Edgar Cochran ✝️’s review published on Letterboxd:
Spoilers present at the last paragraphs, and definitely some aggressiveness throughout, like that of Ash arm-sawing deadites heads off in NC-17 fashion!
Fine, my dear people and fellow buds.
The only thing I can accept and grant to you is that, reportedly, Raimi was hesitant to come back to the superhero genre after the backlash received by Spider-Man 3 (2007). At times, I come back to Maguire’s interview enthusiastically explaining the plans that were in store for the 4th installment before the switch was turned off and the project was cancelled. However, Sony is to be greatly blamed since he was forced to either commit to putting Venom in the story or being fired a la J. Jonah Jameson. The rest is history.
However, that project gave us one of the memes of all time: Bully Maguire, whose godly powers, power of indifference, inhuman mockery and back problems have changed the face of the Internet forever.
So the Disney negotiations were done under odd terms, since he didn’t want the same conservative impositions of artistic freedom being applied to him again: as long as you stick to a PG-13 rating, you can have more creative control as long as your story is tied with the events of the average Spider Man: No Way Home and open room for the never-ending franchise.
Disney gives the seal of approval. What is the result?
Amazing horror! Madness! Unapologetically amazing visuals! Creepy dissolves! Extreme close-ups! Twisting / rotating zoom-ins and Dutch tilts! 360° zoom-out spins! Mirrors turned into water! Blood-splattered faces smiling! Eyes in the most BS random places! Extremely hilarious dark humor! Frame distortions! Bruce Campbell punching himself! A Book of the Damned! And freaking undead creatures!
HELL YES!!! We just got the Evil Dead 4 directed by Raimi himself and didn’t even know we needed. Step aside, stupid Fede Alvarez remake! You can burn in hell, Drag Me to Hell (you asked for it in the title anyways)! The man is back to teach you, once again, an actual undead story disguised as a Marvel film with a Necronomicon disguised as a “Darkhold”.
How did he get away with all this? He’s an auteur, one of the most important he has worked in the MCU after Kenneth Branagh, but not even Branagh could escape from the clutches of ordinariness. Waititi is an important addition, but the latest Thor delivery has killed all hopes, and the Troma guy, James Gunn, was a bold choice (who ensured that the dirtiest and funniest old man alive, Lloyd Kaufman, received a cameo in the prison scene of Guardians of the Galaxy [2017]). That’s as far as we go. Zhoe failed immediately and Shane Black abandoned the dark comedy and crime wittiness of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005).
Not Raimi, however. The issue will always be the writing, and the requirement that you must stick within a specific timeline and continuity of events, in this case being WandaVision (a decent series which had two great first chapters). Much has been addressed regarding how much Dr. Strange keeps getting underpowered, but the “he stood a fight against Thanos” argument keeps getting immediately invalidated after considering that the power of The Scarlet Witch surpasses a gauntlet-less Thanos significantly and this can be easily debated with the fact that she could manipulate the mirror realm to her advantage in order to escape it (!) and enter freaking Charles Xavier’s mind to horrify it to the point of death(!!). Thanos is not the greatest and most powerful villain anymore: it is The Scarlet Witch, whose burden of the past keeps weighting a ton over her doomed shoulders.
Raimi is no stranger to memes, especially after witnessing the stampede of Bully Maguire creations by notoriously famous YouTube creators like “Matan Animation Studios”, “The Human Spider”, “Mork”, “TOBEY VERSE”, “Chiptuner”, among others, and the father of them all: “Tobey in the MCU”, taking the infamous character from all movie franchises to Family Feud. Yes, we have come to a time where YouTube content creators have to be talked about in film reviews, since not only their technology at disposal for visual effects keeps increasing, but also their influence of ideas plays a huge role in Marketing Research studies to determine what the audiences actually want.
Moreover, since Raimi has a self-awareness regarding the multimillionaire franchise, he just accepted to direct a film for, he creates memes as well, such as The Smartest Man Alive, Bruce Campbell himself, an African American Captain Marvel that shows a hilarious indifference towards the death of her partners, and a roaring Wanda (bloopers still count!).
“So few multiverses, too much madness!”, scream the mindless fanboys complaining. Complaining! Go play with your MCU action figures, since an auteur just arrived to pose as a game changer and create the first horror MCU film to make you cry like a baby. The multiverse travel sequence is an extraordinary, digital-single-shot sequence that is barely teasing us with the potential of live-action follow-ups and a stunning number of shocking revelations, such as:
-They reached The Living Tribunal Universe (debatably the best cameo, and it’s not even human)
-There’s a “Splatoon” Universe; I wouldn’t mind an entire film set in that place
-Beehive Universe!
-There’s a dystopian, Blade-Runner/Akira-like Universe
-There’s a black and white Universe, as hinted by Spiderverse
-There’s a futuristic Universe where all Stark droids featured in the dumb Tom Holland Spidey films have taken control over every aspect of human life
-There’s an animated Universe, for Christ’s sake!
-Dinosaurs still exist somewhere, where evolution took alternate paths
-There’s a Bone Hell Universe where skeletons actually have life and move! Raimi, can you make your next horror film set there please without minding the MPAA?
I am still not mentioning many, but for the Wanda’s story’s sake, the film had to take place in an alternate Universe for trying to give Wanda’s conflict a resolution, for better or for worse. In the middle however, you get shown a freaking incursion and its implications of the idiotic actions that Dr. Strange inexplicably took in the clumsily written No Way Home, and in the middle, what do you get? You get all the director’s stand-out trademarks, Scarlet Witch getting out of the mirror realm like the girl from Ringu (1998), a magnificent multiverse travel sequence, great and intense terror sequences, Elizabeth Olsen staring at you in the deepest way your soul will tremble at, intentional meme material, a mind invasion scene (expertly shot), and a terrific musical battle where the attention to detail is exquisite (Strange battling with Beethoven’s 5th Symphony and Sinister Strange battling with Bach’s Toccata and Fugue is just A-class). Imagination, freedom, style, auteurism... all of this unfortunately intercepted by the limitations of the characters’ writing.
Still, the reception of this film is just wrong, plain and simple. This is Top 5 MCU stuff (I’d say Top 4), self-aware, extremely creative, and with impressive humorous and fantasy sequences.
Don’t like it? Too much madness??? Go cry under your bed and cheer for banal Spidey fan services!
#ReleaseTheRaimiCut. If Zack freaking Snyder did it in HBO, why wouldn’t Raimi? If Disney+ has the Deadpool films, just allow the man to unleash the old-school horror beast within and give us a worthy Director’s Cut!
75/100
P.S. Yes, it’s better than all Spider-Man live-action films ever released.
