Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City

For fourteen years, Resident Evil’s theatrical presence was dominated by the work of Paul W. S. Anderson, whose contributions had notoriously little relation to the source material. Following the release of the sixth film, Resident Evil: The Final Chapter, work on a reboot of the film series began with the idea that the new film would be more accurate to the games. After a rocky start, the final product would see a wide theatrical release as Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City to mixed reception. Once I finally played the two games it was based on, Resident Evil (RE1) and Resident Evil 2 (RE2), I decided to give this film a try while the stories were fresh in my head just to form my own opinion. Unfortunately, Welcome to Raccoon City does a good job at showing that while video game adaptations have come a long way, they still haven’t cracked the code on this series.

Welcome to Raccoon City adapts the stories of RE1 and RE2, but with a few key differences in the setup. Where the zombie outbreak had already started in RE2, it’s on the edge of occurring at the start of the film. Leon S. Kennedy (Avan Jogia) and Claire Redfield (Kaya Scodelario) haven’t met each other yet, but still have their own storylines. Here, Claire gets a ride into Raccoon City and finds her brother Chris (Robbie Amell), who doesn’t initially believe her claims of Umbrella poisoning the population. Meanwhile, Leon, an RPD rookie, is held back at the police station with Chief Brian Irons (Donal Logue) while the members of the S.T.A.R.S. Alpha Team, Chris, Jill Valentine (Hannah John-Kamen), Richard Aiken (Chad Rook), Brad Vickers (Nathan Dales), and Albert Wesker (Tom Hopper), are sent to investigate the disappearance of the Bravo Team at the Spencer Mansion on the city’s outskirts.

Let’s first talk about what the movie did well. Based on my limited knowledge of the Paul W. S. Anderson movies, I liked that Welcome to Raccoon City felt pretty faithful to the source material. For the most part, the sets look like they were lifted directly from the games, with the entrance to the Raccoon City Orphanage and the Main Hall of the police station as particular standouts. This film also puts emphasis on directly using characters and events from the games. In fact, there’s great attention placed on shots that recreate iconic moments, like the first encounter with a zombie in the Spencer mansion. Best of all, all of the monsters that appear are game-accurate, including a dog and a Licker. At the very least, you can tell that those involved in the production deeply cared about the games from an artistic standpoint, which even includes recreating a piano puzzle where the result is playing “Moonlight Sonata”.

The set design is on point.

With that said, the film wastes its own potential. It starts with the premise of combining the plots of two games into one. It might sound okay on paper, but the execution results in both storylines feeling rushed and underdeveloped. Many questions go unanswered and other details are either left vague or take the audience’s familiarity with the games for granted, like what the T- and G-Virus are. I also found that the characters either aren’t quite the same as their game depiction, like Annette Birkin being reduced from a complex and interesting character to “woman”, or don’t appear at all, like Barry Burton, Rebecca Chambers or Marvin Branagh. It’s clear that certain actors are having fun in their roles, like Avan Jogia as Leon or Donal Logue as Chief Irons, but the acting is overall okay. A minor thing as well, but the film establishes Chris and Claire as growing up in the Raccoon City Orphanage where their game counterparts didn’t.

Other aspects of the film have their own issues, like how some of the special effects come off a little dodgy, like the Licker’s interactions with the environment. Then there’s also how the writing handles references to the games, like forcing a reference to the infamous line “That was too close...You were almost a Jill Sandwich.” That’s not to mention the placement of “Itchy Tasty”, which has less impact than in RE1, or how an element from Code: Veronica is included with no rhyme or reason. On top of that, William Birkin’s (Neal McDonough) later appearance doesn’t quite resemble how he looks in the games, despite the effort put into the other monsters.

Separating the two storylines into their own films would have immediately improved the pacing. Either game could already fill out at least 90 minutes, especially if they were rewritten to be more story-driven, and allow room to fully explore several ideas on the big screen or even have a consistent threat like Tyrant. At the same time, Umbrella could be better explored as an antagonistic force and the audience could have more time to get attached to the cast.

As it stands, however, Welcome to Raccoon City is a film best viewed by existing Resident Evil fans, though that’s not a guarantee of enjoyment. If there’s a sequel, then hopefully the filmmakers can learn from their mistakes.