Ash Williams' Evil Dead Return Fate Officially Sealed By Bruce Campbell 4 Years After Revival Announcement

Published Aug 15, 2026, 11:00 AM EDT Grant Hermanns is a TV News Editor, Interview Host and Reviewer for ScreenRant, having joined the team in early 2021. He got his start in the industry with Moviepilot, followed by working at ComingSoon.net. When not indulging in his love of film/TV, Grant is making his way through his gaming backlog and exploring the world of Dungeons & Dragons with friends. EXCLUSIVE: Ash Williams' future is finally clear in the Evil Dead franchise thanks to Bruce Campbell. The genre icon was notably the face of the Sam Raimi-created horror franchise for its first three films, later returning for the Starz series Ash vs Evil Dead, which served as a sequel to the original trilogy. Despite rave reviews from critics and audiences alike, the show never found a foothold in its ratings, being cancelled after three seasons, with Campbell retiring from live-action Ash portrayals a few years later, albeit indicating an animated revival was in the works. Now, in an interview with ScreenRant's Grant Hermanns for his new dramedy Ernie & Emma, Campbell offered a definitive update on his potential future return in the Evil Dead franchise. The star and franchise producer confirmed that "Ash is done," even revealing that he will "not [be] going to do any animated voice work" for the character to return, expressing that if any of the creatives want to bring his beloved character back, they "can get Joe Ash soundalike," and saying that "there are ways to [recreate my voice] now." Campbell's confirmation that he will no longer play Ash in the Evil Dead franchise is sure to come as something of a surprise for longtime fans. The years following its original announcement, the star remained pretty optimistic about the planned Ash vs Evil Dead animated revival, though did tell ScreenRant back in late 2024 that "things like this take forever," and joked that he may not have a proper update for five years. That being said, some of the writing did appear on the wall in the past few years. While he was involved in Lee Cronin's Evil Dead Rise, both executive producing the film and providing a vocal cameo, which Cronin cited as being a time-displaced Ash, Evil Dead Burn saw Campbell decide to step away from the franchise entirely, still getting an executive producer credit on Sébastien Vaniček's film, but turning his attention elsewhere. While this shift in focus resulted in the aforementioned Ernie & Emma, his first directorial effort since 2007's My Name is Bruce, this past March also came with the announcement from Campbell that he had been diagnosed with some form of cancer, which he described as "treatable," but not "curable." The star also confirmed he would be ramping down his public appearances and work in the hopes of working on his health, thus making it understandable he would be pickier about which projects he takes on going forward. Though Campbell may not be returning as Ash going forward, the Evil Dead franchise is certainly still finding ways to forge ahead beyond the iconic character. The next film is already set with Francis Galluppi's Wrath, which will also be the first-ever prequel in the series, slated for a 2028 release, and given Burn's post-credits teased Alyssa Sutherland's Ellie potentially being the new connective character in each new film, Ash may finally get his time to rest. TV Show(s) Ash vs Evil Dead Video Game(s) Evil Dead: Hail to the King, Evil Dead: A Fistful of Boomstick, Evil Dead: Regeneration, Evil Dead: The Game First Film The Evil Dead Cast Bruce Campbell, Jane Levy, Shiloh Fernandez, Lily Sullivan, Nell Fisher, Ray Santiago, Dana DeLorenzo Created by Sam Raimi Character(s) Ashley Williams, Mia Allen, David Allen, Bethany Bixler, Kassie Bixler, Pablo Simon Bolivar, Kelly Maxwell Created by Sam Raimi, Evil Dead is a horror-comedy franchise that began with the release of the original film, The Evil Dead, in 1981. The series follows protagonist Ashley "Ash" Williams as he and his friends venture into a cabin for a vacation only to discover it harbors a demonic book that can summon terrifying creatures known as Deadites, hell-bent on torturing and slaying them all. As the series progresses, Ash becomes more of a masculine B-movie action hero until the soft reboot helmed by Eli Roth occurs, which shifts the franchise deeper into its horror roots.