Like I tried to with the Zombi and Demoni series I’m going to try to explain the Evil Dead series.
Evil Dead was released in 1981 starring Bruce Campbell and Ellen Sandweiss, directed by Sam Raimi. I wont summarise the film because everyone should have seen it by now.
A big hit going as far as getting banned in the UK by the British Government as a ‘Video Nasty’ it was only natural that someone would want to feed of it’s success.
And this is where we move our story from America to Italy where the film is renamed “La Casa” (The House) and Evil Dead 2 is renamed “La Casa 2”
Fairly Straight forward so far but then to cash in on the success of these films there was 3 unofficial Italian sequels starting with Umberto Lenzi’s La Casa 3 known in UK\US as Ghosthouse
La Casa 4 should be sought out for no other reason than the inspired casting of Linda Blair the Exorcist (1973) and The Hoff Baywatch, Knight Rider and Nick Fury: Agent of Shield. Who doesn’t remember that one. It was also released on video in the UK as Ghosthouse 2
House
As we know La Casa translated into English means House so what about the horror film House (1986), you can’t call that La Casa as well as that would be confusing?
Well this you could as I’ll show later that the Italians have no problem using the same name for two different films in the same series. Instead House was renamed Chi è sepolto in quella casa?
House 2 was renamed La Casa Di Helen
This was later re-released as La Casa 6 as the series skipped that number and jumped to La Casa 7, just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse. Unfortunately I have no poster or VHS cover of this film bearing that title.
The Horror Show (1989) which was already renamed House 3 in the US was later renamed La Casa 7
Of course earlier I mentioned how the Italians are not above having two films having the same name in a series well here it is. House 3 (La Casa 7) was renamed La Casa 3 for its DVD release even though Ghosthouse already had that title. It seems Italians will also rename a film already in a series to another film in that same series.
But wasn’t there an official 3rd film to the original American Evil Dead made?
Yep, Army of Darkness: The Medieval Dead (1992), so how does that fit into this mess?
It doesn’t, it was renamed L’armata delle tenebre until it was released on DVD when La Casa 3 was added.
Evil Dead 2013
The recent reboot was also named La Casa which is in keeping with the original series.
Using La Casa doesn’t end there. A 1988 film Dream Demon was renamed La casa al nº13 in Horror Street
So there you have it, at least it can’t become anymore complicated. Well actually it can, for the original series at least.
Sam Raimi has discussed his plans for the future of the Evil Dead series.
You have…
Evil Dead
Evil Dead 2: Dead By Dawn
Army of Darkness: The Medieval Dead
Sort of sequel My Name Is Bruce
And the semi-canonical Reboot Evil Dead 2013 directed by Fede Alvarez
There was plans that included a sequel to Alvarez’s reboot as well as a sequel by Sam Raimi to Army of Darkness culminating with a further film Evil Dead 7 that would bring together the characters of the original series and the reboot but this looks increasingly unlikely now.
