Ash Williams

Ashley J. "Ash" Williams is a fictional home improvement clerk and former college student and the main character featured in the Evil Dead film series by Renaissance Pictures and New Line Cinema. He was played by actor Bruce Campbell.

Biography
There are two conflicting stories on how Ash, his girlfriend Linda, sister Cheryl, and friends Scotty and Shelly found the cabin in the woods. One story says that Scotty rented the cabin, while another says that they heard that the cabin was abandoned by its previous owner, but either way, the five decided to venture out to this cabin to spend the weekend there. At this cabin, they find the "Naturon Demonto" (renamed or possibly translated to Necronomicon Ex-Mortis in the sequels), The Book of The Dead, along with a tape recorder. The tape is a recording of the owner of the cabin, Professor Raymond Knowby, who was translating a passage of the book. By playing the tape, Ash and friends awake the Kandarian Demon, the same one that Professor Knowby had previously unleashed earlier in the week. who can now possess the living. Ash's friends and sister are consequently possessed and killed one by one. It isn't until he's the last survivor that he finally destroys the Necronomicon by throwing it into the fireplace, and in doing so, the possessed bodies of Scotty and Cheryl rapidly decay and 'die'. The evil appears to be driven back, however, as the morning sun rises, Ash attacked by the unseen force.

He is slammed hard against a tree and falls in a puddle of water. From here he becomes a deadite but shortly afterwards is released from the spirit by the coming of dawn, only to pass out. Ash regains consciousness moments before sunset. Deciding to get out of there as fast as he can, he climbs into his car and drives to where the bridge was, only to find it completely destroyed by the evil force. As the sun quickly sets, said force starts climbing up the cliff, and Ash hops into his car, driving away as fast as he can and as a result, crashing right into a tree stump that sends him flying through the windshield.

With the evil close behind him, he runs into the cabin and through it trying to hide, and ducks into the trapdoor, waiting until the evil force leaves. After it does, Ash comes out, only to find himself stuck at the cabin with the spirits of the Evil Dead for yet another night. Later, the cabin owner's daughter, Annie arrives with Ed Getley and two other people arrive. It also turns out that Henrietta Knowby is still in the basement. One by one all are killed until only Ash and Annie are left.It is near the end of this film that Ash gets his famous chainsaw in place of his right hand. The film ends with Ash being sucked into a vortex and traveling back in time to 1300 AD, with Ash being surrounded by medieval knights.

Ash finds himself trapped in time and knights. Despite The Wise Man's attempt to convince him otherwise, Lord Arthur became convinced that Ash was an ally of his mortal enemy Henry the Red and ordered his execution. Captured and brought to Castle Kandar, Ash (accidentally) falls into The Pit. After fighting the horrors within the pit, Ash escapes using his belt and the chain that operates the spiked walls of the pit. Realizing that he is truly the Chosen One, the residents of the Castle begin to worship him. One of the locals, Sheila, falls in love with him, and he falls for her.

Because of his status as The Chosen One, the Wise Man attempts to persuade him to retrieve the Necronomicon from the Deadites. At first he is reluctant to help the Wise Man recover the book, however he agrees when the Wise Man explains that the book can return him to his on time and place. Putting his engineering degree to work, Ash constructs a mechanical prosthetic hand out of a gauntlet from a suit of armor, using it throughout his journey in place of the chainsaw (though he still carries it with him).

During his lone journey to retrieve the book, he hides from the evil force in the woods in a windmill and is attacked by several tiny reflection of himself. One of them manages to jump into his mouth and grows into a full-size bad Ash. The döppelganger is quickly dispatched and Ash retrieves the book. However, because he forgets the correct recitation to say beforehand, the army of darkness, and his evil self, rise up from the dead. He barely escapes, but when he gets back he learns the bad news, because of his blunder, Ash has to defeat his alter-ego known as Bad Ash/Evil Ash who is leading the Army of Darkness to steal the Necronomicon. He refuses until Sheila is captured by the Deadites, whereupon he rallies Henry to the causes aid, brokers a peace between them, trains themen to fight, and converts the Oldsmobile into a death coaster. There is an epic battle in which he saves Sheila, defeats Bad Ash, and destroys the army of darkness with the help of Henry and Arthur's combined forces. He then turns to the matter of returning to his own time.

After using a potion given to him by The Wise Man, Ash sleeps for over 600 years, and awakes back in his own time. Realizing he would have to face his parents and tell them about the events at the cabin, Ash decided to run away from his hometown and never look back. When Linda and the others never returned, the locals of Elk Grove began to suspect that Ash went crazy and killed them, this caused the locals to give him the nickname of "Ashy Slashy". Now living in a trailer and returning to work at S-Mart, Ash bragged about his trip to 1300 AD to his co-workers (this could also be how the locals of Elk Grove found out that Ash killed his friends). One day while telling his story to an unimpressed co-worker, a Deadite customer attacked S-Mart. Ash jumped into action, quickly taking down the Deadite with a Lever-Action Rifle. At some point after this, Ash was either fired or quit his job at S-Mart and found employment at Value Stop as a stock boy. Also some time after these events, Ash found another copy of the Necronomicon Ex-Mortis at the occult bookstore Books From Beyond. Ash locked up this copy of the book in a chest in his trailer.

Notes & Trivia



 * Ash Williams fills the role of the "Reluctant hero" and "Chosen One" tropes.


 * The further adventures of Ash Williams continued on in the Ash vs Evil Dead television series on Showtime.


 * Bruce Campbell made a cameo appearance as Ash in a post-credit scene in the 2013 remake of Evil Dead where he says his iconic line, "Groovy".


 * Pablo from Ash vs Evil Dead refers to him as "El Jefe".