Remember "Yeah! It's payback time! We've gotta destroy Umbrella. Now, let's finish this once and for all", and then RE4 comes out and Umbrella went under inbetween games.
I'm not one that cares all too much about RE lore, because God knows Capcom sure doesn't give a fuck, but every time they jump the shark is jarring.
One thing I'll give for those crappy movies was that most of the time, the casting was pretty solid (most of the time, they dropped the ball with Leon).
I see Dino Crisis 1 and 2 are on steam now. Surprising they're not double dipping RE 1, 2 and 3 now they've seen that people want to buy old games to the befuddlement of Jap executives.
Except those stupid japs also put Enigma DRM into the Steam ports for DC 1-2 so they're mostly broken and don't work. Might as well just buy them on GOG instead.
So we're just gonna skip over the interesting moral and ethical dilemmas of the BSAA using BOWs to fight other BOWs and Chris' autistic spergout over that?
They do that a lot but it’s especially jarring because it makes 7 and 8 seem completely pointless and not like mainline games at all.
This game could’ve been literally the same except swap out Leon for Chris and make it about him trying to figure out why BSAA is involved.
Remember "Yeah! It's payback time! We've gotta destroy Umbrella. Now, let's finish this once and for all", and then RE4 comes out and Umbrella went under inbetween games.
I think there was a Wii lightgun game that covered that. IIRC it also covered how Wesker survived and escaped the mansion after getting fisted by the OG Tyrant.
They do that a lot but it’s especially jarring because it makes 7 and 8 seem completely pointless and not like mainline games at all.
This game could’ve been literally the same except swap out Leon for Chris and make it about him trying to figure out why BSAA is involved.
they wanted to keep the series concurrent with real time, so that's the price, tons of events have to happen in the interim years.
someone was bitching about them doing the whole "and next we're gonna take down Umbrella!" but it got taken down in court for essentially defrauding the US Government, and Wesker himself testified as the lynchpin testimony.
something is pretty realistic about that, it isn't so much they commited war crimes, its that they failed to deliver warcrime products as per the contract to the Govt.
To do that would bring up the fact nearly all of the veteran leads shouldnt be able to do realistically do all the shit they once did. Resident Evil has been quietly struggling with bringing new blood because the old guard's ages are starting to challenge the suspension of disbelief a bit.
I think there was a Wii lightgun game that covered that. IIRC it also covered how Wesker survived and escaped the mansion after getting fisted by the OG Tyrant.
Yes, they did, as an "enjoyer" of the Chronicles duology (that really needs a proper PC port). Those two games served to fill in backstories that the main entries didnt, Hell, Darkside Chronicles turns out to be a prequel to RE4 while Umbrella Chronicles helps sets up the events of RE5
they wanted to keep the series concurrent with real time, so that's the price, tons of events have to happen in the interim years.
someone was bitching about them doing the whole "and next we're gonna take down Umbrella!" but it got taken down in court for essentially defrauding the US Government, and Wesker himself testified as the lynchpin testimony.
something is pretty realistic about that, it isn't so much they commited war crimes, its that they failed to deliver warcrime products as per the contract to the Govt.
Honestly, what were fans expecting? An epic battle?
Wesker made it very clear he knew that the moment Umbrella found itself incapable of containing their viruses, it was the beginning of the end for them because it would be just a matter of time until it reached a major populated center and caused an outbreak of the likes never seen before in human history, the aftermath of which would obviously lead to the US Gov. quickly throwing the company under the bus and pinning this all on them. While it is true Umbrella were the ones responsible, no one seemed to ask the real questions as to where the funding and demands for these viruses and BOWs were coming from* as the government had the perfect scapegoat.
Spencer did write on his diary about the irony of the situation in RE5, that the same government that shook hands with his company suddenly started to point fingers without a hint of awareness of the hypocritical irony to it all.
The problem with "taking Umbrella down" is that it is a faceless corporation, sure, there are high important members but even if you take one out, someone else will take their place. The only take to destroy Umbrella would be full exposure to the public, which did happen fair enough, but that isnt "exciting".
Tho to be fair, we are still experiencing the aftermath of the company's downfall as they had such overreach and connections all over the globe that we are still seeing loose ends and pieces of "backstory" being added.
*We all know that if that was ever asked, the answer would be "Terrorists, obviously!" and that'd be that.
Spencer did write on his diary about the irony of the situation in RE5, that the same government that shook hands with his company suddenly started to point fingers without a hint of awareness of the hypocritical irony to it all.
That diary really paints the full picture of Umbrella, they aren't nearly as evil in the ways we think as the results of the games are to be believed but a different kind of evil.. indifference.
Obviously neither the Training Facility, the Mansion, or Racoon City were intentional outbreaks, all the lives lost in the first couple of Resident Evil games were entirely because the Leech Queen, Ada fucking Wong (she was hitting up "John" to feed her shit which helped the mansion events along) and Birkin are largely to blame, as Euro Umbrella (AKA Oswald) wanted him to hand over the G-Virus and he essentially told them to get bent.
