbed by the myriad distractions of modern civilization and far from the groves of Akadim. - See, Joe, that's why you go out to the woods. - Mm-hmm. - That is the best real-to-real recording I've ever heard in my life. - It's the whole-- - Crackling? - Yeah. - There's no noise at all in the background. Wow, he got the, he really got the best machine of all. Wow, well, good purchase made by him. - Was that a real-to-real? I thought that was cassette. - No, it was real-to-real. - It was real-to-real? - Yeah. - I mean, it's not, you know what? If it hasn't degraded, you can get some pretty good sound on real-to-rails. My parents had a whole closet full of them, and they're pretty good. - Yeah, you needed a closet full of them. (laughs) They're more crackling and all such a million of those things. - No, they're really about, like, yay, big, and this, what? Like, you can't see me podcast listener, but they're not huge. Maybe, like, of a small LP. - Compared to a, you know, smartphone. - Yeah, but as long as they're in, like, fairly good condition, like, good. Yeah, I don't think the basement of a cabin would keep them in good condition, but I'm arguing that you can have good quality and real-to-real. (laughs) The tape continues, mm-hmm. - I believe I have made a significant find in the Condarian Runes, a volume of ancient Sumerian burial practices and funerary incantations. It is entitled "Nacharon di Monto," roughly translated, "Book of the Dead." The book is bound in human flesh, and inked in human blood. - Ooh! (laughs) Who was this recording for, exactly? - Pause- - Yeah, he was a, he was a professor and his wife, and they went and they did a dig for, at this temple condor, as he explains in the tape. - By themselves. No doubt they were going on a three-hour tour. - I'm sure they didn't go by themselves, but he was bringing it back to translate, as you would know if you listened to the tape, Joe. - They recorded it so that somebody could find it later. - Yeah! - That's the only reason. - Oh no, 'cause when you're a professional, you have as many records as possible. - For somebody to find later. - Yeah. - I'm not, I said what I said. - For himself, well, I mean, for the movie, it's for someone that, like, but for himself. - Okay, let's not make this discussion longer than the movie, let's move on. - Yes. - Yeah. - The tape goes on to explain that the book is an instruction manual for how to awaken immortal, demonic, undead beings that possess living humans. - Mm-hmm. - Sure. Some of the friends have had enough of that, but Scotty wants to hear the rest of it, so he keeps it playing. - Yeah, I would want to hear all of it. This would be my weekend. - Yep, this would be the end of your weekend. - Mm-hmm. - The man on the tape starts reciting passages from the book. Then, outside, the wind picks up and something red and glowy underground begins to stir. Cheryl screams to shut the tape off and a branch breaks through a cabin window. They flip the lights on and Cheryl leaves the room sobbing. Scotty, the asshole, gets a minor dressing down from Ash. - Scotty, you do not have played that. Come on, you knew it was upsetting and you just don't know when you're taking something too far. - On his fair. - Yeah. - He could've taken it to another room. - Yeah. - Once things calm down, Ash and Linda sit on the couch and he gives her a magnifying glass necklace. She says, "She'll never take it off." Pinning that. I didn't get that it was a magnifying glass necklace. I thought it was like a promise ring on her neck until like, movie two, where I was like, "Oh, there's fucking glass in that. No shit." - The evil whatever skulks around the cabin, observing as Ash and Linda chill by the fireplace and as Shelly and Scotty get undressed. It sees Cheryl alone in her bedroom and speaks. - Oh my gosh. - She's so good. She sees nobody outside. So she goes outside in her bathrobe and wanders into the forest. - Okay. So many questions. Number one, she doesn't tell anybody that she's doing this. - Nope. - Seems kind of foolish. Number two, it's late at night dark. She doesn't take any lights with her. Oh, why would she do this? Because the script says so. - 'Cause the script says so exactly. - The forest comes to life growing vines to restrain, disrobe, and rape her. She breaks free and runs back to the cabin. - Mm-hmm. - Now, if there's any scene that was completely unnecessary to have filmed that a lot, scenes that were over the top, this was totally unnecessary. - Yeah, I mean, that's, I would have cut that myself, but it's a bunch of guys making a movie and what's gonna scare people the most and how can I get my friends titties out? Like, 'cause you want tits, gore, and assault. And, unfortunately, young men, especially before, you know, things before now, like, that's what's gonna sell. I think they could've cut it. - The producer. - Just that last part. - The producer wanted it rapier. - Which producer? - One of them. It wasn't Sam Raimi. - What? - It was another one involved in it. - Actually, Slashie. Bruce Campbell was a producer in these movies as well. - Might've been him. - But, I don't know if there was another one. I don't think so. But, you know, it is. - Regardless. - You could be pervy when it's fake. I mean, how else is she's gonna get the forest insider? - Jesus. And they all get stuff inside of them without being sexually assaulted. - Yeah, that's true. Like I said, it was just an excuse to have that scene. - Yeah, and this gives you a show of breasts and stuff. