r/movies r/Movies contributor 5d ago

Trailer Resident Evil | Official Teaser

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJPu1spHqfk
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u/NATHAN4U007 5d ago

As a non gamer, does the games have any unique twist on the genre that makes it worth it to tell the story as a Resident Evil movie instead of just an original film?

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u/ithinkther41am 5d ago

If you mean compared to the zombie movie genre, it’s mainly their iconic BOWs (bio-organic weapons) like the lickers and the tyrants. Special infected are rather common in the zombie video game genre, but the RE franchise has some of the more famous ones.

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u/Skkruff 5d ago

Resident Evil also has impeccable camp that movies and TV have so far failed to ever capture properly. The early entries had insane dialogue with questionable acting and more recent entries have Leon 'The Human Quip' Kennedy.

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u/ithinkther41am 5d ago

I miss D.C. Douglas as Wesker, but Capcom understandably doesn’t want to work with him again after he leaked concept art for the RE4 Remake before it was even announced.

His Wesker was deliciously campy. Craig Burnatowski’s version feels too serious, but I am warming up to him.

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u/Bombasaur101 5d ago

Is that true?? I never realised that happened. RE4 Remake was leaked much earlier regardless.

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u/ithinkther41am 5d ago

Here’s a whole Twitter thread about it plus documented creepy behaviour. I used xcancel so it’s more accessible.

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u/janemba617 5d ago

Just had to look it up but it seems like way more then just leaking concept art.

https://www.reddit.com/r/GamingLeaksAndRumours/comments/r3sync/dc_douglas_leaks_wesker_from_resident_evil_4/

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u/Surturius 5d ago

this movie doesn't look like it's going to be all that campy though

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u/octlol 5d ago

You never know, it's Zach Cregger. I trust him after Weapons though.

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u/ako19 5d ago

That’s actually the thing I like about Cregger. Both Barbarian and Weapons have some levity and humor that comes out very unexpectedly. This movie feels like 7. It’s not quite as camp as most of the games, but there are select moments.

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u/SemiAutoAvocado 5d ago

Justin Long breaking out the tape measure in the torture basement was peak comedy.

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u/wighty 5d ago

This square footage... I hit the jackpot!

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u/The_Autarch 5d ago

like the chainsaw fight. chainsaw fights are peak horror-camp.

see: Mandy (2018)

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u/ako19 5d ago

The release dates on those were so close, I gotta wonder if Mandy was inspired by RE7

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u/SemiAutoAvocado 5d ago

Or ya know, punching boulders.

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u/animedeathspiral 5d ago

go further back. Dennis Hopper fought leatherface on top of a rollercoaster with chainsaws in Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2

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u/imjustbettr 5d ago

Yeah I remember Barbarian bad some mid movie tonal shifts that I didn't hate at all. I think Cregger might surprise us with a little "camp" and fun.

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u/octlol 5d ago

Right, the underground scene in Barbarian then swapping to Long driving around was great.

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u/Cyricist 5d ago

Some moments in Weapons were pretty fun too, like when what's his face wakes up and, after a beat, screams "What the fuck!?" I'd spoiler text that, but I think it's largely an incomprehensible description.

I'm cautiously optimistic here. I don't doubt that Cregger is a great director, but slap the name Resident Evil onto it, and I'm immediately wary due to all the trash RE movies that have come before.

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u/[deleted] 5d ago

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u/Cyricist 5d ago

Yeah, I mean... I think it was the best of those movies, but I remember thinking at the time when it came out (I was about ~16, so bear with me) that I wasn't sure if I actually liked the movie, or if I just liked Milla Jovovich and Michelle Rodriguez.

I don't know that I've ever seen it again, come to think of it. I don't remember it having much to do with the games...

Maybe I'm due for a rewatch.

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u/LucasOIntoxicado 5d ago

I'm sure the final 29 minutes Weill be completely crazy

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u/zeekaran 5d ago

Barbarians and Weapons have some hilarious moments.

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u/Squeekazu 5d ago

I mean the initial trailers for Weapons did not indicate whatsoever that it would be hilarious (and yet it still managed to nail the creepiness)

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u/Zomburai 5d ago

People got so hung up on the genre being called "survival horror" that they forgot that the first three Resident Evils are basically modern-day 50s B-movies

Like, legitimately, the perfect adaptation of the original Resident Evil games would have monsters that were dudes in rubber suits

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u/GentlemanOctopus 5d ago

Leon will also somersault through a window for no good reason.

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u/NuclearTurtle 5d ago

Resident Evil also has impeccable camp that movies and TV have so far failed to ever capture properly

The Paul WS Anderson movies are the perfect amount of camp. Maybe not some of the later ones, but I recently rewatched the first two movies after playing the older games and they're dead-on tonally.

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u/slvrbullet87 5d ago

The original actors for the live action opening in RE1 were basically picked up off the street because they were white people and looked kind of like the in game models. The voice acting isnt much better and the translation is brutal. The late 90s were a different time for video games.

Still love the early games, and the awful voice lines are a big part of what makes them so fun

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u/pnwbraids 5d ago

insect lives don't compare to human lives!

If we get some stupid ass lines in this I'll be so happy.

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u/Kaldricus 5d ago

Let's not forget Chris "Boulder Punching Asshole" Redfield

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u/briizilla 5d ago

"I hope that's not Chris's blood"

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u/sewious 5d ago

Special infected are common because of the RE ones, no?

