Alternative Character Interpretation: The Hope Spot where it appears as though Linda and Cheryl are unpossessed. Was that the deadites pretending the whole time? Or did they briefly leave the two girls to make it a crueller Yank the Dog's Chain for everyone? Or were they able to actually fight off the possession briefly?
Best Known for the Fanservice: Or, best known for Fan Disservice in this case. Mention the first film to anyone, and the scene that usually gets brought up is where Cheryl gets raped by the woods.
Fans Prefer the New Her: There's no denying that, the more dishevelled Ash gets, the more it gives Bruce Campbell the male version of Unkempt Beauty.
Fridge Horror: It’s been shown that Cheryl has been possessed after being raped by the trees. Keep in mind the viewer never sees what happened to Scotty before he returns to the cabin badly bruised and bleeding profusely, which implies that the trees did to Scotty what they did to Cheryl earlier.
It Was His Sled: The movie had the twist that Scott would spend the first part of the movie looking as if he would become The Hero, only for Ash to step up and outlive all of them. Since Ash has become a pop culture icon, it would be obvious to any first-time viewers that he would become the hero of the story.
Narm Charm: The movie is a product of a very, verysmall budget, so many of the special effects shots and acting come off very poor in execution. But for many horror fans, it’s what makes the film even more frightening and fun to watch. The producers took notice of this, and decided to run with it. The rest is history.
Sam Raimi notes in the first film's commentary that this is the case for Bruce Campbell's congested delivery of the line "She can't even stand up."
And, of course, the tree rape scene.
Once Original, Now Common: The movie enjoys a reputation of being schlocky, and the effects look rather crude to modern viewers used to the likes of Saw, Hostel etc. But this was seen as genuinely disturbing and terrifying when it was released - and it was one of the infamous video nasties.
Overshadowed by Controversy: At first the film was remembered entirely for being the first one on the 'Video Nasties' list. It has since transcended this and become a Cult Classic in its own right.
Sequel Displacement: It's still an incredibly good horror film on its own, but if you're here looking for the legendary Camp factor synonymous with the rest of the franchise, you're in the wrong place, and Ash isn't quite the character he would later become. He doesn't even say "Groovy" in this one!
Cheryl being raped by the woods. Particularly infamous for how shocking and disturbing it is, this is a scene so creepy and grotesque that even Sam Raimi himself regrets filming it.
The Deadite makeup looks like... well, makeup, painted onto the actors' faces with little to no dimensionality, most shots of the moon are quite badly composited (as in, the moon has a big blue box around it, betraying that it was shot separately), and at least one shot from the final scene is obviously just a still photo, held onscreen for a few seconds.
One example that the production team found particularly disappointing: the demonically twisted bridge that traps the heroes in the woods was, in fact, completely real, built at full scale by the crew in the middle of the actual forest the cabin was located in. Unfortunately, when night fell, they came to realize why most Hollywood productions shoot nighttime scenes in a studio or with “day-for-night” techniques, because they did not have nearly enough lighting equipment to illuminate something so large in the middle of a pitch-black wilderness. The resulting shot in the final film is a static image that’s convincing enough, but also looks like it could be a miniature, and probably would have looked better if it was.
Any shots with the moon in the background. The moon is a matte edited in the background, and the edges of the matte are visible.
The end scene where the deadites melt away was all done with stop-motion animation, which still looks gorgeous even today.
Cheryl stabbing Linda in the ankle with a pencil and violently jerking it. This scene is seen by many audiences to be one of the film's most gruesome moments.
The Surreal Horror portion of the movie, with the Mirror Scare, the weird camera angles and the bloody lightbulb all very well-done.
The Woobie: Everyone in the movie has these moments at some point. Particularly Ash, who sees his sister and girlfriend possessed and later dismembered. In fact, the original cut focused on the tragedy of Ash slowly losing his friends, and his guilt for not being able to save them.
