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Games[]

  • Acceptable Targets: The evil megacorporation doing research into biological weaponry, and with contacts in the government, Umbrella. The government does drop the hammer on them rather magnificently, though.
  • Alternate Character Interpretation: Is Ada Wong a badass and brilliant spy who uses her looks and wit to accomplish her goals? Or a complete bitch, who dresses like some cheap slut and betrays every single person who trusted her?
  • Base Breaker:
    • People are very divided on whether Ada is an Ensemble Darkhorse or The Scrappy. Capcom doesn't help with their inconsistent portrayals of her.
    • There are a lot of fans who want Steve back from the dead in a sequel. But a lot of fans also find his whiplashing moods, brashness, and oftentimes his voice rather obnoxious and annoying.
    • There is an extreme divide between fans of the earlier survival horror games (0-3 and Code: Veronica) and fans of the later action-oriented games (4-6 and ORC). Publicly announce that you prefer one and expect angry tirades from fans of the other.
  • Canon Dis Continuity: The Game Boy Color RPG Resident Evil Gaiden, which had Barry Burton as the main character, was made by a completely different developer and is entirely ignored by the rest of the series (despite being written by the director of Resident Evil Code: Veronica).
  • Designated Protagonist Syndrome: Many fans consider Chris too bland and generic compared to the other main characters of the series. Though he's a bit less generic in Resident Evil 5.
  • Ensemble Darkhorse: Rebecca Chambers, Billy Coen, Barry Burton, Krauser, HUNK, Nicholai, the "Pirate Merchant Guy", Ada Wong (to some), Josh Stone, and Nemesis.
  • Ethnic Scrappy: Jim Chapman.
  • Evil Is Cool: So cool that Word of God states Albert Wesker is the most popular male character in the series because of it.
  • Evil Is Sexy:
  • Foe Yay: Chris and Wesker. Tons of it, especially in RE5.
  • Fountain of Memes: Wesker, Leon, and Barry Burton.
  • Harsher in Hindsight: In the first Resident Evil game, when Chris encounters Wesker near the Tyrant lab, he tells the latter after deducing that Wesker was the mole in S.T.A.R.S. that Chris would never work for a company like Umbrella. Let's just say that with Resident Evil 7: Biohazard and a certain revelation about Chris working for Blue Umbrella, reluctantly or not, makes Chris look like a very big hypocrite in hindsight with that statement.
    • On a similar note, Wesker's reaction during Chris's scenario in the original game has him, aside from actually activating the Tyrant and releasing it from its containment field, saying to Chris "Go to hell! Jill will join you shortly!" These words become especially harsh with Chris's characterization via Resident Evil VII: Biohazard and Resident Evil VII.I.AGE, which featured him (albeit somewhat reluctantly) working alongside Blue Umbrella despite, as the above entry noted, his disgust for Umbrella being strong enough to personally vow to never work for a company like that, and then his apparently doing more villainous actions such as abducting Ethan Winter's newborn daughter and then killing Mia; and as for Jill, she got the infamous Took a Level in Jerkass treatment in the remake as well as had her beauty significantly toned down.
    • Heck, the entire premise of Resident Evil, and in particular Umbrella's overall role in both researching viruses for weaponization and causing a massive outbreak, becomes this with the 2020 COVID-19 global pandemic, as well as suspicions that the virus that escaped from Wuhan was being researched for warfare purposes.
  • Hilarious in Hindsight:
    • The reason behind the Nintendo exclusivity - Capcom wanting to have all of the core franchise playable on one console - on two counts. Firstly, Resident Evil 5 hasn't been released on a Nintendo console; and secondly, despite their desire to have all of the core entries playable on the same console, Resident Evil 0 and the REmake remain Nintendo exclusive, and are the only two core games that can't be played on a PS3, thanks to the launch models having Backwards Compatibility and the Resident Evil: Revival Edition featuring HD Remakes of RE4 and Code Veronica X.
    • In the Saturn version of the first Resident Evil's battle mode, the final zombie to face is a zombified Albert Wesker, implying that he was infected with the T-Virus. Let's just say that while the battle mode itself was not canon, Wesker being infected with a virus certainly was, and it actually made Wesker even more dangerous than before.
    • Wesker might have been the basis for Master Miller's current look (assuming it isn't a coincidence) in Metal Gear Solid. In Resident Evil 6, Wesker is revealed to have a son. His name? Jake Muller, which is two vowels away from "Miller."
    • Raccoon City believes that the cannibal murders in the Arklay Mountains are the result of an evil cult. Cue [[Resident Evil 4]] where Leon fights an evil cult.
    • In the original Resident Evil, in the Barry Lives ending, Wesker ends up killed offscreen by what is implied to be a Chimera, since it was the only enemy found in the area with the self-destruct switch that he activated. In Umbrella Chronicles, during the Rebirth story arc covering how Wesker escaped the doomed mansion before it exploded, Wesker actually encounters a Chimera in roughly the same area and... well, let's just say that Wesker ended up putting an end to that creature rather easily.
  • Internet Backdraft:
    • The debate as to whether or not 4 and 5's new direction is a good thing rages to this day.
    • The movies to fans of the game and vice-versa.
    • Criticizing the Tank Controls doesn't end well either.
  • It's the Same, Now It Sucks: Fan reaction to the Gamecube ports of Resident Evil 2, 3, and Code Veronica fell under this, as they came after the REmake and happened to be straight ports of the initial PlayStation and Dreamcast releases. It should be noted, however, that Capcom had already announced that those three games would not be receiving the same treatment and the releases would just be ports.
