In 2024, Francis Galluppi’s thriller, The Last Stop in Yuma County, garnered critical acclaim yet failed to make an impact at the box office. Despite this, it caught the eye of renowned director Sam Raimi, leading to Galluppi’s selection to direct the next installment in the Evil Dead franchise.
This Underseen Neo-Western Thriller Is the Reason Why Sam Raimi Handpicked the Next Evil Dead Director
Francis Galluppi’s The Last Stop in Yuma County came and went in 2024 without much fanfare. While it received strong critical notices and currently has a 97% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes, the thriller didn’t make a dent at the box office. And yet, it made such a mark on director Sam Raimi that he asked Galluppi to helm an upcoming installment in the Evil Dead franchise, which will release after 2026’s Evil Dead Burn.
The Last Stop in Yuma County is a twisty, tense ride, and one of the best features of 2024. While it lacks any supernatural elements, its plot plays into the strengths of Raimi’s Evil Dead movies, and his skill behind the camera hints that Galluppi could easily make the transition from the desert to the Deadites.
‘Last Stop in Yuma County’ Follows a String of Bad Decisions
The Last Stop in Yuma County follows Jim Cummings‘ knife salesman, who’s on his way through Arizona to California to spend the day with his daughter when he pulls into a gas station to fill up. The station attendant informs him that the fuel truck is late, and Cummings heads into the adjoining restaurant to wait for its arrival. It’s the first of his many bad decisions that day, a tradition in the thriller genre.
While waiting for help to arrive, two sketchy men walk in, whom the knife salesman quickly identifies as the perpetrators of a local bank robbery. As more customers arrive, the knife salesman and the diner’s waitress try to figure out a way to alert the police without the situation devolving into chaos. It goes without saying that they fail. The film builds to a tense and violent standoff and, once the dust has settled, spends the next 30 minutes revealing new twists and turns that suggest that Cummings’ character might not be the innocent bystander he – and viewers — assumed. It keeps audiences on their toes, and it’s a shame it wasn’t noticed among the most unpredictable movies of 2024.
The Last Stop in Yuma County belongs on a list of the best directorial debuts of the decade. Galluppi is an assured writer-director who lets the tension build and keeps two steps ahead of his audience. What begins as a typical hostage thriller quickly escalates into something more surprising and thrilling, with its characters trying to survive in one location as everything goes to hell.
Galluppi Is a Perfect Fit for the Evil Dead Franchise
The Evil Dead franchise is one of the most consistent and innovative series in horror cinema, building on a few essentials to terrify and delight audiences. The ingredients are simple – take a group of people, strand them in one location, and let the demons terrorize them. It’s the premise that powered Raimi’s first two films, Fede Alvarez’s 2011 Evil Dead remake, as well as 2023’s surprisingly effective Evil Dead Rise. Even though Army of Darkness initially seems to be a different beast, it is largely limited to one village, and its highlight takes place in a windmill where Deadite clones torment Bruce Campbell.
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The Last Stop in Yuma County might lack the supernatural terrors as well as the overt gore, but Galluppi understands the basics. His film strands a cast of largely innocent bystanders in one location, where they’re terrorized by forces beyond their control. Galluppi and cinematographer Mac Fisken show considerable skill and control behind the camera, whether using it as a POV to get viewers into the characters’ heads, slowing down the action to heighten the tension, or to reveal new wrinkles in the plan. It might not be the energetic movement Raimi perfected in the first two Evil Dead films, but it’s still highly effective cinematic storytelling that shows Galluppi understands how to heighten the tension before letting the film explode in violence and unexpected twists.
In its last half-hour, The Last Stop in Yuma County reveals a dark sense of humor that is the hallmark of Raimi’s three Evil Dead movies as well as Evil Dead Rise. As Cummings’ character tries to exploit the deadly situation for his own gain, Galluppi tosses in a variety of wrinkles – including the ill-timed arrival of a family, complete with a crying baby – that reveal he might be a bit more capricious than the film has hinted at. And as the salesman’s plans continuously fall apart and fate seems intent on punishing him, it’s easy to imagine Cummings as Galluppi’s own Bruce Campbell, whom Raimi delighted in making miserable throughout the production of the Evil Dead movies.
When Will the Evil Dead Rise Again?
It remains to be seen when Galluppi’s Evil Dead project will be revealed or what it’s called. His involvement was announced in 2024, shortly after Sébastien Vaniček was tapped to direct Evil Dead Burn, which will be released in 2026. Galluppi seems to be a perfect fit; in interviews, he’s showcased an Evil Dead poster on his office wall and boasted that he has three copies of the Necronomicon on his desk.
In the meantime, as series fans wait for another round with the Deadites, they can catch up with The Last Stop in Yuma County, which is available for rent on most streaming services. It’s a great preview of where Galluppi might take the franchise.
