Nakajimas ── Miscellaneous

The New Resident Evil Movie (?)

Bonjour it's me ya boi Vik

I was refreshing my YouTube page instead of clearing my 7k notifications and saw the trailer for the new Resident Evil movie pop up. It's no surprise that this was recommended to me.

A couple things. Resident Evil will be short-termed as RE. This is FULL of spoilers so read at your own discretion and also this is just me avoiding my college essays and the fact that my ex and i r applying to the same unis bc wtf NOO. Anywayz.

Resident Evil is my favourite video game of all time. It's combination of open-world playthrough, a controlled but grounded narrative and complementary elements of action and horror, all make it onto the list of the best video game franchises of all time. Yeah, franchises. We have at least 8 games (if you're only counting the main ones and not Code: Veronica or Revelations etc.)

First of all, this is literally just me being mad as a Funky loser gamer and NOT me bashing the actors because I don't exactly blame them... besides 10 year old me was obsessed with Victorious and I watched like every movie with Kaya Scodelario in it.

I'm just lowkey pissed bc Resident Evil never gets good fucking adaptions!!!! Sorry hun but Milla Jovovich's movies were a trainwreck and not only visually displeasing but incorrect to the entire storyline.

Anyway this is about the new trailer which we will analyse frame by frame. The teaser is short but to the point: Claire and her brother Chris must return to Raccoon City to stop Umbrella after the city is overrun with the T virus.

Okay, there is a lot of unpack.

First of all, that brief synopsis I just gave you has the biggest disparity that we will discuss today. This is lack of adherence to canon. Claire Redfield travels to Raccoon City in search of her brother. Sure, we can assume maybe that the movie starts off with that premise and Claire is subsequently reunited with Chris BUT NO? 

No?!?!?!?! Oh my god why am I getting so riled up.

Claire does NOT find Chris in Raccoon City. She teams up with Leon S. Kennedy - a central character to the RE franchise who makes no apparent appearance in this film - to find her brother. She uncovers evidence of his presence but has missed him due to the tight timeframe that RE, RE2 and RE3 takes place in. Chris is a member of S.T.A.R.S !!!! 

S.T.A.R.S is central to RE3. The secondary antagonist of RE3, Nemesis, is created with the purpose of eliminating all S.T.A.R.S members following the original RE timeline where Team A and B of S.T.A.R.S were sent to Oswald's mansion and uncovered the T Virus. Nemesis is basically there to silence them, of course. Wouldn't want corporate secrets getting out! 

Anyway, by having Chris with Claire in this film, Sony is just completely crumpling up the blueprint for the first three RE games and throwing it away? It would have been so much better just to make the original RE movie with Team A and B of S.T.A.R.S vs Albert Wesker/Oswald and his family. HONESTLY...!?!?!?!

Chris would still have been in the fucking movie. Robbie Amell as Chris Redfield is near-perfect casting. I am honestly pleased with this representation of Chris so early in the RE timeline (Chris in Resident Evil 8 is just .. INSANE.) Now, I have watched the trailer a million times and there is evidence to suggest they are in Oswald's mansion? They've just... overlapped the timelines?

For context, RE, RE2 and RE3 all take place within the same week basically. RE2 and RE3 at the same time, exactly. Although, Jill, Claire and Leon do not directly cross paths, their presence is made known indirectly through game secrets etc. 

I think.. I THINK.. this is what Sony is attempting? At the very least, there is some futile attempt to string together RE at the beginning of the movie, following into RE2. 

Now, personally, I don't think there is any coherency to RE3 being in this movie, plot-wise. Because Nemesis makes no appearance in the trailer. Not even a "STARS..." growl from him. However, Sony have still thrown Carlos in.

Carlos Oliveira is the deuteragonist of RE3. He's a mercenary that eventually teams up (somewhat) with Jill. They have different agendas and he is largely separate from the actual storyline of RE2 and RE. SO WHY IS HE IN THIS FILM WITH CLAIRE!?!?!?!?!!?! 

Avan Jogia as Carlos is actually very pleasing casting. I was kinda horrified at first because Avan is the guy my friends sent tiktoks of to me because he's trying to relate Indian troubles and I'm like... Ok... (I dont like tiktok).

Anyway, I've been thinking about it and (By thinking about it I mean rewatching videos on RE3 for the last day or two) and I am comfortable with this casting. They tried and well... I guess if it ain't broke, don't fix it?

 But what really violates all of my human rights is fact that he has to be in the plot with Claire and Chris? Are you telling me you cut out Jill and Leon, or just borderline faded them into background characters, for the sake of the 1:2 female male ratio that is standard in Hollywood movies?!!?

If you don't know what that is, basically they never put the ratio more than 1:2 for females to male, because they feel that having more than one woman as the lead makes it too "female" and two men are needed to balance it out. So strange but college taught me that - thanks college! 

Moving on, let's talk about William Birkin! First of all, the casting is... again Strange? I swear the guy playing him was in DC Legends of Tomorrow. I think he played Ray Palmer's girlfriend's evil dad. Anyway, Uh, you know what... Fine we'll accept the casting. I can't think of a better actor off the top of my head right now. Fine Sony you get that one... Although, COULD YOU AT LEAST REFERENCE THE FUCKING GAMES!?!?!?!?!?!!? FOR YOUR CASTING??

This is why Im gonna become a politician so I just smack out companies like this for ruining video games. Ok what was i saying, okay so William is a funky little virologist who gets pissed at his employer, Umbrella so he kinda manufactures this deadly thing called the T virus and just lets it go wild. 

He eventually evolves into this grotesque ugly monster you have to fight a million times and punch out it's eyes to hit it's weak spots. He's basically your main "villain." There is no reference to dear Old darling Annette (his wife) who is actually important because guess what SHES ALIVE! and then she dies, but she is there...She is the one who helps Claire get a vaccine for Sherry because SHERRY'S BEEN INFECTED ! Who is Sherry, you ask? Sherry Birkin is their daughter, and is also somewhat centrifugal because she guides Claire to the laboratory and you must also play as her to escape this bastard white man Sheriff who has a major taxidermy obsession. 

Yeah ok that is um.. A wild one...

AND THE BEST BIT! WHERE IS AVA WONG???? My superstar Spy my queen??? Ok yea shes a merc selling the virus to the highest bidder but WHO CARES! She's important because she helps Leon. Yeah... you know.. the Leon that has not been exactly portrayed at all as the protagonist of this dumpster fire RE movie???

Leon is so important to the RE franchise it is making my eyes water.... He has some strange character growth in the later games up till RE 6 and AHH!!!! I can't envision it. I really can't. Could they at least refer to the people who modelled the characters in game and find actors similar to that??? 

I think what hurts me the most is that there is clearly efforts to replicate iconic moments from the early games... but they just haven't been executed fully. Their lack of knowledge regarding RE is startlingly evident. In the trailer, Carlos (Avan) yells "RUN!" after he and Claire come across a Licker (a mutant from the T Virus you must fight). 

You aren't supposed to make noise when you come across them ?!?! It's literally in the game. You need to walk slowly beneath them?!?!!?!? Insane, sometimes. That in the film could be a tense transition from a Stereotypical Gobble gobble kids action film to AN ACTUALL HORROR FILM!?!?! did they forget resident evil is horror...

Ok this chapter was a hot mess but it was just an unfiltered, unedited draft of my thoughts on this film. I'm disappointed... I hope the actual movie is better. I will probably pay to see it with my friends just so I can criticise it the whole way through and oggle over Avan (Not). 

BYE!!!!!!