But they were blaise as fuck, and callous, willing to get data from the events, and send in BOW Hitmen AKA Nemesis to clean up loose ends, which is always their biggest core mistake.. tying up loose ends in deadly fashion, just killing Marcus alone could be considered an event that lead directly to 100k people being obliterated, if they didn't have a need to so tightly control and tie up so much shit, the U.S. Govt would have continued to let them torture children for their adrenal glands and all the other heinous shit they were doing forever, though I think they would never have found what they were looking for, which they accidentily created anyways.
Sherry Birkin's subdued G-Virus results are exactly what Oswald wanted, it was right there in plain as day results from Birkin, but neither Birkin nor Oswald could think "weak" virus reactions and results, they wanted big reactions and effects, when a weakened G-Virus was the true godly outcome, creating effectively an eternal fountain of youth elixir.
They do that a lot but it’s especially jarring because it makes 7 and 8 seem completely pointless and not like mainline games at all.
This game could’ve been literally the same except swap out Leon for Chris and make it about him trying to figure out why BSAA is involved.
Maybe that's a story they plan on expanding in revelations 3 (coping). But yeah it was kinda jarring to finish re8 and get intrigued by that plot only for it to go nowhere.
I actually finished re8 for the first time the other day and knowing where re9 is going is some whiplash. Maybe they'll reference current Chris in a file like they did with Leon in Code Veronica.
One thing I'll give for those crappy movies was that most of the time, the casting was pretty solid (most of the time, they dropped the ball with Leon).
Hot take, after seeing the remake Leon, I'd honestly say I like this version a lot. Hell, he handled Ada the way I'd expect him to handle her after, if not by the time of RE4.
The worst casting I can think of has to be Chris. The guy from Prison Break is just not exuding the feeling of "they're not 100% accurate, but they still feel like they're the character they're playing" that almost every other actor in the PWSA films gave off.
He honestly felt like he would've been a better remake Carlos, albeit being a little on the lanky side of physicality.
Also, absolutely agreed on the Bollywood point. Indian filmmakers are possibly the only ones who can do justice to the original goofy, B-Grade yet sincere fun of the series.
Please see yourself out. The reality of India is a Resident Evil biohazard fallout site already. It would probably be the only county that would survive the onslaught of bioweapons for the simple reason that they'd get raped/eaten by jeets, or the filth and pollution would get to them.
Look, I'm all for deservingly hating pajeets too, but, & I say this with enough personal experience, their films are the one power they have, a power so high in recent years, that I'd say it trumps even over Hollywood at certain times. They're the only ones who can give you shit (metaphorically ofc, they're used to giving the literal ones) that feels perfect for these types of adaptations.
As for RE, they're the only ones sincere & proud/shameless enough for being perfect fits for making a live-action of anime & Japanese stuff in general. Speed Racer being the only Hollywood live-action accurate, if not surpassing it's source material is proof of my point. We need that so called "shamelessness" (which is just their sincerety in contemporary filmmaking & fiction, which feels alien to most foreigners) in Hollywood.
As for the movies, they're bad fanfics that had some great casting directors (for the most part) wasted on shitty scripts and an even worse sequence of directors.
The first movie was tolerable schlock, but when they started using game characters as props to make the titless Mary Sue look awesome we transcended into the realms of gay fanfiction.
The films are made by a dude who loved his wife a little too much & said wife was very eager to be hot in films (Milla actually wanted a nude scene, the behind the scenes are very funny).
However, Capcom knows almost everything about it's live action projects, be it the Latino looking Pajeet Leon, be it the Blade Wesker in Netflix series, or even be it the Paul W.S. Anderson films. Capcom is also a Japanese corporation, a legacy one at this point. As such, Japanese are EXTREMELY protective of their brand (ironic coming from modern Capcom, but still), this shows up in every live-action film too.
As such, Alice is Capcom's own idea. Capcom is the reason Alice exists. Alice exists because it's safe from Capcom's hands & Capcom can't bitch about it hurting the brand or anything particularly assosiated with the brand directly.
>Paul W.S. Anderson wasn't married to Milla Jovovich until the late 2000s.
>Paul W.S. Anderson didn't direct Resident Evil Apocalypse (2004) nor Resident Evil Extinction (2007).
>Alice is the main character because she survived the 1st film, ala Ripley, & is a rewritten version of Jill Valentine. She was created to ensure the films had a protagonist whom Capcom would not control & who could be used if any issues arose with the Resident Evil license.
>Constantin Film, Sony & Anderson foresaw a situation where Capcom's fuckery would interfere in their movies. Which it did, in The Final Chapter. An impasse they solved by keeping Alice & killing off everyone else (except Claire because she's Alice's very hetero gal pal).
>Resident Evil films demonstrably need Alice to succeed. However, Alice does not need the Resident Evil brand. Capcom don't own Alice. They could have called the 3rd film Alice: Extinction, then Alice: Afterlife, & so on.
