Characters / Evil Dead - The Evil Dead

The Evil Dead

The Dark Ones

In General

The Dark Ones

Played By: N/A

A group of beings responsible for the creation of the Necronomicon.

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• Bad Guys Do the Dirty Work: In "Judgment Day," They show up during Ash's fight with Ruby and Kaya, and finish the two off for him; Ash takes advantage of the distraction to steal the Necronomicon and make a run for it.
• Black Cloak: The only depiction of the Dark Ones ever seen shows them wearing dark hooded cloaks that completely conceal their appearance. This is to conceal the fact that they indeed can pass for completely human.
• Humanoid Abomination: It is unclear exactly what they are, being described as “neither demon nor fully human”. They at least look human but possess enhanced strength, Healing Factor and immunity to fire. Ash calls Ruby a "half demon half person".
• Predecessor Villain: They do not appear to be active in the present time, but as the creators of the Necronomicon, they are responsible for all the terrible events of the franchise. At least one is still active in present times, planning to use the book to unleash and the rule over the forces of darkness.

Ruby

Ruby Knowby

"I've learned you can always make things more painful."

Played By: Lucy Lawless

A mysterious figure who is myopic in her quest to hunt down the source of the recent evil outbreaks. She is the daughter of Professor Raymond and Henrietta Knowby and sister of Annie Knowby from Evil Dead 2. Ruby blames Ash for the deaths of her family members and has been trying to track him down for years for revenge.

Except that's all a lie. As it turns out, Ruby is actually one of the Dark Ones, millennia old, and the author of the Necronomicon.

