This post contains spoilers for Netflix's Resident Evil. If you're not caught up on the series yet, check out our spoiler-free Resident Evil Netflix review.
Netflix's newly released Resident Evil series is an adaptation of Capcom's globally renowned video game series that gets a whole lot right. Showrunner Andrew Dabb finds a happy medium between original conceptualization and direct callbacks to the game's mechanics or intricacies, rooted in Umbrella's flagship virus strains. It's nestled between Paul W.S. Anderson's action-forward, non-canon route and Johannes Roberts' mirrored execution of survival horror scenes torn right from Capcom's first two games. Dabb's retooling as a Netflix television show may seem like an even farther swing in terms of settings, characters, and timelines — but in reality? It's the most Resident Evil-y adaptation we've seen yet.
Whether you've been playing Resident Evil games since the first S.T.A.R.S. helicopter crashed outside Spencer Mansion or only know Anderson's Hollywoodized remix of Capcom's otherwise atmospheric haunted horrors, Netflix's show appeases both crowds. It may take place thirty years after the discovery of the T-Virus, but Lance Reddick's Albert Wesker provides a link between replayed histories and infected new dawns. The ultimate goal for adaptations is to tell an original story within a universe that's already popularized, utilizing what current fanbases adore while reeling in fresh viewers with comprehensible origins. Dabb's Resident Evil retains the very essence of Capcom's games, from their investigative puzzles to more shoot-em-up styles made prominent in Resident Evil 6.
By adhering to future timelines, Wesker — who, yes, canonically died in a fatal volcano incident — connects Dabb's dystopian outbreak future with Umbrella's notable sins. Although, it's Wesker's daughters who rise as the prominent leads driven apart by their father's childhood experimentations. Young Billie (Siena Agudong) and Young Jade (Tamara Smart) help us understand Albert's livelihood as a Wesker who's assumed parental mode after Raccoon City. Adult Jade (Ella Balinska) and Adult Billie (Adeline Rudolph) explore life in an apocalypse where Umbrella acts without mercy, and University researchers seek to find ways to live amongst "zeroes" (what the show calls their infected hordes aka zombies).
The cornerstones of Resident Evil are fundamental: Umbrella, outbreaks, “zombies,” and corruption. Anderson's blockbuster actioners starring Milla Jovovich as a fictional Alice may have conditioned mainstream audiences to believe otherwise, but Dabb's infinitely more focused on recreating that experience of being stuck trying to decipher elaborate tests or crack a code using collectible items. From Resident Evil — where you control either Chris Redfield or Jill Valentine matching symbols to unlock mansion doors — to Ethan Hunt dodging a nightmare fetus crawling around House Beneviento's basement, gameplay has always featured non-brawler puzzle interactions. These "less exciting" elements sometimes ignored by media representations are a key to Dabb's storylines.
In Episode 5, titled "Home Movies," Dabb accurately encapsulates the experience of Capcom's strategy sleuthing with minimal emphasis on zombie defenses. Adolescent Billie and Jade are home alone in their New Raccoon City crib with an objective — to understand more about Albert Wesker, their family dynamic, and Umbrella's secrets. What transpires is a series of clue retrievals and problem-solving while Jade's crush Simon (Connor Gosatti) helps them avoid surveillance cameras via FaceTime. It's not about smashing and grabbing or zombie interruptions. Billie and Jade use cleverness and cunning to unlock milestones in Umbrella's corruption, which includes evidence that suggests Albert Wesker isn't just an unassuming Umbrella scientist who gets excited about kombucha on tap. These situational challenges match Resident Evil DNA and understand the games more fluently than other adaptations that would rather insert fan-favorite characters into undead shooting galleries.
Resident Evil isn't worsened by its suburbia bubble commentaries nor is any strong focus on character dialogue off base from Resident Evil playthroughs. Readable diary entries unravel the wildest exposition dumps, and cutscenes ramble on about kidnapped president’s daughters, brainwashed ex-partners, broken families — character drama itself is at the core of every Resident Evil game. Most recently, Resident Evil Village sent thirsty gamers into an excitable goth heat with their voluptuous Amazonian vampire socialite, with zero to do with zombies. Yet Netflix's Resident Evil is getting review-bombed on IMDb because they dared cast a Black Wesker and focus on his Black children as leads? There's no difference between Heisenberg and Lady Dimitrescu's bickering or Billie and Jade's rivalry in the aftertimes — except one is less threatening to demographics who've forgotten what Resident Evil is about.
