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I love horror. Always have, always will. But the man you see before you today did not always crave the raw, visceral carnage that horror movies had to offer. No, sir. Before this, I'm not sure if I even really had a favorite genre. But now children, pull up a seat and allow Uncle Stephen to share with you the moment that changed my life forever...

I was still living at home, in my junior year of high school, with my brother living at home as well. My brother had always a penchant for making interesting friends, and these two were no exception. There names escape me at the moment, so I will just call them Tim and Tom. I don't remember much about either, but I know that Tim was a huge horror movie fan and his favorite actor was someone by the name of Bruce Campbell.

Now during this dark, naive time in my life, I was only vaguely familiar with these movies. I know they were trilogy and I had seen maybe 10 minutes of 'Army of Darkness' when it was a local TV station's 'SATURDAY AFTERNOON MOVIE OF THE WEEK' but that was about it. Per his suggestion, I went to rent 'Evil Dead' on VHS (Didn't have a DVD player at the time) and sat done one night to watch it. Where as it didn't immediately blow me away, it did catch my interesting. Oh sure, I had seen movies with a much slicker production and much better special effects and one could even argue, better acting. But the thing that Evil Dead had was personality. It wasn't trying to be a paint-by-the-numbers horror schlock that comes out once a month, no sir. They were trying to be original, stand out of a crowd and do something worthwhile.

And I respected that.

So having digested this, I immediately rented Evil Dead II a month or so later, after I got a PS2 as a birthday present. [NOTE - Evil Dead II was near impossible to find on VHS in this town, new or used] Immediately I ran home, slid open the tray and inserted the gleaming piece of plastic into the tray. My life was never the same.

Evil Dead II was a masterpiece of physical comedy, doused in copious amounts of bucket loads of red, red faux-blood. Souls were threatened to be swallowd, chainsaws were swung, boomsticks (though the term wasn't coined till Part III) were fired. It was amazing. It had just the right amount of near-slapstick and gore. Imagine if Freddy Kruger was directing a skit comedy show in Hell, and you have a good idea of what to expect from EDII.

This was also the time my fan-boy crush on Bruce Campbell began to form. That chin! Those lines! The acting! *swoon*

And of course, to follow it up, one most ingest the last of the series, Army of Darkness. Whereas it lacked the theatric 'oomph' of the first two, it did take the series in a new direction, setting it up as a horror/action/comedy. Less gore, but plenty of Bruce and honestly, that's what sells the movie for me.

AND THE ONE-LINERS! Oh sweet Azar, the one-liners!

"YO! She-b***h! Let's go!"
"Good? Bad? I'm the guy with the gun."
"Hail to the king, baby."
"SEE THIS?! This...is my BOOMSTICK!"
"Gimmie some sugar"

Ah yes, I get teary eyed just thinking about it.

I have since lost contact with Tim and Tom and honestly have no idea where the hell they are. I do remember hearing from the grapevine that one of them became horribly addicted to drugs, but that was never confirmed. So Tim, wherever you, I tip my hat to you, good sir. Thank you for introducing me to this wonderful film franchise and showcasing my interests into the wonderful world of horror.