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• Ambiguously Evil: She wants to control the demonic forces and bring the world into harmony, as there can be no good without evil.
• Anti-Hero: She pretends to be one in season 1, casting herself as a ruthless demon hunter out to save the world. It's a lie, but she does become one in season 2 where she's forced to ally herself with Ash. She's not necessarily friendly, but she is on their side and helps out Kelly and Pablo a few times.
• Anti-Villain: Her goal of taking the Necronomicon for herself in order to control evil in a managed fashion puts her at odds with Ash and the others, but she presents it in a way that suggests that it would be better for everyone. In a surprising turn, Ash sees the up-side of what she's proposing and accepts her offered truce.
• Asshole Victim: Well technically she wasn't really that bad, but on the other hand her past self who really deserved it. In the second-to-last episode of Season 3, Ruby is murdered by the Dark Ones, and considering all the trouble and pain she's caused like killing her future self, trying to turn Ash's daughter against him, and got Pablo possessed, no one will miss her. Ash certainly has No Sympathy to spare for her, and even mocks her before making his escape.
• Ax-Crazy: Her 80s counterpart is a lot more focused on carnage and destruction with her plans.
• Ambiguously Gay: Ruby seems to hit on Amanda while trying to calm her. Deadite Amanda implies this too by saying they could have been together. Ruby willing kisses who she thought to be a female cop, turns it was actually Baal in disguise
• Black Eyes of Evil: She sports these in "The Dark One" as another sign that she isn't truly human.
• Been There, Shaped History: As revealed in "Bound in Flesh," she wrote the Necronomicon.
  • In season two's opening episode, she mentions having fought alongside Genghis Khan and Attila The Hun.
  • In the season 2 finale, it's discovered that she was the one who murdered Professor Knowby.
• Big Bad: Of Season 1, the present version of Ruby is seeking to create a new order for the Evil Dead where she rules supreme and poses as the main antagonistic force for Ash and his allies.
• Big Bad Duumvirate:
  • In season 2 the past version of Ruby teams up with Baal to overrun the world with demons, even killing her present self after the latter's Heel–Face Turn.
  • In season 3 the same version of Ruby resurfaces to again enact her nefarious schemes, this time forming an alliance with Kaya, a treacherous member of the Knights of Sumeria.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: In Season 3. She poses as Brandy's beloved and caring guidance counselor, Mrs. Prevett, all while plotting against Ash and trying to turn Brandy against him. Ash is unable to convince Brandy of Ruby/Mrs. Prevett's true nature until "Twist and Shout," when Brandy sees Ruby survive and regenerate from being impaled on Ash's chainsaw with her own eyes.
• Brought Down to Normal: As revealed in Season 2, her demonic children stripped her of her immortality when they turned on her.
• Complete Immortality: She's lived for thousands of years, and any damage inflicted on her quickly heals. Only the Kandarian Dagger can truly harm, let alone kill, her. Even if her body parts are blown away in separate directions with explosives, they just crawl back together.
• Cool Car: She has one.
• Deal with the Devil: In the Season 1 finale, she makes a truce with Ash, sparing his friends and giving him a chance for a normal life as long as he doesn't interfere with her plans to unite the world's evil under her rule. Much to the dismay of Pablo and Kelly, Ash accepts. It's derailed in Season 2 by her demon offspring turning against her.
• Defiant to the End: In "Judgment Day," even when faced with the vengeful Dark Ones, Ruby refuses to show any fear, and informs them that Ash is still out there and will kill them.
• Determinator: She's been trying to hunt down Ash for the past 30 years.
  • And she had been hunting the Necronomicon even longer. Ash even jokes about this saying how she spent her life looking for it, but he can't do anything without "tripping" over it.
• Evil All Along: The Season 1 finale reveals that her story about being Knowby's daughter was all a lie, and she is in fact a Dark One who intends to unite all the world's evil under her rule, though it's actually much more complicated than it sounds, she is not evil per se as her intention is simply to control the evil forces to prevent from wreaking havoc on the world.
• Evil Is Not a Toy: As revealed in the Season 2 premiere, the demonic children she forced the possessed Pablo to spawn have turned against her and want the Necronomicon for themselves, forcing Ruby to form an Enemy Mine with Ash to help clean up her mess.
• Greater-Scope Villain: She's a Dark One, creator of the Tome of Eldritch Lore that has caused so much death and destruction throughout Ash's life, which makes her this during the previous movies.
• Horrifying the Horror: In "Books from Beyond," she subjects a Deadite to a Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique. It gets so bad that the Deadite freaks out and begs her to stop.
• Humanoid Abomination: She's a Dark One, considering that she wrote the book (which mind you, has been around for centuries if not millennia) in the first place. However, Baal implies that she is becoming or has become a mortal
• Healing Factor: She recovers from having several large holes blown into her chest fairly quickly. Her injuries from the Demon Spawn seem to be taking longer though.
• I Hate Past Me: Her present day and 1980s selves meeting has shades of this, with past Ruby expressing horror at her future self's actions, while present day Ruby delivers a failed You Are Better Than You Think You Are speech.
• I Have Many Names: Including "demon woman of fire" in Latin and "fierce mother from Hell" in Greek.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Turns out Ash is in fact responsible for the Deadite outbreak due to reading the Necromonicon and pretending it's poetry while high to impress a girl.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: Ruby wrote the Necronomicon, and is one of the Dark Ones, but Ash and the audience don't know that until the ends of the first season.
• Made of Iron: In "Fire in the Hole," she survived being burned alive with nothing more than Clothing Damage.
• No Name Given: Technically speaking, Ruby Knowby isn't her actual name and her real name is currently unknown. People still call her Ruby and even after dropping her ruse, she still tells people to call her Ruby. It is possible that the Ruby part is her real name, and the lie being the "Knowby" part.
• Off With Her Head! Done to herself in the second season finale. Or rather, done to present Ruby by her past self, off-screen, after 1982 Ruby kills her present self, she throws her head into Ash's lap.
• Omnicidal Maniac: 80s Ruby is significantly more destructive goal-wise, wanting to unleash Hell on Earth and kill everyone on it.
• Psychic Powers: She seems to have some psychic abilities, able to sense Deadites.
• Redemption Demotion: Her immortality was stolen by her demon spawn, resulting in her needing to turn to Ash and his friends for help.
• Redemption Rejection: In the season 2 finale, she offers a chance at redemption to her own past self, informing her of what will happen to her in the future if she continues down the path she's going. Past-Ruby not only turns her down flat, but stabs Present-Ruby in the gut with the Kandarian Dagger.
• Torture Technician: She tortures a Deadite! That's like punching out Muhammad Ali!
• Villain with Good Publicity: In Season 3, she works in Kenwood High as a guidance counselor.
• Villainous Breakdown: In "Twist and Shout," she suffers one, annoyed at Ash's constant streak of victory.
  Ruby: Hundreds of years spent looking for that book! And two years in this shithole of a school! No one is that stupid, or that lucky!
• Visionary Villain: She claims to want the Necronomicon so she can rule over the forces of darkness and impose order on them so that they don't destroy humanity.

Kaya

Kaya

Played By: Chelsie Preston Crayford

She is a former sorceress of the Knights of Sumeria who later becomes a Dark One after betraying her order and also a close protégé and ally of Ruby.

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• Asshole Victim: Seeing as both Ruby and Kaya have a knack for betraying anyone and causing so much trouble, hardly anyone's going to miss them.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Betraying the Knights of Sumeria in order to become one of the Dark Ones and later along side with Ruby decided to betray the Dark Ones and rule over evil by themselves which didn't end well in the near season finale.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Lets see? Stripped out of Kelly's vessel only to be put back into her original by the Dark Ones before being burned to a crisp.
• Face–Heel Turn: As Chronic Backstabbing Disorder explained, she betrayed the Knights of Sumeria to become a Dark One, and later join Ruby.
• Flat Character: Compared to heroes and villains, the only thing that's known about her is that she's Ruby's protégé which is about a characterization she receives before being killed off.
• Smug Snake: Along side with Ruby who think they can actually stab the Dark Ones in the back and act like they can get away with it as long as they could without anyone taking notice, they're dead wrong when the Dark Ones caught up to them and gave them a taste of their own medicine.