Dabb's Resident Evil focuses more on T-Virus modifications, their unstable mutations, and the effects of Umbrella's genetic testing. In the first episode, a behemoth caterpillar burrows and viciously attacks Jade to remind us that Resident Evil is filled with spliced threats. Lickers, T-dogs, and a Tyrant are all there to reassure video game fans that they'll see their greatest foes brought to life — but then a monstrous mutant spider starts massacring trespassers in its underground tunnel. Where Anderson builds his own post-Matrix world of zombie hordes, and Roberts sticks rigidly to William Birkin's transformation into Monster Birkin, Dabb focuses more on the environmental mutations as Umbrella plays God with global implications. Dabb understands Resident Evil as more than "point shotgun, boom headshot" in ways that feel plugged into the game franchise's sensibilities.
That's not to besmirch Anderson's or Robert's adaptations. That's the exciting part about different creative teams rebooting the same source materials — everyone's interpretations can play in private sandboxes. Anderson's franchise may be a convoluted mess of Alice's kick-ass heroism spliced with game subplots like Nemesis Project, yet the filmmaker uses Raccoon City and its fallout to unleash some wickedly entertaining adrenaline-pumper zombie combat. Then there's Roberts' adaptation, which outside Leon S. Kennedy's weird bumbling officer persona and a killer Jennifer Paige needle drop, nails the one-to-one recreation of Racoon City's destruction after Umbrella's carelessness. Dabb finds a new avenue to achieve what Roberts delivers in a less blatant display of fan-servicing while honoring Anderson's spirits of expressive freedoms by blasting forward past the still-acknowledged but old news histories of the game series.
Netflix's Resident Evil series is loaded with Easter Eggs for those who've played through Capcom's entire catalog. Although the timelines largely remain in 2036’s future or prior in South Africa's New Racoon City, we still get leather-daddy O.G. Wesker, an eyeballs-and-all Lisa Trevor after G-Virus transformation, and callbacks to the Arklay Mountains. When Jade is breathless and facing a pivotal calm before incoming storms, the camera frames a typewriter at the bottom of the screen to suggest it'd be a good time to save — just in case. Then there are evils like Chainsaw Man, the infectious Doberman, and Wesker's mind control Scarab seen in Resident Evil: Afterlife. The camera moves to highlight useful objects for characters to mimic angular and precise cinematography especially prominent in early games, which aims the show's appreciation of Capcom's material like a bullseye kill shot.
CEO Evelyn Marcus (Paola Nuñez) — daughter of Umbrella legacy and T-Virus inventor James Marcus — is as ruthless and company-driven as any Resident Evil Umbrella patsy. Same for Turlough Convery's menacingly charming Umbrella hitman who orders mass executions like it was Tuesday. Dabb's dedication to expanding the world of Resident Evil still lives, breathes, and screams Capcom’s influence even when revealing new additions, like they're testing characters for upcoming downloadable content packs. Lance Reddick's Wesker comes with a comparison point that he crushes, while Marcus and Convery's agent are blank canvases. Lesser shows would insert generic baddies who pale compared to well-known franchise faces, but not 2022's Resident Evil. They're cartoonishly evil cover-up addicts who'd rather dope their unwitting partners with test pills than dare watch Umbrella's stock price plunge.
Netflix's Resident Evil represents everything “Resident Evil'' in fresh (sans festering flesh) but attentively familiar ways. For all its alterations, Andrew Dabb's series is a union of what both video game and movie audiences know — or don’t — about Resident Evil. Paul W.S. Anderson used title appeal to corner the action junkie market, Johannes Roberts lifts entire sequences like silly putty on newspaper, and Dabb sees the value in blending both approaches. The latest in a long string of Resident Evil adaptations may be the most faithful yet, since there's a hell of a lot more to consider than "that doesn't look like my favorite character."