Resident Evil

I've been a fan of all things Resident Evil for a long time, but aren't one of those people who rate things badly because something strays too far from the games or the originals or anything like that. I'm usually down for new things and get excited for new storylines and characters.

Infinite Darkness was fine-ish and I actually enjoyed Welcome to Raccoon City, but this new series makes for some tough watching. It seems more like a teenage drama than anything else so far and it hasn't grasped me four episodes in.

Lance Reddick has been the show's saving grace so far, but that's totally subjective because I think he's great in everything.

I'm going to finish the series because I've made it this far and although I'm not too hopeful, I'm gonna keep my fingers crossed.

I've watched the first two episodes (so you thankfully don't have to) & can safely say - with a certain degree of confidence - you should simply add this show to the accumulating list of other substandard Netflix series which have already been consigned to history & forgotten by audiences; stuff like "Cursed" & "The Irregulars" etc. Commissioned by the streaming service (clearly hoping to lazily capitalise off of the recognisable brand by sheer association) to just fill their release slots & keep subscribers subscribed, in order to view something - ANYTHING - & their money rolling in every month. The quality obviously wasn't even considered before the season went in to production. It's all about profit.

This approach to content creation is painfully apparent moreso here than in most cases, in an egregiously unimaginative, badly written, clichéd & hammy first season, which acts as yet another sub-par installment to the franchise & a waste of the source material. A real shame, as this could've been a great sci-fi / horror series but alas, the potential's squandered. Can't say I'm enthused about continuing any further.

That should be the title of the show because it has nothing to do with resident evil.

Unlike a lot of the reviewers here, I did not watch this with any expectation of resemblance of games or the original movies. I was just looking for good entertainment. Unfortunately, I was disappointed.

First of all, the teenage drama, and my god is the drama bad! After couple of episodes, I was skipping every scene with the teenagers in it. Secondly, the ending is just disastrous. I would have probably given this a 5 star but the last 2 episodes are so bad that they probably average a 2.

I should have checked the ratings before I dove into this one but the stupid "No. 1 in the US" for a few days now got me. Thought it must be good. Unfortunately, it is not. Save your time and don't watch this.

So firstly yes I am a huge resi fan I have stuck with the rough along with the smooth , read comics ,books , fan fiction , the first batch of movies that progressively worse , the CGI movies which are pretty good and the new movie which has the same or very similar issues to this .

However I am also a movie fan and will give Most things a watch and like to suspend disbelief and get lost in a good series or movie even if changes are made from the source material as long as they are for the better .

This series so far is just a check list for the modern audience , ticking all the culture boxes for the sake of it , which is tiresome now as it's every single movie or series that comes out it's not original it doesn't add anything they do it just because .

But let's remove that issue and go back to the resi franchise , if you took the name Wesker and umbrella out of this it could be any generic Netflix zombie show . Yes the creatures are cool but other than that it's pretty poor.

I'm not sure why we can't just stick to the lore , the characters and do it for the fans , even a prequel series in the arklay mountains would or could be awesome leading upto the Spencer mansion incident , but we get this mess.

The characters are bland and cliche , the story is pretty predictable , and whilst I'm all in for character building and story this tries too hard with what are pretty much boring cardboard cutout characters .

It doesn't know what to do with them either , jumping from the modern setting to the future it drags it's feet and becomes frustrating , and the pacing is all off , one minute you will be in what feels like a tense horror scene and the next something that belongs in a Nickelodeon teenage sitcom .

The resident evil games especially the earlier ones have always been a bit hokey and had weird and whacky characters but this series I think tries to have serious characters but just really poorly acted , and when a hokey character does come in it feels really cringeworthy .

Like i say at the minute I'm at a stage where I want to turn it off but IV commited so far and will force myself to the end to hope things get better and we get more ties to the lore and characters we all love .

The guys who are giving it 1 star and just blasting it I would ignore I was going to give it 4 stars but just as I was finishing up they have just shoehorned a character from one of the games in which felt tacky and awful and again had no purpose other than just because .

You're in a restaurant. You think you're gonna treat yourself and order a nice and juicy filet steak. The waiter comes and slams a lone hot dog on your dish and calls it a day.

Had you ordered a hot dog, you might have been kind of satisfied, but now you're just confused AND unhappy.

Thats what its like to watch this show. It has basically nothing to do with Resident Evil, aside from names. Even less than the Anderson movies.

We've got two main characters. Billie and Jade. Billie is actually a little bit more likeable than Jade, who is an insufferable teenager that just hates everything because she was forced to move. Okay - a trope we've had a lot in the past, but Jade doesn't change. She has no revelation that changes her perspective or anything, she just stays insufferable until the very end. Billie cannot really decide if she wants to be the nice sister or the bitchy sister, so she just jumps between those two.

There is a second timeline in the future where Jade is researching zombies, but its basically just a row of monster attacks to mix up the monotony of the past timeline. The future feels like it has no direction other than action and Jade kind of trips over what she is looking for while fighting monsters, all while the show can't really decide if it wants to be funny, tragic or just popcorn.

All in all the show would've been at least partially enjoyable if it didn't have anything to do with Resident Evil, which is why it still got a 3 stars from me. Just watch it with the idea in mind that its completely original and you can at least enjoy it for what it is - a mediocre at best show with subpar writing.

That being said, I'm a big fan of Lance Reddick and I think he was awfully wasted in this show.