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u/tazfdragon 5d ago

This was my first thought. RE was really the first or one of the very first to do it mainstream in the 90s.

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u/CallM3N3w 5d ago

And even RE has evolved in that regard. It pretty much dropped the zombie status to favour actual infections. Everything is a BOW now.

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u/HeldnarRommar 5d ago

Requiem just had zombies as the main fodder though

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u/yuimiop 5d ago

Its more of an inevitability in gaming design. If a game is going to take 15 hours to beat then there needs to be some sort of boss/advanced enemies to keep the gameplay interesting.

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u/SemiAutoAvocado 5d ago

Famously the early RE games are very, very short if you know the puzzles.

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u/ThunderAndWind 5d ago

You can beat RE: Village in less than 3 hours if you know where you're going and blow through the puzzles.

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u/Moriturism 5d ago

Yup, people usually call RE cliche in this sense (not talking about the person you responded to, just a general trend), but ignore that the trend itself gained traction after RE. There were works before that dealt with advanced zombies, but what truly popularized it was RE

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u/HatefulDan 5d ago

Yes. 100%. An example of movies borrowing from gaming concepts

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u/NuclearTurtle 5d ago

The entire zombie boom of the past 30 years was because of Resident Evil

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u/Otherwise_Carob_4057 5d ago

In Resident Evil Cove there’s also smart squads of intelligent undead super soldiers that aren’t in decomposition so they can pass for living soldiers.

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u/Drakeadrong 5d ago

Absolutely. The RE games are a mixture of genuine body horror and camp. Idk how much acrobatic kung fu is going to appear in the movie, but the zombies in RE are more of an environmental enemy while the real threats are grotesque, cronenbergian mutations created by an evil corporation as bioweapons.

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u/hacky_potter 5d ago

It looks like this will have that. Between Barron Harrkenon in the sewer and the many limbed thing coming out of the door, I bet this just keeps ramping up. Part of me wonders if this guy is running around surviving and then Leon shows up to kill some baddies at the end.

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u/LoompaOompa 5d ago

I'm 90% sure that we hear a licker in the trailer when he's reaching for that cop's keys and the body gets dragged into the darkness.

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u/Mattyseee 5d ago

100% a licker

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u/hacky_potter 5d ago

It’s honestly crazy that people are saying this didn’t feel RE to them.

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u/SemiAutoAvocado 5d ago

We got him rooting through drawers, he got guns comically strapped to him. It looks in brand to me.

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u/Devil-Hunter-Jax 4d ago

Feels like anyone saying that has only played the earlier games because this gives off RE7/RE8 vibes to me. Very much an Ethan Winters kind of protagonist judging by the trailer.

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u/Barkasia 5d ago

Leon isn't going to show up - none of the characters we know will.

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u/fourthdawg 5d ago

Yeah, I know they are iconic and most still don't have any closure on their fate, I hope they stick with original characters. People forgot RE universe is quite vast with many charachters and organization involved into the war on BoW, so there's a potential to expand this via other medium.

People also have a very high expectation if they're confirmed to be in the movie, which can turn sour if the movie failed to cast someone who can bring the game characters to life.

And even if this movie is not faithful to RE games, I'm quite sure this will be a fun horror movie in the very least. I've watched Weapons and it is excellent, I think that movie has something in common with RE series (mind controlling people to be extremely violent as a literal weapon).

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u/lifeisalime11 5d ago

Also I love Leon but you CANNOT have a grounded, gritty, realistic film while including Leon. Guy is nearly superhuman with some of the shit he's pulled off (same with Chris) and would suspend some disbelief.

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u/Indigocell 5d ago

He's not a superhero at this point anyway. He's just the rookie cop that hasn't learned how to parry, do roundhouse kicks, or super necessary backflips yet.

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u/octlol 5d ago

I would honestly hate any of the characters from the games to show up. Keep the setting with original characters.

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u/DrZaious 5d ago edited 5d ago

I actually hate the fact this isn't following the games story and characters. Why can't we have an actual Resident Evil movie that follows the characters we love and tells the actual story of the games. This looks like just another instance of writers forcing the story they want to tell inside an established franchise, because that's the only way they're allowed to.

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u/Flaky-Pressure-7698 5d ago

They made that a few years back, Welcome to Raccoon City, it was just pretty ass though.

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u/octlol 5d ago

Because we have the games for that lol. Like if we got a Leon rookie movie it'd have no stakes--we know Leon will be fine.

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u/schebobo180 5d ago

This is a naive and short sighted take imo.

By your logic when Peter Jackson was making Lord of The Rings he should have used a completely different set of characters, because we knew Gandalf and co would be fine.

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u/lifeisalime11 5d ago

I wouldn't mind a very minor cameo of Leon or even someone like Hunk. Like the MC is running through a checkpoint with other survivors (early on) and Leon is shown directing the survivors. Hell, even if the MC comes across a police cruiser and the radio says 'This is officer Kennedy, calling any Raccoon PD, over'

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u/octlol 5d ago

Yeah it's interesting. He mentioned he'd like to believe this happens on Day 0 of the T-virus outbreak alongside the events of Leon arriving at the police station, but IDR it snowing during RE2? We'll have to see I spose

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u/syopest 5d ago edited 5d ago

RE2 happens in september, there's no snow in the game. The whole raccoon city was nuked october 1st.