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Well, nobody believes her. But Ash said-- - As usual. - As usual. Nobody believes you when you say the forest raped you. - Yeah. - But Ash says he'll take her back to town. So they try to do that, but the bridge has been destroyed and it is now warped and twisted into the form of a clawed hand reaching back towards them. Cheryl loses it, screaming that it's not gonna let them go before Ash drives her back to the cabin. - I do love that no one was like, that's really funny. It was amazing looking. Like, I kind of wonder what they did to make that or how long it took to make that. - I mean, had I been in this, it's ridiculous to say this, but if I had been in this situation, which 'cause nobody would be 'cause this thing doesn't exist, but in that situation, okay, this bridge is down. There's gotta be another way to go. There's nothing else-- - Well, it turns out there is. - Yeah. - Well, we'll learn about it later. I mean, it won't matter. - But it's like further around and it's nighttime and it's inconvenient. So they're like, ugh. - They also don't know about it yet. - Yeah. - Mm. - At the cabin, Ash listens to more of the tapes. The narrator describes his wife becoming a host to one of those demons. And the only way to stop it was to dismember her. - Got her apart. - Yep, that's what Mrs. Pemberman means, all right. - Yep. - Shelley has Linda guessing the number and suit of playing cards, like they did for the psychic test in "Sharship Troopers" and "Ghostbusters." - Mm-hmm. - Shelley lies to Linda, saying she got correct guesses when she hasn't. Cheryl, who is staring out the window, starts correctly identifying every card she pulls out. - Spooky. ♪ Why have you disturbed our sleep ♪ ♪ Or liken us from our ancient slumber ♪ ♪ You will die ♪ ♪ Like me on this big floor you ♪ ♪ One by one we will take you ♪ (laughing) - I mean, I don't like getting woken up either, but this seems excessive. (laughing) ♪ No, you woken up from my ancient slumber ♪ - It's so good. (laughing) - Oh God, so sweet. - No, I love it. I every time I hear shit like that, I'm like, "Yes!" (laughing) "It's coming for you!" - And why do they not want to die? - I just kill them, if that's your goal, why play as a game with them? - Well, they wanna terrify you. - Why? - It's fun, they want you to suffer. - But you wanna go back to sleep, I thought. You just kill them and go back to sleep then, you said you don't want to be awake for you, like slumber. - Well, they sleep because they don't have anybody to fuck with. - Yeah, now they're a great evil that is going to take over the lamp. - Mm, the film is called Evil Dead, though. - Yeah. - Now we have a plot. - That will change every movie after. - Yep. So that was the demon possessing Cheryl, who drops to the floor, unconscious, all veiny looking. Linda approaches with caution, and Cheryl stabs her in the Achilles tendon with a pencil and slaps her into a wall, then goes after Ash. Scotty knocks her into the cellar with an axe, and then manages to chain it shut. - What? Where did the chains come from? The chains were on top of the thing. - Yeah, 'cause the professor was already keeping his wife locked down there before. - How could we never find her body? Because he dismembered her and then buried her. - Yeah. - And where's his body? - That's what I'm saying. - He died at some point. - He's like first before I die. - Well, no, at one point he said he's certain that it's gonna come for him next. - Yep. - Right. - But before he did that, he made sure that it got set up as a vacation rental. - Yes. - Yes, okay, that makes sense. - After Ash gets Linda settled into bed, he and Scotty discuss making an escape. Shelly doesn't think she can wait 'til morning and gets weirdly specifically freaked out about Cheryl's eyes, which have gone white. From IMDB trivia, they had to use the cheapest contacts they could find for that. So they had to take them out to let their eyes breathe every so often. - Yeah, those things are thick. - Shelly thinks there's something skulking around outside, 'cause there is. So Scotty sends her to bed. (laughing) - I love that. You know how I've been watching like binge crime and like multiple times? Oh gosh, there's this one lady who was made to rob a bank because they had her child hostage. And the night before, her kid was like, I think I like saw someone outside and she just was like, look, look, it's fine, baby, go to bed and the next day, strap bombs to them and then she had to go rob a bank. - Okay, sure. This is why I never send you to bed when you tell