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‘Resident Evil 6’ Movie: ‘The Final Chapter’ Release Date Marks The End Of The Movie Franchise, And Critics Rejoice [Op-Ed]

By David Cornell
Published on: 05:37 PST, Oct 8, 2016

The Resident Evil 6 movie, The Final Chapter, has been confirmed by writer Paul W.S. Anderson as being the end of the franchise. Most fans of the video game which spawned it, as well as movie critics, professional and armchair alike, have been waiting for it to end.

Resident Evil, a video game series which was the North American re-naming of Japan’s Biohazard, was a survival horror franchise which eventually evolved into a first-person shooter with way more than just zombies to slaughter. The series had such a strong following that Hollywood decided to make it a big-screen series.

This was promising at first, though the trend of video games being made into movies has rarely spawned a good film. Mortal Kombat and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider were the earliest exceptions with watchable concepts mixed with cheesy acting. I won’t even get started on other franchises which died instantly because the film-makers didn’t have a clue what a movie should be, or what the video game was actually about.

Silent Hill was another notable exception, bringing an actual feeling of terror to the big screen and spawning a sequel starring the main characters from the third game.

The Resident Evil 6 movie is at least three movies overdue because starting with Afterlife it just went straight into the ridiculous. There was a scene where Albert Wesker, a character only loosely based on his video game counterpart, threw his sunglasses straight into the camera. This was so blatantly made to show off the 3D effect that audiences cringed. At least the monster with the big hammer looked cool, but one scene isn’t going to save an entire movie.

Paul W.S. Anderson’s revelation that the Resident Evil 6 movie, as revealed by Entertainment Weekly, would be the end may be the best news we’ve heard since the sequels were made. The Final Chapter, as explained by star Milla Jovovich, is about Alice finally meeting the Red Queen and being told that she needs to race back to The Hive and stop Umbrella from destroying everything. If Anderson can avoid the cheesy and horrible action scenes he’s become known for, it might be worth seeing.

Many video game veterans doubt this, though, as the movies actually strayed from the video game origins from the beginning, only giving nods with monsters like Nemesis, and characters like Chris and Claire Redfield (Wentworth Miller and Ali Larter, respectively), Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory), and Albert Wesker (Jason O’Mara). Even in the first movie, there was a scene where Alice literally stopped doing anything and waited for the music to die down before moving on. Sadly, this was only the first of many awkward scenes throughout the series.

We’ll probably see even more stupid scenes in the Resident Evil 6 movie equivalent to Alice crashing into a church on a motorcycle, a helicopter crash where both survivors emerge without a scratch, and Mike Epps pulling out golden pistols and announcing that his is “custom.”

Of course, we can’t forget that scene in Retribution where a small army is firing automatic weapons at Alice and her group as they speed away in a car. Not one of them gets hit despite not even ducking or making an attempt to dodge. Either Umbrella’s soldiers have worse aim than Star Wars‘ Stormtroopers, or the director had no idea how bullets work.

Fans can only hope that the Resident Evil 6 movie shows a little more intelligence than the previous films, but that’s doubtful. Paul W.S. Anderson wrote them all. The Resident Evil: The Final Chapter release date is January 27, 2017.

[Featured Image by Screen Gems]

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