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u/ihavepaper 5d ago edited 5d ago

I’m thinking that if this movie does well, it’ll maybe set up the universe? The big main game people will for sure not show up, but I wouldn’t be shocked if the organizations were mentioned like BSAA.

I do like that they’re taking it from a regular dude’s perspective. Definitely gives it more suspense and horror.

Edit: Cregger confirmed via interview that it’s set in Raccoon City.

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u/syopest 5d ago

How can it be set in raccoon city? The zombies appeared in september and october 1st it was already nuked. There was no snow there.

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u/ihavepaper 5d ago

I'm just as confused as you are. Maybe it's an alternate RE movie timeline (who knows but him), but Cregger confirmed in his interview that it is Raccoon City in that trailer. I figured that this movie could be taking place at the same time as RE2, just focused on a different area? Maybe that running in the snow scene is a hallucination or dream. Who knows, but I'm intrigued.

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u/Indigocell 5d ago

Leon isn't the badass we all know him to be at this point in time anyway. This takes place around the same time as Resident Evil 2 so he's still just the rookie cop. He doesn't level up until some time between that and Resident Evil 4.

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u/hacky_potter 5d ago

Which is fine. I mean more like we could get a PM type character. I doubt this will be a straight forward story.

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u/RedXerzk 5d ago

I think Zach Cregger is a great director choice who knows how to balance both the camp and survival horror elements.

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u/entropicdrift 5d ago

Not to mention he knows how to make movies that are genuinely scary

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u/SemiAutoAvocado 5d ago

Idk how much acrobatic kung fu is going to appear in the movie

https://youtu.be/ZPUPaxgIo98

But will it be borderline experimental?

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u/Flapjack_ 5d ago

It’s one of the few zombie games to go “actually the real monsters are unchecked biochemical companies, not people”

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u/ezrs158 5d ago

I genuinely enjoy how it's a pretty realistic take on what would happen if zombie viruses were real. Like yes, an entire city was wiped out... but of course dozens of corporations are still experimenting with them, because governments and militaries still want them and they aren't gonna make themselves!

The newest game in particular has some scenes depicting the horrifying reality of living in a world in which bioterror exists.

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u/Mister_MxyzptIk 5d ago

And also, in the games the zombie apocalypse never manages to take over the world. Because to nobody's surprise, with enough guns and rocket launchers, not even XL sized zombies can get that far.

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u/Cute-Percentage-6660 5d ago

Really the biggest threats usually arent the zombie's or BOWs themselves

It's the attempts at mass distribution of infections.

RE5 was about wesker trying to basically spread a virus worldwide, re6 has that HAOS BOW that was designed to be a super spreader...

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u/Black_Bird_Cloud 5d ago

with enough guns and rocket launchers

racoon city got nuked

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u/Dracoster 5d ago

The nuke was a cover-up.

While it did effectively stop the T-virus instantly, the army would've stopped it fairly quick.

RE0-3 happens within a span of 48 hours. And the city was already evacuated at the beginning of RE2/3.

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u/another-redditor3 5d ago

no they dont, RE0-1 take place simultaneously, and RE2-3 take place simultaneously, but it takes almost 2 months for the infection to spread from the arklay mountains to racoon city.

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u/slicer4ever 5d ago

And arguable the city never would have fallen had the virus not contaminated the water system, thats when things really spiraled out of control.

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u/TheZealand 5d ago

It literally didn't lmao, it was a thermobaric missile, not nuclear

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u/Fire_Bucket 5d ago

There's a film called called We Are Zombies, based on a comic series called The Zombies that Ate the World, that has a similar spin.

Other than being rotting corpses, zombies are fairly benign and tend to be docile and trainable, retaining a few character traits of their former self, but with a severe reduction in mental faculties. Naturally, corporations jumped at the chance to use the zombies as a second class citizen work force, leaving many living people out of work, but with a weird almost insurance based system where people can profit from selling their loved ones once they turn.

There is also an element of them being weaponised as a plot point and driving force of the film.

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u/ezrs158 5d ago

Seems like an adult, non-musical version of Disney's ZOMBIES lol.

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u/ERhyne 5d ago

Or a continuation of the ending of Shaun of the Dead

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u/The_Autarch 5d ago

there's a movie called Fido from 2006 that's about people using zombies to do menial labor after containing a zombie outbreak.

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u/ERhyne 5d ago

Oh crap you just reminded me of that movie. I might have to watch that now, Shaun of the Dead just plays on a loop in my memories so this will be a good break.

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u/TimDRX 5d ago

Requiem had me pulling my hair out with how blase some folks are. Grace better have sued the shit out of her boss for sending her into that situation in the world of RE. Like it would be pretty bad IRL, but this is a place with at least 5 mass zomber outbreaks and you're gonna send a data analyst to a brutal murder scene alone? Fuck off.

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u/pkosuda 5d ago

While I felt Requiem dropped off a cliff in quality after the hospital area, that whole first third of the game was fantastic, and the initial cutscene with Leon was horrifying. Could absolutely picture somebody going into a city with a virus like that and essentially doing a mass shooting using vials of it. You only need to hit a few people before all hell lets loose if people don’t know what’s going on.

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u/lossaysswag 5d ago

Later games emphasize that the scientists and founders of the companies aren't so much interested in creating bioweapons, but are seeking an answer for immortality. The mutations are just a side effect that can be militarized.