Demons

Baal

Baal

"Baal doesn't use brute force, he breeds paranoia. Gets into people's psyches, turning them against each other."

Played By: Joel Tobeck, Piotr Michael (Evil Dead: The Game)

A diabolical demon, Baal, is an enemy more powerful than any of that Ash and team have encountered. Released from the underworld, he has bigger plans than just destroying Ash. He conjures hysteria to carry out his evil deeds and is Ruby's ex-husband.

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• Absurdly Sharp Claws: His talon is razor sharp and can even bisect people with ease.
• Big Bad: Of Season 2. Possibly the Greater-Scope Villain of the entire series.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Refers to himself and the demons that serve him as "evil".
• Compelling Voice: He's able to enthrall Margie completely with a word.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: Unlike the Evil Force, he has a human appearance and personality. And while the Deadites are too stupid or too sadistic to properly make use of Paranoia Fuel, Baal is an expert at turning people against each other and messing with their minds.
• Deadpan Snarker: When Linda refuses to talk to Thomas, his response is simply, "Looks like someone's sleeping on the couch tonight."
• Deal with the Devil: Offers to return Lacey to Thomas and Linda in exchange for Ash. And so he does ... albeit possessed.
• Faux Affably Evil: He's a smooth talking sadist. When he tries to sway Thomas to his side he speaks cordially and friendly; offering to murder a woman who's giving him a hard time.
• Femme Fatalons: He has a single razor-sharp claw.
• Genuine Human Hide: He disguises himself using the skins of his victims.
• Glamour Failure: The human skins he wears don't always fit perfectly, and he can occasionally be seen scratching at them, causing the loose skin to stretch out unnaturally.
• Humanoid Abomination: He's not as obvious as some of the other abominations that have been summoned by the book, but he hails from the same place as they do, is inhumanly strong and possesses Face Stealer abilities. He also growls and snarls like an animal when he's frustrated or pissed off.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Ash defeats and sends him back to Hell by stabbing him with his own claw when his guard is down.
• Knight of Cerebus: More so than any other antagonist in the franchise, Baal is utterly ruthless and virtually humorless. His Mind Rape of Ash is fully Played for Drama, and his manipulation of the town of Elk Grove proves to be one of the biggest obstacles that has ever been set in Ash's way. It's worth noting that whenever Ruby says his name, even she is clearly horrified of him.
• Naked on Arrival: When he first appears, he's completely naked.
• Red Right Hand: His standard form looks mostly human, save for the single sharp black talon on his right hand.
• Replicant Snatching: His modus operandi is to kill someone and wear their freshly-peeled skin to assume their identity.
• Shapeshifter Guilt Trip: Does this to Ash in "Second Coming" by assuming the form of Ash's various dead friends and mocking him for his inability to save them.
• Suicidal Overconfidence: He is absolutely certain that he'll kill Ash without effort, only for Ash to distract him and use his own claw to peel off his skin.
• Super-Strength: As to be expected of a Demon, he even seems stronger than Ruby since he was able to throw her about with no resistance.

Eligos

Eligos

"Can't blame a demon for trying!"

Played By: Ben Fransham, Kellen Goff (Evil Dead: The Game)

A demon summoned by Lionel at Ash's request to get information about how to stop the evil.

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• Adaptational Wimp: In real world demonology Eligos is a Great Duke of Hell but Lionel refers to him as a weak lesser demon. He is still a hell of a lot stronger than anyone of them expected.
• Alien Blood: As shown in "Brujo," his blood is greenish-blue.
• Arc Villain: Served as the main antagonist of Episodes 3 through 5.
• Black Eyes of Evil: The only outward sign that a person is being possessed by Eligos. He can turn it on and off at will, though.
• Boom, Headshot!: Ash puts a shotgun shell right in his face.
• Demonic Possession: He has this ability, but is a lot more subtle than the Deadites' version, being able to make the victim pass of as completely normal.
• Evil Sounds Deep: Has a very deep, raspy voice.
• Eyeless Face: His appearance may remind some of The Pale Man or The Chatterer.
• Faux Affably Evil: Not to the extent of the Deadites, but Eligos can slip in to this from time to time. It's especially pronounced when possessing Kelly and he becomes more sardonic and quippy.
• For the Evulz: He pretended to be Kelly to trick Ash into performing a Mercy Kill on her. Ash nearly does it but catches onto the trick.
• Humanoid Abomination: A distorted, demonic monstrosity in the vague shape of an emaciated human being that, save for his mouth, flickers and vibrates like a bad VHS tape.
• Knight of Cerebus: Compared to the Deadites. There's nothing comedic about him, Ash is left almost completely helpless when he tries to confront him, and the way he tortures Ash and Pablo is not Played for Laughs.
• Normal Fish in a Tiny Pond: He's explicitly stated to be the weakest demon that the Necronomicon can summon, and he effortlessly kicks Ash's ass and nearly kills him. Which means that if the most powerful of the lot crossed over to our side of the fence, those trying to stop them would be absolutely powerless.
• Ominous Visual Glitch: His entire body flickers, vibrates, and glitches out like a bad VHS tape.
• Out-of-Character Alert: While possessing Kelly, he pretends to be her in a moment of clarity, begging Ash to Mercy Kill her. Ash is about to do so, but then "Kelly" asks him to make a cross for her grave. Knowing Kelly is Jewish, Ash quickly realizes the trick.
• Psychic Powers: He's referred to as a "demon of the mind," and in "Brujo," he invades Ash's Vision Quest.
• Shoot the Mage First: Upon breaking free of the binding circle, the very first thing Eligos does is kill Lionel, the only one who can read the incantation needed to send him back.
• Teleport Spam: Uses these to get the drop on anyone trying to attack him. Ash finally exploits this ability in the showdown at Brujo's ranch; by anticipating that he always appears right in front of his victims, Ash tosses up his shotgun, swipes at him with his chainsaw, and spins on his heels to catch the gun just as the demon re-appears. The resulting blast splatters Eligos's physical form across the barn.

