Movie - Resident Evil Series (2004-16) [/]
Sep 16 2020
I rewatched the Resident Evil film series all of which I have on iTunes. I've seen them all at least twice now except for The Final Chapter which was my first time.
Resident Evil is great because it's the first film and is the most original both in story -- it's a prequel to the Resident Evil video games and introduces Alice (Milla Jovovich) -- and in various elements that are repeated throughout the series.
Apocalypse moves the location from underground lab to the city above and adds Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory) who is unfortunately rarely used in the rest of the series. There was a setup at the end of Retribution but in The Final Chapter jumped ahead a bit and started Alice off alone again.
Extinction went from typical zombie horror setting to desert and the desert-reclaimed city of Las Vegas. We add Claire Redfield (Ali Larter) who also appears in two future films making her the closest thing to a reliable ally for Alice.
Afterlife is set in a Los Angeles prison and an offshore tanker. Neither location really works well. The prison is too indoors claustrophobic like the first film and the tanker is a bit too white-lab-perfection.
Retribution at least has an original settings because it's set in a big Umbrella Corp simulator. I kind of like that it brings back some dead characters for cameos and not as zombies.
The Final Chapter I found kind of boring. The above ground scenes are not interesting and going back the original underground lab of the first movie is barely paid off, basically just the one laser corridor. More of the hero characters showing up for an epic climactic battle would have been cool though I guess way out of budget.
So I think in the end the first three movies are good and the last three are a definite decline.
Still, I guess the other thing is Alice, who goes from unknown woman with various hints of her story revealed until The Final Chapter spells it all out for us. That part at least was nice as a wrap up to her arc. So watching everyone once is worthwhile for that.
I like the commentary tracks though on iTunes implementation is not good. First off you can't download the extras so have to have an Internet connection to view. Second is that commentary viewing does not remember where you left off, next time it starts from the beginning. So if you like commentary tracks I'd get a DVD and rip it with both normal and commentary audio tracks.
Anyway, Resident Evil series starts out strong and slowly fades but at least it has strong heroine characters and often good practical action.
- Resident Evil (2002) [+]
- Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004) [/]
- Resident Evil: Extinction (2007) [/]
- Resident Evil: Afterlife (2010) [/]
- Resident Evil: Retribution (2012) [/]
- Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (2017) [-]
Resident Evil is great because it's the first film and is the most original both in story -- it's a prequel to the Resident Evil video games and introduces Alice (Milla Jovovich) -- and in various elements that are repeated throughout the series.
Apocalypse moves the location from underground lab to the city above and adds Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory) who is unfortunately rarely used in the rest of the series. There was a setup at the end of Retribution but in The Final Chapter jumped ahead a bit and started Alice off alone again.
Extinction went from typical zombie horror setting to desert and the desert-reclaimed city of Las Vegas. We add Claire Redfield (Ali Larter) who also appears in two future films making her the closest thing to a reliable ally for Alice.
Afterlife is set in a Los Angeles prison and an offshore tanker. Neither location really works well. The prison is too indoors claustrophobic like the first film and the tanker is a bit too white-lab-perfection.
Retribution at least has an original settings because it's set in a big Umbrella Corp simulator. I kind of like that it brings back some dead characters for cameos and not as zombies.
The Final Chapter I found kind of boring. The above ground scenes are not interesting and going back the original underground lab of the first movie is barely paid off, basically just the one laser corridor. More of the hero characters showing up for an epic climactic battle would have been cool though I guess way out of budget.
So I think in the end the first three movies are good and the last three are a definite decline.
Still, I guess the other thing is Alice, who goes from unknown woman with various hints of her story revealed until The Final Chapter spells it all out for us. That part at least was nice as a wrap up to her arc. So watching everyone once is worthwhile for that.
I like the commentary tracks though on iTunes implementation is not good. First off you can't download the extras so have to have an Internet connection to view. Second is that commentary viewing does not remember where you left off, next time it starts from the beginning. So if you like commentary tracks I'd get a DVD and rip it with both normal and commentary audio tracks.
Anyway, Resident Evil series starts out strong and slowly fades but at least it has strong heroine characters and often good practical action.