Sébastien Vaniček injects a French Extreme energy into the franchise that makes this entry possibly the most unsettling one yet.

The Evil Dead Franchise has become a place for newer filmmakers to prove their mettle on their way to becoming chaos kings. Each installment takes the ingredients that made the original film a crowd-pleaser and remixes them. Beginning with the 2013 soft reboot helmed by Fede Álvarez, the films have taken a darker tone that has been divisive. While some people claim these later models aren’t as funny (I disagree with those people), others are here for new levels of dread and WTF. Many of us are also enjoying that the new phase of the franchise is finally churning out some vicious final girls alongside all of these Deadite queens. An assignment that Lee Cronin’s Evil Dead Rise understood a little too well. So, director and co-writer of Evil Dead Burn, Sébastien Vaniček, had some very big maggot infested shoes to fill.

Vaniček and Florent Bernard’s script knows that real horror starts at home. They bypass introducing us to a cast of characters who stumble upon the Necronomicon and read the words that seal their fate. Instead, Evil Dead Burns opens with a Deadite on a mission. She rips her way through two strangers and collides with Will (George Pullar), cutting his screentime short. Before Will’s quick demise, we get a glimpse of how he treats his wife Alice (Souheila Yacoub) and learn enough to know we’re glad he’s dead. 

Alice is a French woman who left her life and family behind when she married Will. So, she’s an outsider who is isolated in many regards even among the family she married into. Her brother-in-law Joseph (Hunter Doohan) and his girlfriend Thya (Luciane Buchanan) seem nice to her. However, the rest of the brood seems to hate her while they avoid working through their own baggage. When Alice shows up at the funeral in sweats, the vibe is definitely off, as they begin judging her for not being the ideal widow. When she goes to their home, we watch them treat her with disdain as she is clearly still reeling from the emotional and physical abuse she suffered at the hands of their son. By the time the Deadites make their grimy, bloody, and chaotic presence known, it feels more like this woman is being saved from her in-laws than terrorized alongside them.

Alice’s mother-in-law, Susan (Tandi Wright), and father-in-law, Edgar (Erroll Shand), were the real villains of the film. They raised a monster and do not want to hear it. We have to wonder if part of their issue with Alice is that she’s not as keen to pretend Will was a saint. Susan also seems to be avoiding her own familial issues while taking care of her mother, Polly (Maude Davey). Polly is wheelchair bound and has dementia, so she forgets who people are while getting some of the easiest laughs of the movie. Susan’s mantra is that she’s nothing without her family, as we see her ignoring her own demons. We get quick peeks at the person she might’ve become had she ever put her own oxygen mask on and pursued her happiness. Not enough to let her off the hook for looking the other way for her son’s actions though. She’s serving oldest daughter syndrome, but we never get time to unpack it enough to make it a moment.

Once the family dynamics are established, Vaniček wastes no time in making sure his Evil Dead installment hits different. Evil Dead Burn feels like a New Wave French Extremity movie wearing the skin of Sam Raimi’s favorite child. It’s relentless, twisted, grim, and wicked in all the right ways. While this isn’t going down as the most fun entry, or even the best film of the franchise, it carves its name into your retinas. This film takes bold swings that will make it memorable long after we’re done talking about how fine it is. It harnesses the midnighter energy of the series and shoves it into a blender set to liquefy. Then Vaniček paints this room of Raimi’s home in that goop, knowing full well this smell will linger for decades.

Vaniček has a skill for making the gross even more disturbing than it should be. The things we see coming are somehow more brutal and vicious than you could imagine. To borrow a hunter’s term, he uses every inch of the animal. The ingredients that are passed down from film to film of the franchise get repurposed in new and crude ways. The character details are weaponized to the point that a scene with fake teeth made me look away. The bodily fluids, skin holes, and grit are worth the ride. The Evil Dead Burn ensemble does everything they can to make the script work and churn out some very fun characters. They also take their Deadite ass kickings like champs.

While Evil Dead Burn is a fun time, and I appreciate that it raises the family horror bar higher than most movies of late, it does run into a few snags. We love a final girl that’s been through it. We also love to see male filmmakers who understand men are the problem making art that yells that. However, in the third act, things become a bit too on the nose. The dialogue reminding her she stayed in an abusive relationship, and telling her she must have liked it, feels ripped from broadcast TV procedurals. 

While watching Alice come face-to-face with her trauma as her final boss is iconic, there were so many ways it could’ve been a bit more powerful. It’s entertaining, and you get the intention. However, much like when Evil Dead (2013) gave us a final girl who was fighting addiction (and survived the unnecessary tree sexual assault), it feels just a little left of center. I’m not knocking the men who have helmed these movies, and I’m actually a huge fan of most of them. Yet, I cannot help wondering if now that we’re pushing women to the front on screen, it’s time for one to helm one of these bad girls.

Evil Dead Burn especially feels like it wants to ask the same question. Vaniček and Bernard’s script sees the eldest daughter (Susan) and the woman who suffered domestic abuse (Alice). However, it runs into the male habit of speaking for them instead of listening to them. While it feels like a backhanded insult to say they brought something to the table so interesting that it forces us to nitpick it, that’s exactly what happens here. The film feels like a very thoughtful and considerate smash-and-grab to serve a smorgasbord for women who fall into these two categories, a sandwich. With a woman’s touch, it could’ve flown higher and stuck the landing for both characters it seems to want to support.