Kandar the Destroyer

A massive demon, summoned by the Dark Ones to test the mettle of man.

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• Alien Blood: He bleeds pale blue blood in Evil Dead 2, when Ash skewers him in the eye with his chainsaw-hand. Whereas in the Season 3 finale of Ash vs Evil dead however, he bleeds green.
• Breath Weapon: Possesses the ability to breathe giant jets of flame that are strong and far-reaching enough to blow fighter jets out of the sky.
• Beast of the Apocalypse: His only purpose is to destroy everything. And worse, any attempts to stop him with conventional weaponry just makes him stronger.
• Final Boss: Ash fights Kandar at the very end of the series after its presence was being foreshadowed since season 1 (and by extension, the first movie).
• King Mook: Is basically a Deadite Kaiju.
• Rent-a-Zilla: It's the size of a building, is Nigh-Invulnerable and even breathes fire (which it uses to shoot down an A-10 Thunderbolt).

Deadites

In General

The "Evil Dead" / The Deadites

Played By: Ted Raimi, Denise Bixler, Richard Domeier, Lou Hancock, Embeth Davidtz, Patricia Tallman, Shiva Gordon, Billy Bryan, Nadine Grycan, Bill Moseley, Eric Clarke, Kevin O'Hara, Courtney Pakiz, Sam Raimi, Ellen Sandweiss, Richard De Manincor, Betsy Baker, Theresa Tilly

Film Appearances: The Evil Dead (1981) / Evil Dead II: Dead By Dawn / Army of Darkness / Evil Dead (2013) / Ash vs. Evil Dead / Evil Dead Rise

"Why have you disturbed our sleep, awakened us from our ancient slumber? You will die like the others before you. One by one we will take you!"

An evil demonic force of nature, and the Big Bad of the series.