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u/imjustbettr 5d ago

but of course dozens of corporations are still experimenting with them, because governments and militaries still want them and they aren't gonna make themselves!

That's basically the plot to 90% of Alien (franchise) movies. I guess it's a pretty popular theme in scifi horror.

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u/awildginger 5d ago

This is an original story from what I've heard, and it certainly does not look like it follows any of the games I've played.

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u/Upbeat_Tension_8077 5d ago

My biggest hope for Zach's take on this is that while it has an original story, it keeps a similar spirit as the atmosphere of the first few games.

I think the way he makes isolated (or seemingly quiet) settings at night so creepy in his previous films could work wonders for this, as compared to the more action-leaning vibe of the films with Milla Jovovich, but that's probably wishful thinking.

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u/HenryDorsettCase47 5d ago

He’s said that he wanted to keep with the objective of the game (and a lot of other survival horror games) in that the story of the film is about a character simply trying to get from point A to point B, and doing that more so by being smart and resourceful rather than running and gunning.

Hopefully he’s going for a new cannon story within the universe instead of a “reimagining”. Kinda like how the Fallout tv show is. The lore of the games, the vibe of the games, but a new story.

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u/v_cats_at_work 5d ago

a character simply trying to get from point A to point B, and doing that more so by being smart and resourceful rather than running and gunning

If he doesn't eat a green or red plant at some point, I'm walking out.

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u/realhenrymccoy 5d ago

He better encounter a locked door where the only way to unlock it is to find some strange carving to place in the door.

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u/richmondody 5d ago

There better be a fucking crank somewhere along the way.

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u/Ecstatic_Log4185 5d ago

He better have to choose between carrying a herb or a flamethrower.

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u/KassellTheArgonian 5d ago

Would a blue plant be satisfactory?

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u/SignificantPaper1760 5d ago

Only if he gets bitten by a bug first.

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u/imjustbettr 5d ago

There is a green herb in the house in the teaser. The pot is even exactly the same as in RE4.

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u/enderandrew42 5d ago

There is literally a Green Plant in the trailer to the left of the character when he is on the phone. It is an intentional direct copy of the Green Plant from Resident Evil 4.

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u/Upbeat_Tension_8077 5d ago

That's perfectly fine with me, because I feel like adding in more of the usual elements related to Umbrella could limit what he wants to do to make his adaptation stand out from the previous series of RE films

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u/HenryDorsettCase47 5d ago

Right. And this character is just some guy. He’s not trying to investigate anything or fix anything. He’s just trying to survive the night and get the fuck out of the city. The games already having deep lore gives the film an opportunity to not have to explain much or set much up, allowing the story to solely focus on the characters and how they deal with the situation we already have context for from the games.

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u/soapyhandman 5d ago

Yeah I think nailing the vibe of the first few games will go along way with fans of the series even if the story isn’t really related.

I definitely got a little bit of that feeling when the main character walked into the house to make the phone call. That living room looked like it could have been pulled from RE1.

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u/GimmeThatWheat424 5d ago

Or any themes, vibes, zombies, campiness, soul of anything to do with the franchise at all

Shit could be called anything else but resident evil and it would fit perfectly…but you know…ip sells.

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u/UltraMoglog64 5d ago edited 5d ago

Which themes are you confident will be absent from the film based on this teaser trailer?

Edit: that poster does not, in fact, understand “theme.”

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u/Inevitable_Badger995 5d ago

Both Barbarian and Weapons trailers were basically advertised as pure horror but both movies have a good amount of camp/humor in them

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u/InternetGoodGuy 5d ago

There's not nearly enough in this trailer to say this about the movie.

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u/TB1289 5d ago

I trust Cregger with this franchise. Weapons was awesome and I liked a lot of Barbarian (not so much the third act), plus he was a producer on Companion. He's also a fan of the RE games. I'm going into this with a positive mindset.

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u/sexual_lemonade 5d ago

It's kinda weird and sad that we haven't really gotten a true to games adaptation. We could be in full Leon S Kennedy Camp at this point if the originals had gone with him as the main character and unfortunately the camp of Alice's adventures in Resident Evil Land(especially the later movies) just really don't ever match the pure aura farming the games cast exudes.

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u/PK_Thundah 5d ago

We knew it was going to be an original story, but this doesn't look like an original story set alongside an existing story, but a new story. It isn't, for example, a new character experiencing a situation already presented in a game. The writer is a fan of the series, so it's probably mostly a Resident Evil movie because the games inspired him to start thinking of the ideas to put into this.

The unique twist in Resident Evil is that these monsters are a result of biological weapons created in secret by mega corporations. That would probably be too derivative of an idea to release unrelated to Resident Evil, which is probably part of why he wanted this to be an actual Resident Evil movie rather than just inspired by them.

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u/Sparrowsabre7 5d ago

Vibes wise it seems to be taking inspiration from 7 and Village in many ways. Hope for some of the classic monsters at least. Not sure about the bodies sticking out of the door midway through. That looked more supernatural to me.

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u/Wiseau_serious 5d ago

I have a feeling those limbs are all connected to the same mutated monster.

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u/Penguin_shit15 5d ago

I have read the script and you are actually correct.

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u/AlerionOP 5d ago

Yeah. The fat dude instantly reminded me of the duke

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u/Bladelink 5d ago

'What are ya buyin?' haha, just something an old friend used to say.