me you think somebody's skulking around outside. - No, never, you always, always have someone check. - Yep. - Preferably the police. - Preferably somebody armed. - Well, I'm not going to get a gun. - Armed doesn't need to be gun. - That's true, that's true. I'm tiny and I don't have a lot of bats in the house. Oh, edit that out, no one needs to know that. My house is full of bats. (laughing) - Once Shelley's alone in the bedroom, the skulking evil breaks through the window, Scotty and Ash hear her scream and then silence. - By the way, I admit to bring this up before, when she was out in the woods, she was screaming her head off. Why didn't no one hear this? It's silent out there. It's completely silent, nothing else is around and nobody just goes screaming her head off? - Nope, they don't. - Maybe it's full of peacocks, woods full of peacocks. - Doesn't explain why they can't hear her. - Oh, no, I bet. Okay, so in Girl Scout Campground, look, George is like, she's gonna fucking go off and tangent the lands, they have loose peacocks and it sounds like women screaming. So honestly, if like a camper got like grabbed at this Girl Scout camp, like, people would be like, oh, those fucking peacocks are at it and no one would know. - I think they missed the girl, they figured it out. - I think like her. - Scotty goes to investigate and a possessed Shelley starts rending his face. He stumbles back into the main room with Shelley still attached. In the struggle, she's thrown so that her head lands in the fireplace. Scotty pulls her out of it and she tries to kill him with the dagger with Cheryl cheering her on. Scotty pulls out a hunting knife and slashes at the wrist of the hand Shelley's holding the dagger in. She then gnaws her own hand off for some fucking reason. - Oh, it's amazing. - Which horrifies Ash to a point where he can't attack her. - It's so gross. (laughing) - Scotty manages to get that dagger and stab her in the back with it. And that seems to do the trick, causing her to spew and spurt 2% milk. (laughing) - Yeah, what's with all the white liquid coming out of them? - It was 2% milk. And it was used to as an emphasis that these are no longer human beings. - So is that the same milk that's on the robot and alien? - No, but I made that same comparison. - Come on. (laughing) - I said it was slightly less tummy than that. - Oh, Jesus, all right. (laughing) - I wasn't even going there, but all right. - Right? Did you need to go there? (laughing) I think I said don't talk about calm on the show, man. Yeah, no, it was certainly less viscous than a jacket. That is for sure. - Now that we got that out of our system. (laughing) - She's not dead though. So Scotty takes the axe from Ash and dismembered his girlfriend as the demon screams, "No, you love her!" (laughing) They take her still quivering remains out and bury them. Scotty heads into the woods to find another way to escape. - By himself, makes a lot of sense. - I himself. - Yeah, I don't think he cared that much about his girlfriend. - Ash goes to check on Linda and finds she's been possessed too. She sits in the doorway laughing incessantly. Scotty bursts in, having been attacked by the forest and he's in bad shape. He's seen the light and he says Cheryl was right. It won't let them leave and they're all gonna die there. He says there is a trail they can follow, but you know, the trees know, so it's no use. Can't, can't, can't. - Bop, bop, bop, bop, I like it's so weird. Like that was the one of the, one thing in the plot that was really confusing to me. Just the one. - Just the one. - That it's, the book is bringing forth great evil, but suddenly the evil is the forest. Like-- - The evil is inhabiting the forest. - I guess. - The trees are possessed. - Mm. - I guess. - It's almost as if Sam Raim was just making this up as he goes along. Almost. - Yeah. - Scotty's doing it. - What? - I mean, you know, to be fair, I had a friend that did a lot of movies and he changed his script like every time we shot a scene. So like the plot was constantly changing. I think part of the reason why the plot was often changed in this was because of funding issues. - Of course, Linda cackles madly and Ash starts slapping her. That doesn't stop her. So he grabs the shotgun and points it at her head, but she appears to return normal and acts frightened. Cheryl also feigns normalcy. When he opens the trap door to check, she attacks and Linda reverts back to cackling Demon State too. - So the demons are perfectly capable of possessing these people who just don't possess the guys and just get it over with. It's like they wanna drag yourself for 90 minutes. - Yeah. - Yeah. - It's almost like the demons are doing things 'cause the script told them to. (laughing) - I think they have to like get into you as part of what it is. - But they very easily can, clearly. - Yeah, yeah, that's fair. I mean, like it's a movie. So on that it is what it is. They get better at it. You know, spoilers for people watching the series, like each movie gets better and better. So go for it. They