Army of Darkness/Xena: Forever and a Day #1 Review
Welcome ladies and gentlemen to this unexpected pleasure of a crossover that sees two of my favorite characters in any media join forces. Even though both the Evil Dead/Army of Darkness and Xena Warrior Princess franchises are very popular in their own right, let’s give a brief recap anyway, just in case.
The Evil Dead trilogy was pretty much your standard “kids trapped in a spooky cabin and beset by zombies” type franchise, but what set it apart was the character of Ash Williams. Played by the always awesome Bruce Campbell, Ash is equal parts Elvis Presley, Zapp Brannigan and Van Helsing. When originally infected by the Necronomicon or book of the dead, Ash was forced to cut off his own hand to keep the infection from spreading and subsequently replaced it with his iconic chainsaw. Since the original Evil Dead, Ash has had numerous adventures all over space and time, which have been depicted in the films, the recent television show Ash vs. Evil Dead (which I highly recommend) and countless comic books. If I could some up the adventures of Ashley J. Williams in one word, that word could only be… Groovy!
Next up, we have Xena Warrior Princess. Xena Warrior Princess was one of those shows that fell into the rare category of “spinoffs that actually managed to overshadow the series that spawned them.” Initially appearing as a recurring character in Hercules the Legendary Journeys, the Xena character became popular enough to warrant her own show. While the show could be campy a lot of the time, it was ultimately a show about the badass Xena, played by the incredibly talented, indescribably beautiful and possibly immortal (seeing as how she has not visibly aged since Xena episode one), Lucy Lawless, kicking ass alongside her lovable sidekick and eventual lover, Gabrielle.
At first glance, these two characters wouldn’t seem to have a great deal in common, hell they don’t even take place in the same time period, but really when you look closer, these two franchises are almost begging for a crossover. After all, both franchises were Sam Raimi productions, both manage to be exciting and action packed without taking themselves too seriously, and both Lucy Lawless and Bruce Campbell have appeared in the other’s respective franchises as recurring characters. One would wonder why it took this long. Well that’s just the thing… it didn’t. Yeah, I didn’t actually figure this out until I started doing research for the article, but this crossover is actually the third in a trilogy, the other two having been written back in 2008. How will this affect the comic, well… let’s read on and find out.
We open with Xena cradling a dying Gabrielle in her arms while what appears to be an army of Deadites (the name for zombies in the Army of Darkness franchise) closes in. With her last breath, Gabrielle tells Xena to summon “The Warrior who walks through Time.” Using a page from the Necronomicon that Ash apparently left with her, Xena opens a portal by tearing the cursed parchment in half.
Several thousand years in the future, Ash Williams is in a good mood as he struts into his job at S-Mart and shamelessly flirts with the attractive new employee. While in real life, this is the sort of thing that would end with a slap to the face and a sexual harassment suit, in this case, Amber, the employee in question, seems unable to resist Ash’s quirky charm and reciprocates his advances. Unfortunately, just as Ash is about to get some sugar, he’s whisked away to Xena’s time period through a magical portal. Because Ash is well… Ash, he finds himself taken hostage by some primitive screw heads almost immediately. Fortunately, Ash is saved by Xena, but much to his surprise Xena doesn’t seem to recognize him. Afrer a brief fight, Ash finally gets a chance to tell his story. It turns out, Xena in the future did the summoning wrong and Ash was summoned to early in her timeline. Xena, believing Ash’s story but not wishing to deal with him, rips the page apart again and sends Ash back to his own time where he resumes flirting with Amber
What Works: As I mentioned at the top of the article, Ash and Xena are both great characters and they’re both a ton of fun here. Also, their fight, albeit brief, was great and showed the two to be, more or less, evenly matched.
What Doesn’t: I feel like a lot of this issue relies on the reader having read the other crossovers. Now, if those comics had come out only a year or two ago, that would probably have been fine, but when the previous comics came out eight years ago, and are likely hard to track down at this point, it makes it hard for the reader to catch up and just leaves them confused.
What’s more, we didn’t get much of Xena and Ash together in the capacity we would have liked in this issue. I get that this is a multi-issue series and we have to spread it out, but this issue ultimately boils down to: Ash and Xena fight for one page, talk for two pages and then Xena tells Ash to go away and he does. Not exactly the stuff great epics are made of.
Overall: 2.5/5
I will continue to check out this mini-series as it develops, but right now, while is has some entertaining elements, it is not a particularly strong entry in either franchise.