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• Ax-Crazy: Every Deadite seen is a bloodthirsty lunatic which will go on a mass killing spree if given even the slightest hint of a chance.
• An Arm and a Leg:
  • While things like Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain have worked, completely dismembering a Deadite is the only surefire way to keep 'em down.
  • Perhaps one of the most iconic scenes in the series is a Deadite infecting and possessing Ash's right hand, forcing him to amputate it. In Ash vs Evil Dead, they try this trick again on his leg, but Ash manages to suck the demon out after stabbing his leg with scissors.
• Alien Blood: Most Deadites just have red blood, but some of them have green, black, and even yellow blood.
• Arch-Enemy: The race as a whole serve as this to Ash, as they spend an entire film trilogy tormenting him and trying to destroy everything he loves.
• Beware the Silly Ones: Even at their absolute silliest, they're still deadly threats.
• Big Bad: Specifically the "Evil Force" that controls them.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Most Deadites openly gloat about how evil they are.
• Chaotic Stupid: Deadite possession is not always obvious, and Deadites can feign being their host for extended periods of time. They invariably get impatient, however, and show their Game Face. Similarly, given a helpless opponent, the Deadite tends to prefer torturing them instead of killing them outright.
• The Corruption: The Evil Force, like an infection, can enter your body through something as simple as a nail-puncture on the foot. You'll become a Deadite when it fully spreads, and even if you stop it, the infected flesh sometimes takes on a mind of its own.
• The Dead Can Dance: In the musical, most notably during the song, Do The Necronomicon.
• Deadpan Snarker: Good lord, they can keep up with Ash not just in physical combat, but Snark-to-Snark Combat too.
• Dem Bones: Most of the titular Army of Darkness is mostly composed of skeletons who've been buried for years.
• Demonic Possession: Its Modus Operandi. Usually the host requires a Mercy Kill to free them, although the light of the sun can sometimes exorcise the host and occasionally the host can force the demon out on their own if they possess exceptional Heroic Willpower.
• Dirty Coward: Implied in the first movie. The Evil Force refuses to attack anyone in groups unless possessing someone, ending its pursuit of Cheryl after Ash drags her into the cabin, screaming "NO! YOU LOVE HER!" at Scotty as he's hacking up the possessed Shelly, presumably in an effort to save its own skin.
• Evil Is Petty: To the Deadites, there's no such thing as too far, and as a result will stoop to unimaginable lows to dick around with their victims.
• Eldritch Abomination: The Evil Force is rarely shown in full. When it physically appears at the end of Evil Dead II, it's a monstrous, treelike creature with the heads of its victims embedded in its side, and its mere appearance causes plants to wilt and Ash to gain an instant skunk stripe. In Ash vs. Evil Dead, it's shown as a giant, malevolent cloud. Their true form as Kandar The Destroyer is a gargantuan, demonic, emaciated monstrosity that bears more than a passing resemblance to a Wendigo.
• Empty Eyes: A tell-tale sign of Deadite possession is milky white eyes with no pupils or irises.
• Evil Is Hammy: "I'll swallow your soul!"
• Faux Affably Evil: Subverted in a sense, since combining with the above Evil Is Hammy trope and Laughably Evil, it's hard to take them seriously. This is plain old averted in the remake though.
• For the Evulz: Apparently its sole reason for doing anything. In Evil Dead II, Ash is alone for some time by himself being tormented by the Demon, which logically could have killed him at anytime it wanted. Why doesn't it? Because having driven him Ax-Crazy and Laughing Mad, Ash has proven far too entertaining and the Demon is having too much fun to want to kill him just yet. It only renews its attack on him once the others show up at the cabin.
• Hive Mind: Somewhat, each Deadite seems to have its own personality, even though they're all possessed by the same demon.
• Humanoid Abomination: Manifests itself into a humanoid form near the end of the 2013 film, ironically called "the Abomination". On a side note, any of the Deadites who decide to use their Lovecraftian Superpower to really do a number on themselves becomes this as they turn from zombielike to the epitome of Body Horror.
• I Have Many Names: Throughout the movies it's called "The Evil", the "Kandarian demon", "Rotting Apple Head", and in the 2013 version "The Abomination."
• Invincible Boogeymen: While the Deadites are vulnerable (if very conventionally difficult to put down), the Evil that dwells in them is often beyond the protagonists' ability to confront, having no physical shape and possessing power far beyond theirs. This occasionally presents problems; in the original movie and the 2023 movie, even if the Deadites are contained or destroyed, it won't stop the Evil from simply vacating the corpses and possessing someone else. If the original trilogy is any indication, the only real means of defying it once it's loose lies within the pages of the book that summons it.
• Just Toying with Them: Very few Deadites actually have the brainpower or inclination to get serious when facing Ash. Even the evil force itself, when chasing his car and trailer down, it merely smashes on it and tries to seize control of the vehicle instead of outright totalling and tossing it off the road, as one unfortunate passerby learned the hard way.
• Knight of Cerebus: In the 2013 version. It is definitely more serious than the demon in the previous ones.
