Yesterday I wrote about the finale of season 2 of Ash v Evil Dead and how the showrunner of the series up to this point, Craig DiGregorio, left the show after that second season and allowed himself to be interviewed as to why.  It turned out there were strong creative differences between one of the show’s producers, strongly hinted as being Robert Tapert, and he.  The end result of these differences was a season 2 finale that was very different from what Mr. DiGregorio intended (you can read about all that, including how he wanted to end the season, here).

In my original writings linked to above, I noted that I wasn’t all that impressed with the season 2 finale though I really liked all the stuff that happened before it.  Overall I felt season 2 was even better than season 1 of Ash v Evil Dead, though each suffered from rather lame (IMHO!) finales.

After reading Mr. DiGregorio’s interview and how he intended to finish off season 2, I was left incredibly conflicted.  On the one hand, Mr. DiGregorio steered the show through two very fun and enjoyable seasons and he clearly steered the show, story-wise, in a certain direction which was leading up to his version of the season 2 finale.  As detailed in his interview, the character of Kelly Maxwell (Dana DeLorenzo) was to be revealed, because of the time traveling shenanigans of the leads, to be the daughter of Ash (Bruce Campbell).

In retrospect, this was set up almost from the show’s very beginning!  Please note this, the season 1 trailer, and particularly the lines of dialogue at the 2:47 minute mark:

Bear in mind, this trailer was released before even one episode of the first season aired.  The line of dialogue in which Ash states he feels Kelly is a younger version of him, is the first of many hints given through the first and second seasons of the show that Ash and she share some kind of commonality.

What is so damn perplexing in my mind is: How could the people behind the show go through almost two full seasons giving us these little hints and setting up this big reveal… and then at what appears to be the very last second scuttling it and going in a completely different (and for my money, far lamer) conclusion?!

But as I said above, I felt conflicted by learning this information.  The fact is that as much control as Mr. DiGregorio had over the first two seasons of the Ash v Evil Dead, he was not one of the three people who actually control the characters and concepts.  Robert Tapert, who was implied as being the one responsible for nixing Mr. DiGregorio’s original concept for the season 2 finale is, for better or worse, one of the people who has been with the Evil Dead series since the very first film was released back in 1981.  He is one of the owners of the franchise and he certainly has every right in the world to demand things be done to his standards.

The big question is: Why did it take so long for him to realize he didn’t want to go in this particular direction?

I get from Mr. DiGregorio’s interview that the season finale as presented was a rush job as the original script and his concepts were scuttled at the very last minute.  That certainly explains why many of the hints of Kelly’s background remain sprinkled throughout the show’s two seasons.

So I have to ask: What happened?

Was Mr. Tapert not aware of the direction Mr. DiGregorio was going in?  If so, was Mr. Tapert not as hands on as he should have been and only now decided to flex his creative muscles?  Or could it be that Mr. DiGregorio failed in fully briefing his bosses and didn’t give him sufficient “heads up” about his ideas for the Kelly character?

Either way it seems communication was an issue between the two and, sadly, it resulted in Mr. DiGregorio not only walking away from a series he had done some damn good work on, but also removing what could have been a far more exciting conclusion to this second season that what was made.

Like everyone else, I have no idea how Ash v Evil Dead will be next season.  The show will have a new creative overseer and, I’m assuming, he will be more compliant to Mr. Tapert’s ideas of where the show should go.

I’m trying to be optimistic but these revelations have shaken my faith -at least a little- in what to expect in the final product.

We’ll see.