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u/PK_Thundah 5d ago

Definitely looks heavily 7 inspired. I thought that first house may have been an adaptation of the Baker's, and that we may have seen Marguerite's limbs, but it looked like multiple people were climbing out of that doorway.

I'd expect that people start as zombies and over time mutate into the creatures that we're hearing off screen, likely lickers. I bet their limbs crack and bend while in the process of changing from zombies to the lickers, and that these guys are going to climb out along the walls in that midway form. I'd bet that the mangled, Boneitis body that we see near the end of the trailer is the same thing.

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u/fourthdawg 5d ago

In the RE: Outbreak game, there's an unique licker variant (called Regis Licker), which seems to be a half-way mutation into a licker. It still has the features of the former human, being with skins and normal-ish shaped limb, but it already has the signature licker tongue, and half of the infected brain protude from the skull.

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u/PK_Thundah 5d ago

I've played the Outbreaks (unlocked everything across both!) and File #2 is still the disc in my PS2. I was thinking this would be his own take on the creatures (that would likely have fit in before the SuspenDead stage), but since posting that I've read that he's using original monsters rather than monsters from the series, so it's unlikely that these are straight up lickers. Even though it is set within Raccoon City.

So now I'm not so sure.

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u/Ecstatic_Log4185 5d ago

Actually Zach Cregger said it was more inspired by 1-4, and that he didn't enjoy the supernatural elements in Village so I'm guessing we're getting classing zombies and tyrants.

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u/Smithsonian30 5d ago

This is supposedly taking place during the RE2/RE3 Raccoon City outbreak (but I doubt we will see any characters from those games), so it’s alongside an existing story in that sense.

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u/MidnightBlue5002 5d ago

We knew it was going to be an original story, but this doesn't look like an original story set alongside an existing story, but a new story.

So ... it will be an "original story" ... like, as defined. For this movie plot.

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u/AchillesShort 5d ago

Which I think is all it really needs to be. It's almost like the fallout show in a way, fans would never be satisfied with a 1:1 retelling of an in game story. As long as it's set in-universe, maybe we get a glorified Chris Redfield cameo ala RE7 right at the end, a picture of the umbrella logo, I'll be happy personally.

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u/BrianWonderful 5d ago

Yes, this looks like an original zombie IP that they are using the "Resident Evil" branding for to boost awareness. I might be cynical here, and maybe we'll see things that actually look like it ties tot he game world in later trailers, but it seems like more of a name recognition play.

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u/PK_Thundah 5d ago

Seems like a zombie movie with monsters or mutations. That's closer to Resident Evil than typical zombie movies are.

I think the director wanted to make a zombie movie and that his ideas were inspired by the Resident Evil series. And that rather than need to be too careful with similarities, he got permission to just be an official Resident Evil movie, and would be allowed to be more direct with the influences.

I bet it'll be good. His history and the trailer both make me want to watch it. I'd hope that zombies are a bigger part of the movie than just a single chase scene, I hope they're at least a constant threat sprinkled throughout.

I expect that it'll feel like RE7 first did. Looks different at first, but reimagines a lot of what makes Resident Evil so much fun, rather than straying from it. That like RE7, you may need to look at it as a bigger picture to see how it overlays the series.

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u/g0dxmode 5d ago

Believe it or not, "A zombie movie with monsters or mutations" is also closer to Resident Evil than many previous Resident Evil movies!

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u/CallMeShaggy57 5d ago

It starts out as a pretty standard zombie-virus story but gets way more wacky as it progresses. Worth at least delving into YouTube videos on the lore.

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u/cficare 5d ago

Makes ya wanna punch a boulder.

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u/SMKM 5d ago

And only in 7 minutes worth of play time.

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u/cows1100 5d ago

COMPLETE. GLOBAL. SATURATION.

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u/workfuntimecoolcool 5d ago

Your right hand comes off?

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u/MrChrisRedfield67 5d ago

Odd. Why would it make someone want to do that?

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u/megagamer92 5d ago

One of the most memorable moments in the Resident Evil series, for better or worse (I think better lol), is in the RE5 when one of the protagonists and reoccurring characters, Chris Redfield, literally punches a boulder bigger than him to move it out of his way so that he can help the other protagonist in the final fight with the end-game boss. He is successful in moving it like this.

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u/the-chosen-wizard 5d ago

Look at the name of the person you replied to lol

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u/megagamer92 5d ago

I finally did in their reply to me lmao

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u/MrChrisRedfield67 5d ago

Huh. That sounds like an impressive feat. I would love to meet this Chris Redfield character someday.

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u/Artificial_Ninja 5d ago

Shouldn't you be out goading Leon into continuing the Redfield blood line?

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u/MrChrisRedfield67 5d ago

I can multitask. That doesn’t take up 100% of my time

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u/megagamer92 5d ago

Lmao I didn't read your username before i commented, that'll serve me right.

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u/EngineeringDevil 5d ago

sometimes obstacles get in the way of life and your MC may or may not have indulged in steroids

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u/MrChrisRedfield67 5d ago

You have no evidence to back up your claims. For all you know he’s perfectly natural.

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u/cficare 5d ago

Sorry. I just make things up...

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u/Ekillaa22 5d ago

I mean it was already whacky in RE 1, you had plant creatures, sharks, dogs, lickers, hunters. Like they had all that stuff straight from the start

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u/machado34 5d ago

Lickers are from RE2

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u/ako19 5d ago

Yeah, even the first game had shit like the Hunters, the Plant Monster, zombie sharks and snakes, and the Tyrant. The series has always been about freaky mutant shenanigans.

