History Characters / EvilDeadAshWilliams

* BlueIsHeroic: Typically wears a blue shirt, and is TheHero of the series.

* InTheBlood: If [[DirtyOldMan his father Brock is any indication, it would seem that being a party-loving, hard-drinking HandsomeLech is hereditary.

* CartwrightCurse: If he falls in love with a girl, she'll die and become a deadite.

* MyGodWhatHaveIDone: When he returns to the castle with the book and orders the wiseman to send him back to his time, he tries his best to mask his guilt as everyone walks away in disgust.

* GadgeteerGenius: He modified a chainsaw to serve as a BladeBelowTheShoulder, created gunpowder by referencing its elemental makeup in a chemistry book, converted his car into the [[WeaponizedCar Death Coaster]], and crafted a fully functional prosthetic hand from a metal gauntlet.

* AnAxeToGrind: His third weapon of choice. [[spoiler:He uses it to hack Deadite Ed to pieces.]]

* AesopAmnesia: Routinely played for laughs in Army of Darkness and Ash vs Evil Dead. Ash has a tendency to always forget or DramaticallyMissThePoint when it comes to the obvious lesson from his situation. In Army of Darkness in the happy ending he messes up the magic words ''again''. He reads from the Necronomicon while high to impress a girl in Ash vs Evil Dead.

[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/williams_ashley_j.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:300:''"Groovy."'']]

* UsedToBeASweetKid: Ash is introduced in ''The Evil Dead'' as a nerdy college student with a gentle and sensitive disposition that immediately sets him apart from his boorish friend Scotty. The horrific mental and physical torment he undergoes over the course of the first two films forces him to adopt a tougher persona to protect himself, and by the time ''Army of Darkness'' rolls around, he's become a trash-talking, aggressive tough guy bearing very little resemblance to the meek young man he used to be less than forty-eight hours ago in-universe. ''Ash vs. Evil Dead'' takes this even further by ramping his narcissism and selfishness UpToEleven partially for comedy and partially to show how significantly his trauma has shaped him.

** ''Film/ArmyOfDarkness'' demonstrates that Ash is a GadgeteerGenius and adept at chemistry, such that he was able to craft modern smokeless explosives out of basic components some ''five hundred years'' before its official invention in the late 19th century, built himself a PowerGlove from a metal gauntlet that puts modern prostheses to shame, and managed to modify the beaten up Delta into a Deadite-mulching Deathcoaster with just the crude parts provided by a medieval English smithy.

** It's shown in ''Film/EvilDead2'' that he can play piano.

* UsedToBeASweetKid: Ash is introduced in ''The Evil Dead'' as a nerdy college student with a shy and sensitive disposition that immediately sets him apart from his boorish friend Scotty. The horrific mental and physical torment he undergoes over the course of the first two films forces him to adopt a tougher persona to protect himself, and by the time ''Army of Darkness'' rolls around, he's become a trash-talking, aggressive tough guy bearing very little resemblance to the sweet kid he used to be less than forty-eight hours ago in-universe. ''Ash vs. Evil Dead'' takes this even further by ramping his narcissism and selfishness UpToEleven partially for comedy and partially to show how significantly his trauma has shaped him.

* UsedToBeASweetKid: Ash is introduced in ''The Evil Dead'' as a nerdy college student with a shy and sensitive disposition that immediately sets him apart from his boorish friend Scotty. The horrific mental and physical torment he undergoes over the course of the first two films forces him to adopt a tougher persona to protect himself, and by the time ''Army of Darkness'' rolls around, he's become a trash-talking, aggressive tough guy bearing very little resemblance to the sweet kid he used to be less than forty-eight hours ago in-universe. ''Ash vs. Evil Dead'' takes this even further by ramping his narcissism and selfishness ''UpToEleven'' partially for comedy and partially to show how significantly his trauma has shaped him.

** While he puts no effort into his job at Value Stop, it seems he really is knowledgable about housewares and hardware. In season 3, he opens a store that seems fairly successful, albeit partly because of his fame.

-->'''Ash''': We can take 'em on! With science!

* NiceGuy: In the first movie. He TookALevelInJerkass though.

* TookALevelInJerkass: In the first movie, Ash is a NiceGuy thrown into the middle of a nightmare and struggles to survive. Throughout the next two movies, his experiences lead to him becoming increasingly more snarky and obnoxious, to the point where he apathetically "helps" the local castle and refuses to help them when the deadites take the Necronomicon. Administrivia/TropesAreNotBad, however, as that is the version of Ash that fans remember and love. Though there's also some suggestions that he was kind of a jerk all along, when he casually boasts about how he bullied the future sheriff of Elk Grove in ''Ash vs. Evil Dead''.

The protagonist and poster boy of the entire series. Ash evolves over the course of the series from a cowardly college student to a survivalist, to a wise-cracking demon slayer with his detachable hand chainsaw and 12 gauge "boomstick".

The protagonist and poster boy of the entire series. Ash evolves over the course of the series from a cowardly college student to a wise-cracking zombie slayer with his detachable hand chainsaw and 12 gauge "boomstick".

The protagonist and poster boy of the entire series. Ash evolves over the course of the series from a cowardly college student to a wise cracking zombie slayer with his detachable hand chainsaw and 12 gauge "boomstick".