• Laughably Evil: Yes, the Deadites are Ax-Crazy and very dangerous, but their antics are played for Black Comedy more often than not.
• Lovecraftian Superpower: Not on their own accord usually, but when they possess a host, they can change them in god knows how many grotesque ways. What we have seen they do so far is sprouting wings, tentacles, claws, fangs, multiples rows of teeth (and sometimes not in the places you think), and even fusing with others.
• Malevolent Mutilation: Crosses Self-Harm with Body Horror. Deadites from all three books have been shown mutilating themselves: Deadite Shelly gnawed off her own half-severed arm to be able to properly wield a weapon, while Deadites from the books seen in the 2013 and 2023 movies seem to be driven to mutilate themselves almost on instinct, it usually being the first immediate thing a possessed individual does.
• Men Are the Expendable Gender: Harshly inverted. While Deadites seem to be driven by a malicious hatred of all life, the Evil that possesses them almost universally targets women first and men a distant second. All three possession scenes have shown the Evil targeting and raping its way into control of isolated women. From there, women have mostly undergone successive possessions long before any men are turned into Deadites. Cheryl, Shelly, and Linda all turn well before Scotty or Ash, and the pattern is followed with Mia, Olivia, and Natalie in the remake and Ellie and Bridget in the 2023 movie.
• Not Using the "Z" Word: Never called zombies.
• Our Demons Are Different: For one thing, they seem to possess Elemental Powers and a few other psychic powers. They're also Eldritch Abominations.
  • Across the film franchise, Deadites behave differently and have different powers and advantages depending on which book summoned them. The Williams copy can possess the widest variety of objects and move between hosts with the greatest ease, while the Allen copy can summon an Eldritch Abomination if it's able to possess five people. The Bixler copy produces Deadites that are by far the hardest to kill—however, it's worth noting that the incantation read from the first two was a mere three or four words, while the incantation from the third was much longer, perhaps suggesting that all Deadites could be even more dangerous if an entire incantation were read.
• Our Zombies Are Different: Their hosts are very zombielike in appearance, although they possess abilities like levitation and flight, the ability to contort and transform their bodies in any way they choose, have Psychic Powers like telekinesis and telepathy and can possess Black Eyes of Evil as well as their normal milky white eyes. They can also be converted from both living and dead hosts.
• Powers via Possession: Deadites demonstrate the ability to levitate, survive extensive mutilation, and even shapeshift to a degree.
• Pretend We're Dead: Inverted. Deadites like to pretend that they're still human and Fighting from the Inside in order to trick people into letting their guard down.
• Relative Button: It rapes Ash's sister Cheryl.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: A few of the skeletons in Army Of Darkness turn and run after Ash and co. start shooting exploding arrows.
• Shapeshifting: Deadites left alone for too long tend to mutate in a variety of ways, generally becoming more monstrous. It's unknown if Deadites summoned from the other copies of the Naturom Demonto found in the 2013 and 2023 movies can also do this, as most haven't been allowed to linger longer than the movie's runtime.
• Skeletal Musician: A lot of the Army of Darkness use skills as drums and one even plays the bagpipes.
• Stupid Evil: Despite being murderous, soul-snatching demons who contort any hosts they possess into a Humanoid Abomination, they are also almost-complete idiots. They'll happily dance around or play a demented game of cat-and-mouse with their opponent. But they really take the cake when they face Ash, because despite proving himself a foe capable of ending their reign of terror, they still choose to toy with him instead of going for the kill immediately and ending the only real threat posed to them once and for all. The fact that they pull this crap every time with him has led to Ash wisening up to their tricks, even with his tendency to not learn his lessons.
• Troll: They have a nasty sense of humor. Combine that with their ability to make their hosts look normal, as well as possessing the memories of their victims, and that means that every Deadite is an unbelievable dick.
• Tome of Eldritch Lore: Their main way of unleashing themselves onto the world.
• Transformation of the Possessed: When they possess a host, they contort the host's face and occasionally the rest of the body into monstrous forms.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: One moment they could be looking like a demon from Hell, the next moment they would be looking like the body of their possessed victim.
• Wall Crawl: Can crawl across walls and ceilings in the TV series.
• Winged Humanoid: The one Ash kills at the end of the second movie and the one that kidnaps Sheila in the third both have functioning wings.
• You Can't Kill What's Already Dead: Deadites are very tough, and generally shake off wounds like gunshots and loss of limbs. In general, it takes something major, like Removing the Head or Destroying the Brain or outright dismembering the body, to put them down for good; on multiple occasions in Ash vs Evil Dead, Ash and co. chop up the bodies of slain Deadites to make sure they stay down. Evil Dead Rise takes this further, even the classic dismemberment doesn't stop them, they will figure out a way to keep attacking no matter how many limbs are cut off. Even after the Final Boss is fed into a wood-chipper, pieces of flesh can still be seen twitching in vain.