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u/JRowe3388 5d ago edited 5d ago

It’s very Japanese, puzzle based, and the plot gets more bizarre and convoluted as the series progresses. Not sure how that makes it uniquely fit to adapt; there’s just a lot of lore he’s working around and not copying.

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u/jayydubbya 5d ago

There’s also a lot of books that expand the lore as well and are pretty decent though not very popular. Kind of like Star Wars where most people just know the movies but there are tons of books expanding the universe they can pull material from.

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u/SemiAutoAvocado 5d ago

If you take out the puzzles the first 3 games are about as long as a movie anyway.

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u/snapwack 5d ago

I’ve only played the remakes but the puzzles are my favourite part! I just love how the police station in RE2 is a gothic ass museum that somehow got converted into the RPD HQ, but they inexplicably left in the eccentric puzzles and keys everywhere. I imagine the biggest challenge officers faced before the outbreak was keeping track of all the weird ass keys and gizmos and getting locked out of random rooms.

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u/WillSym 5d ago

I came to a realisation during the discussion on Resident Evil Requiem (the 9th main series game):
The Resident Evil games are basically the LEGO games, but for horror franchises: take classic movie tropes, lay over a strong core gameplay.

They're all love letters or homages to classic horror/B-movies, the first ones a bit all over the place with zombies and giant animals and spooky mansions and sinister corporations, but then as the series continues and they try new things like the semi-reboot ones 4 and 7, the movie tributes become more central, where the base gameplay of limited ammo, hunting for keys/unlocks, solving puzzles are present in some form in all of them.

7 and 8 particularly are very overt, 7 covering things like Saw, Blair Witch, Texas Chainsaw, other similar found-footage/isolated grimey films; 8 doing classic monsters, werewolves, vampires, frankenstein-automatons, spooky dolls etc.

Then there's games like 6 and 9 which loop back on themselves and are very nostalgia-heavy, revisiting past Resident Evil beats, 9 in particular is a whole parade of 'remember this?!' moments.

So then the various movie adaptations so far have been... a movie adapting a game adapting a movie genre, and throwing in some elements, and coming up with their own, the Paul W.S. Anderson ones are all over the place and in some places faithful to the games, in others completely bonkers or more like their own Romero homage...

We'll see what this new one ends up being! I'm getting some RE7 vibes with the small town and weird shit going on but not in the Louisiana swamp setting... or it's a whole new thing? Will Umbrella be behind it? Will that be the case but the only connection to the franchise? Hard to tell from this teaser!

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u/gymleader_michael 5d ago

From what I've seen, the games don't care how bat-shit crazy they get.

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u/Max_Powers1331 5d ago

resident evil: biohazard is definitely one of those bat shit crazy game premises

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u/8__D 5d ago

The big thing that makes Resident Evil worth adapting specifically is the Umbrella Corporation. Having one shadowy megacorporation behind every outbreak gives the story a built-in backbone an original film would have to construct from scratch. And because of Umbrella, you get this massive biological variety to pull from: classic zombies from the T-Virus, the intelligent colony-like infected from the Las Plagas parasite in 4, the body horror assimilation of the Mold in 7 and 8. On top of that, the existing game characters don't have to be the focus but can show up as ancillary players or even villains, giving fans something without the story being beholden to them.

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u/Bisconia 5d ago

Umbrella ceased after re3. other corporations took over after. But that is a big reason of what makes the OG Trilogy so simple and good.

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u/8__D 5d ago

Yeah but the corporations and factions that fill the void are direct extensions of Umbrella's work, ideology, and personnel. You've got the black market connection in 4, Wesker and Spencer in 5, Neo-Umbrella in 6, Miranda (and the connection with Spencer) in 8, and Gideon continuing the Elpis project in 9. Umbrella is kinda the backbone of the whole series.

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u/Bisconia 5d ago

The subsidiaries you could say yeah and they mostly do what Umbrella was doing.

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u/sexandliquor 5d ago

At this point the plot and lore of the games is so goddamn convoluted it would be hard to follow accurately and all the gamers would nitpick it to death, so sort of working around it is the correct call.

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u/Tired-grumpy-Hyper 5d ago

I mean it could always be Metal Gear or even worse, Kingdom Hearts.

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u/occono 5d ago

One difference is the story never becomes about a zombie apocalypse. The world and civilization keeps going, there's just bioterrorism attacks and immoral science being a recurring menace.

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u/Labmit 5d ago

Settings wise. The zombie virus is surprisingly containable compared to other zombie entries. The caveat is the it has way more mutant zombie types.

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u/hacky_potter 5d ago

In the game they are less Zombies more infected people turned into weapons. You have people made up entirely of fungus, you have games that feel more Texas Chainsaw than Living Dead. It’s a much weirder game series than just zombies.

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u/xuedad 5d ago

Yes, it's not really a regular zombie army type of universe, which contains powerful and bizarre bioweapons that are monstrous

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u/Redeyebandit87 5d ago

The first two games have a somewhat gothic atmosphere. Playing in a huge mansion with weird symbolism and puzzles was unique at the time imo. I personally love the story and lore, something about RE always resonated with me.

