Warning: Full spoilers follow for Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City. If you’re wondering whether or not the film has a mid or post-credits scene, we’ll tell you right here. Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City has a mid-credits scene.
After the final film in Paul W.S. Anderson’s live-action Resident Evil series was released in 2016, it was only inevitable that Sony Pictures would reboot Capcom’s popular zombie game series for the big screen.
And now that reboot, Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, is finally in theaters. So of course the next question that comes to mind is “what happens next?” And the answer is a lot more straightforward than one might think — especially if you stuck around theatres and watched that post-credits scene. But also, if you’ve played and beat the first game and especially the second game, you’ll have a better idea of how the series might approach a sequel while still crafting an original story with elements borrowed from the Resident Evil games.
We spoke to director Johannes Roberts about that ending and the after-credits scene to dig into what it all means, and where the franchise could go next.
Is There a Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City Post-Credits Scene?
There is one scene after the mid-credits of Raccoon City.
By the end of the film, Raccoon City and the Spencer Mansion are destroyed and all evidence of the zombie outbreak is erased. Only six people survive the incident by the end of the film — five of whom are Chris (Robbie Amell) and Claire Redfield (Kaya Scodelario), Jill Valentine (Hannah John-Kamen), Leon Kennedy (Avan Jogia), and Sherry Birkin (Holly de Barros). They all escape together. But there is a sixth survivor who made it out alive and is well aware of the horrors that happened: Albert Wesker (Tom Hopper) was believed to have been killed, but we learn that's not the case.
In the mid-credits scene, we see Albert Wesker being freed from a body bag, very much alive. He’s confused and also unable to see, and then Ada Wong (Lily Gao) appears. She explains that he’ll regain his vision while also gifting Wekser with a pair of his trademark sunglasses.
With the mid-credits scene we quickly discover that Ada had been working with Wesker, who earlier in the film was hired by Ada on behalf of a mysterious organization to steal some of Umbrella’s secrets before the town was destroyed.
Who Is Ada Wong?
Ada Wong is a spy who originally appeared in Resident Evil 2 where she had the task of trying to steal a '''/sample of the G-Virus.
With Welcome to Raccoon City partly based on the events of Resident Evil 2, fans of the series were likely surprised to see no sign of Ada until the mid-credits scene given how much of a role she played in that game.
"I love that little sequence there. It has my favorite Easter egg of the body bag sitting up from the first game. I brought Ada in earlier into the movie, and I just didn't feel that it was working because it just felt like we were trying to put in one too many main characters within this world," Roberts told IGN. "I felt it swamped it a little. We decided then just to leave her for the end credits. Then I think there's a beginning of a whole…The movie ends with us seeing Wesker as the character he's going to become and introducing Ada.”
Ada is working for Umbrella’s rival company, which is often referred to as “the organization.” Not much is known about the mysterious group in the film, but it is strongly implied to be the company from the game that employed both Ada and Wesker. This company was in an arms race with Umbrella Corporation for a few years shortly before Umbrella went bankrupt. Umbrella’s rival would eventually merge into another pharmaceutical company called Tricell.
What Will the Raccoon City Sequel Be About?
A sequel to Raccoon City has yet to be greenlit by Sony Pictures. Still, based on our conversation with Roberts and the way the film sets things up, there are a few different directions a sequel could take.
We can't go strictly on the chronological order of the games, as it's very unlikely a sequel will be based on the third main game, given the first three numbered Resident Evil titles are set in 1998 in Raccoon City and surrounding areas. While there is a possibility that elements from Resident Evil 3 could be incorporated in a future film, the overall concept of the game's plot will be difficult to adapt.
That said, Roberts did give us a good idea of what game he may adapt should a sequel be greenlit, as he mentioned Resident Evil: Code Veronica as well as his love of Resident Evil 4.
“I think the two things that have been talked about and that we're chewing the fat on are Code: Veronica is very much something that has been kicked around," he said. "I love the fourth game. I don't know. It's not as clear cut in a direction as this was. I could see exactly where this was going to go.”
There were plenty of elements from the games that Roberts just couldn’t fit into this movie, but still hopes we’ll see if and when any sequels happen — characters like Barry Burton and Rebecca Chambers, for example. And then there’s that boulder-punching scene from Resident Evil 5, which the director and Chris Redfield actor Robbie Amell tried to fit into this movie.
“Robbie has such a great sense of humor, and it was just like, 'Oh, man. We've got to somehow put this in,'" Roberts laughed. "We never found how to make it work, and all I can hope is that somewhere in this new envisioning of the Resident Evil world that it all leads to this big… our chapter 10, whatever it is of Resident Evil, is Robbie punching his way through a boulder. That's how we end our epic Resident Evil world.”
Regardless, Johannes has been very open about how he wants the reboot film franchise to stick closely to the source material, yet still retain its original voice by making some tweaks and adjustments to the plot, characters, and events that were in the games.
“I would love that we don't just use this, if we do come back again, as a springboard to then just go any direction we want to," he told IGN. "It was so much fun just throwing ourselves into the game and recreating the game, but telling our own thing.”
Do you think Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City will get a sequel? If so, what game would you like to see be adapted for the big screen? Let us know in the comments!
And for more on the latest live-action Resident Evil film, check out our Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City review.