rework the plot for the second one, so. And move on. - Ash drags Linda outside and then just like fucking leaves are there. What the fuck was that gonna do? - Who knows? - He brings Scotty a glass of water. When he gets up, Linda is back. She slashes his arm with the fancy dagger before licking the blood off of it. - Yeah, and I had forgotten that in this movie, that doesn't taint him with a thing on his arm 'cause you know, later on, as for his pop culture, I'm not spoiling anything. He does lose his arm and puts on a chainsaw. That's like the thing. That's not this movie. - No. - He's just a guy that got stabbed. - Exactly. - But they struggle before he manages to get the dagger into her back and push her over a fallen Scotty, driving it in. She starts spurting 2% milk before seeming to go unconscious. - Mm hmm. - After I spur at 2% milk, I also go unconscious. (laughing) - Me three. - He drags her to a shed and chains her to a table. He's about to dismember her with the chainsaw, but he sees the necklace he gave her and he loses his nerve. - Yeah, he loves her so much. - He's so sentimental. - It's his first love. So he drags her out to the yard and digs a hole, puts her in and buries her. She reaches out of the dirt and tears his leg open. - Oh, so nasty. - So he beheads her with the shovel. Her body spurts blood in 2% milk all over his face before he can get back to the cabin. - Ugh, don't you hate when the 2% milk spurt all over your face. - It's basically just colored water. (laughing) - When he gets back, Scotty is now possessed and Cheryl is free. He's got to fight both of them off. He gets more shells from the shotgun from the basement and for a while the film is just him being scared a lot until the final battle. At some point, the book of the dead gets thrown into the fire and this causes Scotty and Cheryl to start decomposing rapidly. He uses the necklace to retrieve it so he can throw it the rest of the way into the fire. As Dawn is breaking, Ash seems to be safe but the evil thing rushes through the house towards him. He screams and the movie is over. The end. - The end, indeed. Like, I will say this though, you didn't talk about it but like the way the decomposition happened, like it was a lot of things were stop motion animation. Like the way the spider, like the spider web where that girl got stabbed and the ankle spread. Oh, it's fucking amazing. I loved every second of that stop motion animation and that is 100% why I recommend this film. - This is a very well shot film for someone on a shoestring budget, but does it still work? No. How does it not work? - You don't need a forest rape scene. - I mean, yeah. - Like, I'm not gonna say that the horror in this is bad or anything like that and there's plenty of movies after this one where forest rapes or any kind of rapes don't happen. - That's true. - So go watch those ones. - You know what? - Leave this one alone. - Watch the evil dead too 'cause they rework things that were shitty in this movie for the intro 'cause they do a recap and they make it better. They really do. I said, we should totally do it. Like then, hey, patrons, patrons and listeners, you should ask George and Joe to do it. I'll come back. - Yeah, it made me some other time. - Oh, you don't wanna watch evil dead too? - Oh, but I just wanna say now. - I watched it immediately after. - Let's go get back to this film. Now, let me weigh in here. I do agree with you, George. And the reason, and I'm gonna defend George on this and I'm sure many of the audience are kid, everything. Oh, this still works well. We love it, we love it, we love it. The thing is, George and I have watched a lot of movies and we are both beyond tired. - See, Chama Station, basically in sexual assault. I don't know if you people appreciate how many American filmmakers are present in their goddamn films and we can't take it anymore. - Yeah, and it was definitely pointless, but like. - So, if you have any of your film, we're gonna give a thumbs down on how good it is. 'Cause I mean, it's in like precious or something like that. But that's a story about y'all being abused. Right, this is unnecessary. - And you need it. - I will say it ruined a perfectly fantastic set of boobs being shown. - Thank you. That is what-- - They were really the tits. (laughing) - Those tits really tested. - Yeah. - Were you gonna say George? - Nope, I don't remember what I was gonna say. (laughing) But yeah, I mean, it's just, it's exhausting. It really is this goal of this stuff. Over it, over it, over it. Especially if I film like this. Like, oh, this is a container. This is a lot of interesting. - Yeah. - All right. And then suddenly like, "Hey, let's have this wooden rape scene." Like, "What the fuck, man? Come on." - It's so better than that one with that none scene. - Bad lieutenant? - Oh, fucking bad lieutenant, so gross. (laughing) - Him and his weird-- - That is weird. - That is for the plot. I mean, you may not have liked it, but that's part of the plot. This is completely unnecessary. - Harvey and his Kitell. - Harvey