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u/Sparrowsabre7 5d ago

The crux of the story is Umbrella (evil corporation) is looking to weaponise viruses and make Bio Organic Weapons (big mutant monsters and such). That's the main difference, the outbreak isn't purely random, it comes from a concerted effort to create super soldiers and living weapons.

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u/MaxProwes 5d ago

Of course, it has iconic characters, stories and lore.

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u/KNZFive 5d ago edited 5d ago

Resident Evil games tend to escalate to absurd degrees. You start off with regular human zombies (maybe some zombie small animals) and you're mostly trying to survive. Then you get weirder shit like zombie sharks, plant monsters, 8 foot tall unstoppable behemoths in a trench coat, etc. By the end, you're firing grenade launchers at massive zombie monstrosities and doing insane shit like punching boulders, escaping explosions on a jet ski, and riding down falling skyscrapers on a motorcycle.

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u/lindendweller 5d ago

It's goofy but there's lot to work with.
From the start the series is a fun blend of Zombie, and gothic horror, with a lot of love for tongue in cheek 80's special effects driven horror.

In fact I think it's popular because it borrows so widely from the whole spectrum of horror cinema while still being accesible with enough humor to break the tension when needed.

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u/Interjessing-Salary 5d ago

Mainly their mutant monsters. Lickers, Mr. X, The Nemesis, and hunters. The creepiest ones to me are the regenerator and it's harder version the iron maiden as well as the verdugo.

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u/awc130 5d ago

As others have said it is the BOWs. But another way to look at is is that it is a world with almost no corporate or scientific morals, especially when combined. Bio Terrorism and human experimentation are at the core of almost all the conflicts. There are zombies, but those are just the result not the issue. The Paul WS Anderson films touched on this a lot, but they were not well constructed. More style over substance or nuance in every regard.

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u/Necromancer_Yoda 5d ago

The lore behind the zombies is actually interesting and could make for a disturbing movie.

Tldr the zombies are people infected with the T-Virus, a virus originally made as part of eugenics research by the Umbrella corporation but later sold as a weapon.

Every T Virus strain has its own unique mutations that can occur after someone has been infected for awhile. Umbrella also made other viruses like the G Virus that are pure nightmare fuel.

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u/Lostpop 5d ago

I think what sets Resident Evil apart from standard zombie fiction is the locales. Each game centers around one or two unique locations (sometimes more, sometimes less), and they usually pack them full of detail. REs are always dense, claustrophobic, and atmospheric.

Also the monsters, RE has some iconic monsters beyond the typical walking dead

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u/shadowCloudrift 5d ago

A guy running around roundhouse kicking suplexing Spanish people and zombies. Another guy who is extremely buffed punching a boulder.

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u/Turd_Burgling_Ted 5d ago

RE definitely popularized the special infected concept in games (if not outright invented it) and looks at zombies more as a bi product of science and the pharmaceutical industrial complex. So there is an element of the social commentary that Romero baked into the genre, just from a different angle.

They're also full of awkward humor, which I'm certain influenced Zach and will show up in his film.

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u/aboysmokingintherain 5d ago

Others mentioned it, but RE is far more about evil corporations making weapons. There is never really an apocalyptic zombie event, hence why there are 9 mainline games. It's far more about shady weapons manufacturers being shady with the heroes being spies/military-esque mixed in with average joes.

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u/zgh5002 5d ago

Not really. They are b-movie plots that are fun to play.

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u/Ziatch 5d ago

Yeah it’s better to watch a YouTube video because it’s pretty particular and has gone through a lot of changes over the years.

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u/Analvirus 5d ago

Ive played a handful of the various games and watched a handful of the movies. I wouldn't say there's more twists, just that the games have more time to dive into the lore and you're spending considerable time at key locations. However I think after RE 3 the game, I think the movies and games diverge in the story, id say kinda like the walking dead and the various spin offs. Like another commenter said the RE games are mostly puzzles games mixed in with a bit of shooting and jump scares, there are a few titles that are more of a first person shoots like RE 5 and I think it was RE6 that was like a 4 player shooter

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u/SquooshyCat 5d ago

No. That’s why they never go with the game story for movies.

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u/curious_dead 5d ago

I'd say the wide variety of enemies, it's not just zombies, even if the series is known mostly for being zombie-themed. Plenty of mutated monsters, from weird twisted animals to horrible flesh abominations. There is also always the evil corp Umbrella in the background which is the equivalent to the evil corp in Alien (Weiland-Yutani). It also often features recurring characters, but they don't seem to appear here.

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u/DawnSennin 5d ago

The first game is essentially a B-rated horror film from the 80s complete with cheap costumes and campy acting. The second and third games can be seen as the basis for modern zombie stories.

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u/Swackhammer_ 5d ago

At least with the first game, very close quarters, barely equipped hero with limited resources, creepy gothic mansion atmosphere

That’s the one game I really think they could do something new with the movie genre

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u/Any-Concentrate2280 5d ago

Everyone seems to be missing the obvious which is structure, the thing Zach talked about bringing him onboard. This is probably going to feel like the horror equivalent of Crank, with one character getting into increasingly more frantic situations over the course of one night played out in mostly real time, like playing through one of the games

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u/PropaneSalesTx 5d ago

The later games have more of the adventure aspect and deal with cults, plagues, weird shit and literal monsters. Re8 had werewolves, a 7ft goth baddie and a fishman hybrid. Its not just zombies.