The Necronomicon

Film Appearances: The Evil Dead (1981) / Evil Dead II: Dead By Dawn / Army of Darkness / Evil Dead (2013) / Ash vs. Evil Dead / Evil Dead Rise

Played By: Bob Bergen (Army of Darkness)

Necronomicon Ex-Mortis, the Book of the Dead. Bound in human flesh and inked in human blood, the book has the power to resurrect demons and summon the powers of darkness. It appears throughout the series in some form or other. It also goes by the name "Naturom Demonto", and there are three copies each with similar but distinct effects when their evil is unbound.

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• Artifact of Doom: Its incantations center around bringing forth Eldritch Abominations and reviving the dead.
• Blood Magic: Each book responds to blood in different ways. The first copy (see below) wakes up and speaks, while the second one found in the Allen cabin simply absorbs the blood and allows its incantations to be seen through the scribbles intended to make them illegible. Similarly, the third copy has teeth and won't open at all until exposed to a blood sample.
• Break Them by Talking: The book after being drenched in blood speaks to Ash and tries to convince him that burying it will rob him of his only purpose in life. He points out that any hope of any sort of life without it in his life is hopeless. Furthermore the Necronomicon makes a case that it's the only thing that makes him special.
• The Cameo: The book and the skull dagger appear in Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday. Word of God says that Jason's mother used the book to make a Deal with the Devil to bring her son back to life, making Jason a Deadite.
• Couldn't Find a Pen: Inked in blood.
• Department of Redundancy Department: "Necronomicon" is slightly clumsy Greek, which can be translated as "book of the dead" (or "classifying/regarding the dead"). "Ex Mortis" is Latin for "Of the Dead". Book of the Dead of the Dead?
• Genuine Human Hide: Bound in human flesh, inked in human blood. Even the pages themselves were stripped from the hides of the Damned.
• Green Rock: Originally could just summon demons and raise the dead but by the second movie, it's a Time Machine.
  • In the comics it can open portals to parallel universes, mainly for the purpose of letting Ash Crossover with other franchises.
  • in the game Hail To The King, it seemingly explains that the book itself almost constantly shifts and changes what is within its' pages, and apparently only powerful being such as Bad Ash or Ruby and fellow Dark Ones can read its contents in it's entirety.
• I Have Many Names: Referred to as both the "Naturom Demonto" and the "Necronomicon Ex Mortis" at various points throughout the series. Evil Dead II uses both, so it seems that both names are correct, depending on who you're talking to.
• Monster Compendium: Contains information about various demons.
• Names to Run Away from Really Fast: Aside from "Book of the Dead", its original name, "Naturom Demonto" is more accurately translated as "dismantling of nature" or "demolishing of nature", emphasizing that the book is the perversion of all that is right and natural in the world.
• New Powers as the Plot Demands: Along with summoning the Deadites, it can also open portals, or any other weird things that could currently serve the plot.
• Nigh-Invulnerability: As revealed in Ash vs. Evil Dead, it simply regenerated itself when Ash chucked it in the fireplace during the events of the first movie, and Ash has repeatedly tried to destroy it for the past thirty years.
• Portal Book: One of the fake Necronomicons in Army of Darkness sucks Ash in but he manages to escape.
• Repetitive Name: "Necronomicon" already means "book of the dead". Adding "ex mortis" (which isn't even the same language) just makes it "book of the dead from death".
• Sentient Phlebotinum: Despite Lionel earlier stating that the book itself isn't the source of the Evil Force and acts more like a passageway for the forces of Hell, implying it's simply an inanimate object with hellish power, it's revealed in the penultimate episode of the first season of Ash vs. Evil Dead, the book is fully sentient and can even speak.
• Spell Book: The book contains various incantations, centering around summoning demons.
• Time Machine: Can open portals to other parts of space and time.
  • In the original ending to Army of Darkness it contains instructions for a potion that lets Ash sleep for centuries in order to return to his own time.
• Tome of Eldritch Lore: Provides the page image, and is named after the Trope Codifier. It contains incantations to summon demons, as well as to bind them and protect oneself from them.

Ash's Hand

Ash's Hand

Played By: Bruce Campbell's hand (Evil Dead, Evil Dead 2); Various others (Evil Dead 2, Ash Vs Evil Dead)

• Amputation Stops Spread: Presumably why Ash cut the possessed hand off, to stop the rest of him getting possessed.
• Ax-Crazy: After growing a body for itself.
• Body Horror: After thirty years of being on it's own in the cabin, it looks downright nasty, being partially decayed and with maggots crawling all over it. Although, despite retaining its look after turning into a copy of Ash, the rest of the body is strangely unmarked.
• Evil Twin: Turns into a new Evil Ash in Ash vs The Evil Dead..
• Eyes Do Not Belong There: When it's in the process of growing into an Evil Ash, an eye appears on its wrist.
• Flipping the Bird: Does this to Ash after being laughed at for getting its finger caught in a mouse trap.
• From a Single Cell: Clones of Ash have been grown from the hand:
  • The simulacrum Ash is grown from it in the Evil Dead 2 comics.
  • Ruby grows Evil Ash from it in the TV show.
• Groin Attack: Attack's Ash's groin shortly after getting possessed in the musical.
• Humanoid Abomination: Transforms into a copy of Ash eventually, who kills Amanda.
• Laughably Evil: Vicious, Ax-Crazy, and quite hilarious as well.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: It's a crazy little bugger, flipping off Ash, trolling the survivors and later getting caught in a mouse-trap. It also kills Annie in the climax with a knife to her back.
• Red Right Hand: After it turns into a Humanoid Abomination, one of its hands is still as gnarled and twisted as it was before the transformation.
• Stop Hitting Yourself: Repeatedly attacks Ash while still attached to him.
• There's No Kill like Overkill: Its death. He gets pumped to the brim with dozens of rifle bullets and magnum rounds, and finally cut up by Ash to make sure.
• Troll: It seems to have more fun messing with people than it does actually killing them, and even when it does kill something, it's usually timed after something hopeful seems to happen. It even still has this after thirty years, as after they kill Amanda, they proceed to mock Ash regarding her death.