Kitell is so upsetting. - Do you like his naked body? You get a lot of blood. - It's so, like it's cut. And you're like, really, I mean, I guess it should be athletic, but ugh. - Doesn't do it for you, okay? - No, it does the opposite of anything for me. All right. - Poor Harvey. - It makes me wanna like, so shit up. (laughing) Like, I would get, I would be like, you know what? I'm gonna buy a burka. It's just so Harvey Kitell can't look upon me. (laughing) - Okay. So, Joe and I say it doesn't work. Let's get a definitive answer from Kit. Does this still work? (screaming) - I mean, it definitely needs some polish. And it got some, it got some. Later. - So this doesn't cast this still work. - Stop saying later. What about this film? Let's stick with this film. What do you think of this film? - I refuse to say anything bad about Bruce Campbell. (laughing) - You're not saying something bad about Bruce Campbell. - And other than you guys are, you and he brow. - He, you know what, he took care of that. And he was still a very-- - That's a later movie. This movie was Harvey. - You know what, he was still bangable. I, you know what, I'm fine with the universe. Like, I could just hold him down and pluck it. I don't know. - Okay, okay. So you still think it works then, is that it? - I don't, I don't think it's, it's best. I'm, I'm sure someone could put it out today and make a small amount of money on it. Like, I don't, but yeah. I don't think, I don't think it could be like a blockbuster today. - Wasn't a blockbuster then? - Yeah, I think it was a foreign cult classic. I forget what country it was about. - You're not gonna answer this question. No, does it still work for today? This film, no other film, not the later films. This one does the work. - It doesn't work 'cause they're great. - Okay, cool, thank you, we can move on now. (laughing) - Jesus Christ. - Thank you, Kit, for coming on the show. Do you have anything you want to plug? - You're welcome. No, I have nothing to plug, nothing whatsoever. - Well, this is a Patreon's choice episode and the poll for next one's film is already up. All in Patreon, the chances are, Panic in the Streets from 1950, outbreak from 1995, and getting Tajin from 2011. George, ask me what these all have in common. What did these all have in common, Joe? - Disease, yeah, somebody is horribly sick. This is the seasonal flu theme. - Indeed. - Is outbreak the moment that little monkey that was on Friends? - Yep, I don't know if it's a monkey on Friends, but definitely some sort of monkey on Friends. - Like it was that type of monkey at least, but I'm pretty sure it was the monkey on Friends. I think I remember that from the promos, even though I did not enjoy the show, ever. - Panic in the Streets, I believe is tuberculosis, but don't quote me on that. I mean, I don't have to look at the fucking articles from the 1950s. - Oh, it's gonna be fine. I've done that further than that, so yeah. - Oh, yeah. - If they pick this one, make likely people will probably go with the latest one, Contagion, which is a very good movie. - I mean, outbreak was pretty popular if you have a lot of boomers and early elder millennials. - I don't know what we have. What do we have, George? - Keep moving, take monkeys. - Is this my thing, Joe? (laughing) - All right, if you wanna vote but are not a patron, you can fix that by becoming one at patreon.com/dtswpod. Now, Joe wants to watch up next. Next week, we'll be talking about the professional from 1994, or Leon, the professional from 1994, depending on where you're looking. Yeah, it's really weird. It's got two different names. Well, I guess I have this for this episode. I'm Joe Dixon. Thanks for listening. And I'm George Romaka. Thanks for listening, indeed, 'cause if a podcast drops and there's no one around to hear it, just another collection of ones and zeros that doesn't matter. ♪ We're gonna get a dream ♪ ♪ We're gonna get a dream ♪ ♪ Not another peek ♪ ♪ Time to go to sleep ♪ - You've been listening to Does This Still Work? Produced by Joe Dixon and George Romaka. The hosts can be reached via social media, email, or the contact page at dtswpod.com. Be good to yourself and others, because that still works. (upbeat music) I will never cut out that you saying those words. That's an outtake. - Okay. - Let me scroll down here. (humming) - Random question. If you woke up one morning to find you grew a pair of wings, what kind of wings would you hope they'd be? Let's move on to stupid question. Does anyone actually feel happy while exercising? The no-stupid question. Is it socially acceptable to try to pawn off big goods to hookups? All right, random question. If your favorite animal appeared in your room out of nowhere, would that be a problem or a blessing? All right, next question, stupid question now. How many times could you legally go around around about? George, you drive, tell me. No stupid questions. Why do people carry their phones around on speaker instead of putting the phone to their ear? Do you believe things happen for a reason?