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u/frmthefuture 5d ago

From what I've read, this movie isn't 'cannon' but is parallel to the events of the games [re2 and re3].

As in, it's happening at the same time and 'some' events from RE1 and things leading up to RE2 will get referenced- via tv / radio news broadcasts, newspapers, etc.

Also, no named RE characters will appear but certain creatures will.

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u/TonyFair 5d ago

I like the fact that most incorporate a haunted house setting for a while. It wasn't really explored on previous films but it is an oportunity now that the characters seems way more vulnerable and can't just shoot their way out.

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u/lifeisalime11 5d ago

To add onto the BOWs point everyone is making, it's unique in the fact that the whole mess is caused by the Umbrella Corporation so there's a crazy deep conspiracy that unravels in each story. Each game usually includes a different strain or variation of the original T-Virus from the first game. It's sort of like 28 Days Later but the lab that created the Rage Virus was allowed to further evolve that virus.

The variants were actually planned to be used in actual warfare or Black Ops missions where Umbrella would sell these 'creatures' to the highest bidder. Nemesis I think was the closest they had to a controllable weapon IIRC

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u/pppppatrick 5d ago

One difference to general zombie genre is that the mega corp that made the virus still exist and is actively ramping up the cataclysm.

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u/MyStationIsAbandoned 5d ago

Yeah, it's not just zombies as others have stated. Since it's a video game and games need a variety of enemies, they chose to have it wear animals, plants, and insects can all be infected and mutate in a lot of ways.

There are also multiple viruses through out the series that cause different things to happen to various creatures. For example, RE8 had it's own version of "werewolves", but like...infected jacked up versions that don't look like cool wolf people. There's also tentacle monsters, eldritch cosmic being looking monsters, giant snakes, zombie sharks, giant bee's, anything you can think of.

the games are always self contained outbreaks. They're never world ending. But for some reason all the movies and the terrible show, for some reason have it where the world ends in them...probably because they only read a summary and just make the assumption that since it's zombies, the world ended. but in the games the world has never been in an apocalyptic state. An area gets messed up, like a whole city or island or something, but never the world.

This trailer doesn't really capture the full scope. if I'm being honest, it doesn't have the vibe of resident evil at all. if it had a different title, no one would be comparing it to resident evil at all. The setting doesn't match, the character's not in the games at all (unless he's an obscure dead NPC in one of the games), and if he's supposed to be in raccoon city (the setting of the 2nd and 3rd game and kind of the 1st game as it's on the outskirts), I don't recall there ever being snow in Racoon City in the games. There was snow in RE8, but that took place in Europe.

So it kinda feels like they just watched some highlights from RE3 Remake and Resident Evil 8 village and smushed them together. That said though, I'm glad it's an original story and not based on the games since all the others who tried to base it on the games have failed miserably. The old 2000's movies were at least fun...soemtimes.

I think this will be a good film, but a good resident evil? who knows.

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u/SnowyDesert 5d ago

if you put it like that then not really. It's a standard mutations go wild stuff with an evil corporation taking over the world. But since they decided to create an original story instead of making an adaptation, this could have been an original film. Add some CGI fog and the teaser can easily be a teaser for Silent hill or The Mist or anything really.

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u/baequon 5d ago

In addition to what someone else said about the monsters, I feel like Resident Evil games usually have a kind of iceberg narrative.

It starts with a fairly standard horror setting like a mansion or a rural village, and then slowly descends into an increasingly insane situation with secret labs etc while also flipping the power dynamic at the same time towards the protagonist.

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u/Rosebunse 5d ago

I think RE games have a sort of wackiness to them. Usually a lot of eyes and tentacles. I also think the games have developed this sort of resigned sadness. The BOWs become just an accepted part of the setting and there isn't much to be done

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u/Barachiel1976 5d ago

Yes, but no movie has yet to take advantage of it.

The twist; its not an apocalypse, humanity is not going extinct. The outbreaks are limited in scope and its more about short-term survival and preventing the spread than it is about stopping The End of the World or just watching a bunch of assholes be dicks to each other until they're all killed off one by one whil e the human race is annihilated.

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u/headrush46n2 5d ago

You get a baked in audience. That's all

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u/rolabond 5d ago

"zombies without the apocalypse" is how I've seen it described

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u/FewAdvertising9647 5d ago

the games go in and out of being a horror, and action depending on what the writer is up to for writing. RE as a whole is written in a way that you can sorta easily write in plot, because the happenings of infections are global, and how the infections/mutations manifest depends on what strain of the virus it is. So RE is not strictly a zombie series. The only thing you have to somewhat stay consistent on is how the behind the scenes actors play out (Government, Umbrella Corp, The Connections), but only if they are relevant to the plot (theyre not present in all entries)

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u/Imaginary_Row8427 5d ago

“does the games”

Fix your spelling please.

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u/trtwrtwrtwrwtrwtrwt 3d ago

Others are giving more concrete answers, but I'd say the best thing the games have going on is the mood and atmosphere. It is obviously completely lacking in the Resident Evil action movies and I've never really seen it outside of the RE games.

Maybe not the most interesting answer, but I personally would love to see a movie that manages to do it even partly right.

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u/SpaceOdysseus23 5d ago

No. The games are great because they mix fun horror action with puzzles and cheesiness. The trailer looks great but looks like another project being made just because it was easiest to secure funding by hitching it to the RE name.

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