Evil Ash

Evil Ash

Played By: Bruce Campbell

• Bad Boss: Kills one of his own men for getting in his way when he's chasing Ash. He also viciously insults them for getting blown apart by the castle's defenders and orders them to get up and keep attacking.
• Boom, Headshot!: How Ash gets him to finally shut up... Temporarily.
• Breakout Villain: The main villains in Evil Dead typically don't last more than a movie, if there's a single Big Bad at all. Evil Ash, however, gained a fair bit of popularity with the fanbase due to being an Evil Counterpart. As such, he's appeared in many, many spinoff comics, in addition to having Suspiciously Similar Substitute characters show up in his role of Ash's Evil Counterpart in works that don't have the rights to him. He even appears in 2022's Evil Dead: The Game as a powerful unit controlled by the Evil Force. Overall, while Ash has faced many villains, Evil Ash has proven multiple times over to have the most staying power.
• Card-Carrying Villain: He calls himself "bad Ash" when he first splits from "goody two-shoes" Ash.
• The Comically Serious: While a rather serious villain for such a light-hearted movie, he does get a few moments where his seriousness is Played for Laughs, like when his jaw snaps as he's trying to say "sally forth".
• Evil Makeover: He starts out looking exactly like Ash. One boomstick blast to the face and a chainsaw mutilation later, and he now looks like a decayed zombie. Then later his rotting flesh is completely burned off and he's left with the appearance of a skeletal warrior.
• Evil Counterpart: He retains all Ash's hamminess and snarky attitude, but he's on the evil side.
• Evil Sounds Deep: While he initially sounds just like Ash, his voice gets much deeper after being shot in the mouth with a shotgun and consequently so does his threat and villainy level.
• Evil Twin: Is literally formed out of Ash's body, possibly from the Mini-Ash he swallowed earlier.
• Facial Horror: First he gets shot in the mouth with Ash's shotgun, damaging his jaw and leaving the lower half of his face bloody and mutilated. Then he gets buried and eventually revives thanks to the Necronomicon, upon which not only does he still have the damage, but the rest of his face is visibly rotted. His jaw also has a tendency to visibly dislocate if he says certain words too loudly, such as his "sally forth!" demand. Ironically, getting the rest of his flesh burned off down to a skeleton might have actually been an improvement to his looks.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: Starts off a miniature clone, which then grows into an full-sized, evil yet still funny clone; which after comedically putting himself back together via stop motion, he turns into a threatening undead warlord
• Humanoid Abomination: Is the evil force having manifested into Ash's Evil Twin.
• The Heavy: Technically the Evil Force incarnate as an undead clone of Ash.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: Ash does this to him twice. All it does is piss him off.
• Joker Immunity: He comes back a lot in the spinoff comics.
• Knight of Cerebus: Played with, he starts off as a Laughably Evil Evil Clone of Ash until he reassembles himself as a far more threatening undead warlord. Even then, he ends up being more along the lines of The Comically Serious, except in the implication that he's creating a Deadite harem for himself.
• Mini-Me: It's implied that he was the "Mini-Ash" that Ash swallowed and tried to drown in boiling water, now full size, meaning Evil Ash's presence didn't come entirely out of nowhere.
• Multiple Head Case: First appears as a second head on Ash's body, then grows more limbs and splits into a new person.
• Rasputinian Death: Evil Ash is a tough son of a bitch. First he gets his head ventilated thanks to Ash's shotgun, (which only manages to knock him out) and cut up with a chainsaw. After that he comes back as a zombie, raises the titular army of darkness, and tries to lay his hands on the Necronomicon. Then after being set on fire by Ash and falling off the ramparts, he comes back from that as a skeleton and resumes fighting Ash, who then finally kills him by taking advantage of the fact that he lands on a loaded catapult by launching him skywards with a sack of lit gunpowder and blowing him completely apart.
• Laughably Evil: Until he decides to stop mucking around.
• Let's Get Dangerous!: He gets a couple funny moments while attacking the castle and killing various knights. When Ash interferes with him grabbing the book, though, Evil Ash is done playing around.
• Villain Ball: At one point, Ash kicks him towards the book, and his hand literally lands on top of it. Instead of making off with it, he ignores the opportunity to do battle with Ash. Given the nature of this movie, and the villain this could've been Played for Laughs.

Spoiler Character

Ruby's Baby

Played By: Quinn Farrel & Dylan Grant (toddler), Bruce Campbell (adult)

Ruby's demonic spawn, which she gives birth to early in Season 3 using sperm samples she acquired from a bank. He's intended to take Ash's place as The Chosen One once Ash himself is killed.

• Antagonistic Offspring: He's Ash's son via artificial insemination, bred by Ruby specifically to kill him.
• Boom, Headshot!: Twice. He survives the first one, despite it taking a chunk out of his head. The second one finishes him off.
• Chainsaw Good: He was born with an organic chainsaw for a right hand; under Ruby's orders, he chops it off and replaces it with an ordinary chainsaw to truly masquerade as Ash.
• Dropped a Bridge on Him: Hyped up as the next Big Bad, meant to kill Ash. The real Ash easily takes him out with two shotgun blasts to the head.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: He loves Ruby, calling her "mother" and voluntarily cutting off his organic chainsaw-hand on her orders.
• Fetus Terrible: He's born by forcibly ripping out of Ruby's womb, and comes out looking like this.
• I'm a Humanitarian: Ruby feeds him human flesh.
• Rapid Aging: He rapidly grows from a newborn to a toddler, and later cocoons himself and emerges as a full-grown copy of Ash.

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