Reposting from my TikTok, but I adore this theory/headcanon, I haven’t seen anybody else talk about it but I basically see it as canon.
Basically, I think that The Evil Dead is the actual events that happened that first night. Cheryl getting possessed first and then the rest dying until Ash kills Cheryl and Scotty and survives the night. This is basically 100% canon because Cheryl returns so it wasn’t just that they retconned this movie out of existence to say that only Ash and Linda went to the cabin like Evil Dead 2 implies.
So what is it then?
Technically it’s just shitty continuity. Originally Sam Raimi was going to include the others in the opening recap (with himself playing Scotty) but they didn’t want too much of the film to be rehashing the first movie, so they cut it back down to just Linda since she as arguably the one that most impacts Ash.
But that’s no fun, so here comes my headcanon/explanation for these recaps despite the first movie being the truth. So essentially I believe Ash became so traumatised and went slightly insane, and this caused not only memory loss but also him to misremember what actually happened.
The Evil Dead is how the first night actually went down, and the second night is just Evil Dead 2 with Linda coming back and biting his hand before he finishes her off. Then the rest of the movie and whatnot. Now is there actually any differences besides the lack of characters? Yes. Subtle ones and definitely just continuity errors but shhh.
Firstly, Ash remembers Linda being attacked through the window like Shelly was. He also doesn’t know how he ended up finding out about the cabin, despite the first movie saying that Scotty rented it (but Ash doesn’t remember Scotty, so he doesn’t remember how he got the cabin.) And finally, Linda’s deadite looks remarkably less-gorey and visually ghoulish. She’s still scary and supernatural, but compared to the first film she’s very toned down.
I think Ash only remembers Linda since she fucked him up the most mentally, due to how close they were and how scary she looked. That and she is one of the only deadites to go absolutely nuts on him. Cheryl hits him, so does Scotty, but Linda stabs and hurts him so much more. This, and the fact that only Linda returns in the second night AND it’s her necklace that saves Ash, means he would remember her.
But why forget the others existed? Surely they traumatised him too? I think he forgot them because of his massive survivors guilt. He couldn’t kill Shelly because he was too scared, he did kill Cheryl and Scotty, and then with Linda he didn’t kill her. He left her outside and only killed her once he absolutely had to. With how mad he becomes, especially after he learns that deadites can be saved, it’s any wonder he would feel horrible about killing his little sister and his best friend.
Then if you factor Army of Darkness into it, the recap shows no blood or gore, and Linda looks completely different and we don’t see her deadite form again. If I had to guess, going off personality, by Army of Darkness Ash has basically gone mad and circled back into being a charming asshole (which he wasn’t in the OG film) so him forgetting most of the cabin besides the important details makes sense. Him remembering Linda wrong could also mean he’s either forgetting about her (which also makes sense since he finds two new lovers in this film) or he’s still so traumatised he doesn’t really remember what she actually looked like.
It’s much easier for Ash to go crazy and lie to himself about how many people died because of him, instead of being constantly haunted by horrifying images of his loved ones in agony.
TL;DR: The Evil Dead is what actually happened, Evil Dead 2 and Army of Darkness is what Ash remembers due to trauma.