The films made a calculated decision to rewrite Jill into Alice & NEVER allow a Capcom character to be the lead. So if you have the question "Why wasn't Jill the lead?" Because Capcom owns her. It's like asking Capcom why Alice isn't the main character in RE9. Because Capcom doesn't own her. It's weird that 20 years after the first movie deliberately got rid of all the Capcom characters (Jill became Alice, Wesker became Spence, & Brad Vickers became Kaplan, copying the idea of Brad being a computer expert from the Romero script.) People are still confused why the movies don't focus on Capcom characters, yet it's glaringly obvious.
It's also the same reason why in Disney Star Wars they made a ton of stuff that's not George Lucas' so they didn't have to cut him a share of merch & so on. Tho, I'd say Star Wars is a bit of a different case because it was goddamn OBSESSED with bringing back Original Trilogy stuff. I think the unimaginative alien design & stuff were just corporate bullshit.
The situation with Resident Evil is more like Rainbow 6. Ubisoft doesn't own any of the characters from the Rainbow 6 book like Ding Chavez. When Capcom sold the rights to Resident Evil, it was a fairly generous deal that gave the movie company the rights to make RE movies with relatively few conditions. One of those conditions was that Capcom be consulted on scripts & that any Capcom characters or organizations should be cleared with Capcom in regards to their representation.
So for example, that's why Jill never kills anyone in Retribution. Rain (Michelle Rodriguez's character) isn't a Capcom character, so she can kill freely. But Capcom had to sign off on how Jill dresses, how Jill behaves, (so yeah, they signed off on her swearing, which later became a much worse version of Jill in R3MAKE anyway) & other stuff like that.
The only reason Claire & Carlos are smoking weed in RE: Extinction is that Capcom didn't know what "the special" (that's what they call it in the film) was. The script never makes it clear they're talking about the weed stash. If they'd known, they never would have allowed that. But there's no bad blood in retrospect. They're all cool.
Also, originally "Wesker" in RE Extinction was actually a character named after a Capcom executive. But unfortunately he was fired, & Capcom was like, "No, you can't put his name in the movie.” So bada bing, bada boom, he's Wesker now.
Welcome to Raccoon City had EXTENSIVE script notes from Capcom because it concerned their characters, & a relatively direct version of a Capcom plot. Capcom doesn't just ignore these movies. They have a lot of input. It's possible the strange decision to have WTRC use both RE7 & RE2 for the plot was Capcom's suggestion.
Now, in that context, it is WAY, WAY, WAY easier to make a Resident Evil movie if the main character is "Alice". Her name wasn't even said in dialogue in the first movie. It's just in the credits. Because she's an original character, they don't have to wade through Capcom's nonsense.
For example, Resident Evil: Afterlife had to make Jill blonde, because Capcom had made Jill blonde in RE5. Similarly, Afterlife's Wesker had to be like RE5 Wesker because Capcom wanted the film to promote RE5. It was very much a friendly request, but it wasn't the sort of thing they were going to get bitchy with about Capcom. With Alice, Alice can just... be Alice. They can tell the story they want to tell.
At one point they wanted to have Jill in The Final Chapter, & she was going to betray the group. And Capcom was like, "No." They wanted to kill Jill, Leon & Ada in the opening battle. Capcom said "No." Those characters aren't allowed to die. So they just get "betrayed" off-screen. They couldn't have a scene of Alice erecting graves for them because that would be admitting they died, & that's not allowed. The levels of BULLSHIT that using Capcom RE characters caused is... also why the RE Netflix show is about Jade & Billie, & the Black Wesker, 2 new characters.
That said, that schlock:
Made it into the games:
Hell, even the slo-mo acrobatic martial arts from the films were literally from RE5.
Capcom knew exactly what it was doing, it always does.
They should have just rewritten the final chapter to be a goofy fast and the furious ensemble piece or separated the group somehow. Killing everyone on screen, let alone off screen was a pretty stupid idea.
The Novels (yes the live action movies have novels) apparently show the original plan and it didn't sound much better then the finished product. Honestly the RE movies had "quality" to them up until final chapter. I suspect due to production troubles and maybe a different writer.
They should have just rewritten the final chapter to be a goofy fast and the furious ensemble piece or separated the group somehow. Killing everyone on screen, let alone off screen was a pretty stupid idea.
The Novels (yes the live action movies have novels) apparently show the original plan and it didn't sound much better then the finished product. Honestly the RE movies had "quality" to them up until final chapter. I suspect due to production troubles and maybe a different writer.
The novels for the games were better even if they went off the rails from game canon, hell they had a more coherent narrative than what we ended up with
I didn't even know there was novels to the Millaslop.
I have all the SD Perry stuff and read them all. The canon based books were pretty good, even though she took liberties with stuff I think it didn't harm anything.
Remember "Yeah! It's payback time! We've gotta destroy Umbrella. Now, let's finish this once and for all", and then RE4 comes out and Umbrella went under inbetween games.
I'm not one that cares all too much about RE lore, because God knows Capcom sure doesn't give a fuck, but every time they jump the shark is jarring.
Capcom cared about lore in a very shortly lived period. RE2-CVX didn't piss and shit all over the previous games with retcons. If I had to guess, the writing room of the boomers on the dev team for the trilogy were already on their way out or gone by the mid 2000s.
*runs away*
