Evil Dead Burn is going to swallow Sam Raimi‘s soul. Okay, okay, that’s going too far. But the latest trailer for the next entry in the horror franchise features both the audacious camera movements that have been the director’s calling card since he made The Evil Dead in 1981, but it also inserts something new for the series: a plot.
The trailer has lots of nastiness, as someone with a car seat headrest in their face chases a couple into a family home. But it also sets up some character stakes, with the loss of a family member driving a person to read from the Necronomicon Ex-Mortis, the Book of the Dead, on purpose. Intentionally. Not by accident.
That’s a pretty huge change from previous Evil Dead movies. From the first two films and Army of Darkness, directed by Sam Raimi and starring Bruce Campbell as Ash Williams, to the 2013 remake and 2023’s Evil Dead Rise, reading from the Necronomicon draws the attention of Deadites that possess the living.
However, no one in those movies does it on purpose, at least not to raise the dead. In the first two Evil Deads and Evil Dead Rise, the reading comes via recordings. In Army of Darkness and the 2013 remake, characters intentionally read from the book, but the former because it will allow him to time travel back to the present and the latter because the guy is a curious dummy.
Directed by Sébastien Vaniček, who co-wrote the script with Florent Bernard, Evil Dead Burn raises the emotional stakes of the story by giving someone reason to read the Book of the Dead. Souheila Yacoub plays Alice, a recent widow who retreats to her in-law’s home to share in the grieving. Somehow, she discovers the Necronomicon in a garbage bag, which apparently belonged to the husband’s grandfather. Even though the shot in the trailer shows a bloodied Hunter Doohan (Muse from Daredevil: Born Again) saying that his grandfather believed the book would summon the devil, it’s clear that Alice sees it as a way to possibly reunite with her beloved husband.
That’s a little more plot and character than we usually get in an Evil Dead movie. Sure, Evil Dead II gives Ash time to lament the death of his girlfriend, the 2013 movie has a drug addiction plot to explain why the protagonists have gone to a secluded cabin, and there’s some sibling tension in Evil Dead Rise. But character dynamics rarely drive the plots, which are mostly about Deadites doing terrible things.
To be clear, the Evil Dead Burn trailer has a lot of terrible stuff being done by Deadites. Lots of nastiness occurs in the clip, including a good object lesson for anyone who needs to teach young children how to properly load a dishwasher.
If they can maintain the level of intense brutality we expect while delivering well-rounded character, then Vaniček and Bernard could add an interesting new chapter to the story that Raimi started.
Evil Dead Burn arrives on July 10, 2026.
