Tales from the Rift: Review for Ash vs Evil Dead 306


Tales from the Rift:
Review for Ash vs Evil Dead 306
by A. Zombie

Before you mosey on, keep an eye out for pesky episode spoilers.

Reckless as always, Kelly allows her emotions to take the lead after she gets information from Brandy about where Ruby’s living during her long-term impersonation of a school counselor. Armed with a shotgun and the Kandarian dagger, Kelly barges into the middle of whatever the heck is going on in Ruby’s attic. The fight should be decidedly one-sided, but they’ve done a great job interspersing this scene throughout the episode and gave Kelly just enough weapons which do major damage to give her half a snowball’s chance in hell of hurting Ruby in any meaningful way. Unfortunately, Kelly being human is her ultimate downfall. The dagger she wants to use on Ruby goes into her stomach instead. At last Ruby has a body to offer to her sorceress friend stuck on the other side of the portal, Kaya. We all knew Kelly would go out fighting, but for it to be such an ill-advised fight isn’t as satisfying as it should be when we say goodbye to a hero.

We can’t talk about that fight scene without giving huge props to the special effects team for their work on Ruby’s post-grenade regeneration gag. The limbs are fully detailed. Their movement is bizarre yet mesmerizing. A lot of talent went into realizing that moment. It may be just one in a thousand bloody gags on this show, but it’s one that’ll stick in my mind for a while.

On the run from police after Ash fails to reveal Ruby’s demon spawn as the monster he is, Brandy and Ash hole up in the house to regroup. They’re not alone for long. More Knights of Sumeria wind up on El Jefe’s doorstep searching for answers. The best Ash can offer is a look at the long-lost Necronomicon pages and the notes the dead guy left at the hardware store. Driven by a vision, Pablo joins them later. Overwhelmed by his new powers, Pablo accidentally recites a ritual which opens a portal to the underworld. Because of course that’s one of the random things he inherited with his gift. The Knights are thrilled. Their plan has always been to take the fight to The Dark Ones on the other side. Erring on the side of caution, everyone agrees to send Marcus as a scout, first. It’s a rough round trip. The Marcus who returns isn’t the man they sent through the portal. He straight up absorbs other Knights, then spits acid. It’s a great creature design; new effects with the absorbing thing, but holding echoes of previous creatures Evil’s sent Ash’s way throughout the years with the boils and exaggerated limbs.

Pablo is coming along nicely as a hero in his own right, though he’s not going to get far if he keeps opening portals to hell all willy-nilly. During the fight with the mutated Knights, he doesn’t waste time jumping in to grab a weapon. Nor does he grandstand to take all the glory when he’s obviously out of his depth. This revived Pablo is the sidekick Ash needed the whole time. Can they keep on track with these new powers at their disposal? Hard to tell in this episode because while they’ve gained a powerful brujo, they’ve lost their ballsiest fighter.

The guys don’t know that though, so it’s business as usual when Ash returns home after defeating the newest monster and Kelly’s there waiting to hand him the dagger. I would not want to be the one to tell the guys their friend died in the most senseless way possible, but they need to get in the loop ASAP before Kaya puts Ruby’s plan into action and turns Brandy against Ash.