  • Launcher of a Thousand Ships: Leon seems to get all of the action.. Of course, his canon lover is Ada, but he also can be found paired with Alfred, Angela, Ashley, Chris, Claire, Hunnigan, Jill, Kevin, Krauser, Luis, Steve, Manuela, Mendez, Mike the Helicopter Guy, Saddler, Salazar, Sherry, Wesker, a Licker, Ganados, an Iron Maiden/Regenerator, a Tyrant, and even in one slightly disturbing story, Mr. X.
  • Magnificent Bastard:
    • Albert Wesker is responsible for most of the events of the Resident Evil universe and manages to win every single game (even when he appears to lose). He is, quite understandably, pissed when he realizes that all his schemes, his activities, his Social Darwinist beliefs — in short, the entire pattern of his life — were programmed into him from the beginning by Ozwell Spencer, an even bigger bastard.
    • Ada outsmarts everyone. Including Wesker (although that said, the supplemental notes for Resident Evil 5 implied he anticipated she'd do that).
  • Mary Sue: Rebecca, but only in S.D. Perry's novels, since Rebecca is clearly the author's favourite character, to the point of writing two original stories based on her, where Becky basically saves the world.
  • Memetic Mutation: Not surprising, considering the series is almost filled to the brim with Narm.
  • Memetic Badass:
    • According to the internet, HUNK could take on every zombie in the universe. And Wesker. And every protagonist. At once. And still win.
    • The fandom tends to overemphasize Claire's 'rawr girl power' factor, despite being the only major character (excluding Outbreak) that has had no formalized training.
    • It would be a sin not to mention Albert "Why Haven't I Died Yet until RE5?" Wesker.
  • Memetic Outfit: In 2, a player could search Wesker's desk 50 times to find a picture of Rebecca in a basketball uniform. Some fans really, really like that outfit.
  • Narm: Has its own page. CHRISSSSS.
  • Narm Charm:
    • One gets suspicious that Capcom has caught on that the voice acting was bad, and are now doing it on purpose. Dead Rising suggests that a couple of the more infamous lines were thrown in just because of how B-Movie horror flick terrible they sounded.
      • Barry Burton's lines in The Mercenaries: Reunion in RE5 are his old Narmful lines from the original campy Resident Evil 1, as well as having "HERE'S Barry!" (to address RE1 Jill's question of his whereabouts) and a melee attack called Barry Sandwich.
    • The live action B horror intro to the original Resident Evil is sorely missed in this day of CGI.
  • Rescued From the Scrappy Heap: Rebecca got this in Zero, and also in REmake/REmaster, the latter of which altered her characterization from someone who doesn't seem to grasp the gravity of the situation to someone who is in fact firmly aware of what's been going on, but makes an effort to soldier on DESPITE her doubts.
  • The Scrappy:
    • Sheva's not generally liked by a good deal of the fandom, who see her as bland, uninteresting, serving only as Eye Candy with her many revealing alternate costumes, irritating when AI controlled in the main campaign, and generally annoying in the later chapters.
    • Steve, thanks to acting like a Jerkass and/or an idiot most of the time, and having a very annoying voice. The writers seem to have realised this, as Darkside Chronicles made him act much less of a prick towards Claire, and gave him a better voice actor.
    • Rebecca Chambers was this regarding her original game characterization. She got Rescued From the Scrappy Heap with Zero and especially the REmake/REmaster versions of the first game.
  • Unfortunate Implications: Everyone thinks that Resident Evil 5 is racist just because it's got a white man gunning down black zombies in Africa, but that's just... wait. Why are the black zombies dressed in grass skirts and chucking spears at you? And why is Sheva's alternate outfit a Nubile Savage Fur Bikini covered in war paint?
    • And yet, no one raises an eyebrow at the very American Leon gunning down Europeans in RE4, not to mention Europeans that fell victim to the Spexico trope. (However, this is possibly subverted in that at least one of the European characters in 4--Luis Sera--is a genuinely heroic character. Unfortunately, he bites it about halfway through.)
  • They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Jill, largely due to being Put on a Bus after RE5, barely has any canonical appearances afterwards (the closest thing to a reference being Revelations 2 regarding an unlockable email for Barry Burton, as the game occurs between RE5 and RE6). It also doesn't help that a choice comment by Wesker regarding the proto-Tyrant in the Beginnings Scenario[1] implies that her T-virus antibodies from both Nemesis's infection of her and Wesker's experiments may have made her potentially immortal similar to Sherry Birkin, although to a much lesser degree.
  • Values Dissonance: The use of green herbs as healing items. In Japan and other Eastern countries, this is a staple of traditional medicine. In America, the most common medicine associated with this is illegal in 37 states. Cue tons of weed jokes at the expense of the characters — and sometimes the developers.
  • The Woobie:
    • Stoic Woobie: Leon. Almost everyone he likes dies or betrays him. No wonder he's so mopey.
    • Rebecca.
    • Steve.
    • Sherry. Poor little girl, stray in a zombie-filled city with first insane, then dead parents.
  • Woolseyism: The series' Japanese name "Biohazard" was changed to Resident Evil when first localized in the United States because the Western localizers at the time could not copyright "Biohazard" as that was already done by an unrelated rock band. The name change is actually somewhat fitting in the initial game, as the game took place inside a residential area (specifically a mansion) with stuff that, until a certain point in the game, was initially believed to be supernaturally evil.

Live-Action Adaptations[]

In General[]

  • Seinfeld Is Unfunny: Over the years, the first 8 live-action films can be considered as a usually so okay it's average popcorn flicks. But now, given the negative receptions of the 2021 reboot film and the Netflix's 2022 TV series, it's fair to say that live-action adaptations are a major curse to this franchise at this point.

The Movies[]

  • Alternate Character Interpretation: The Red Queen,: Homicidal AI on the fritz or brutal but effective AI trying to contain the T-Virus outbreak at all costs? You decide.
    • Cracked even points out that the Red Queen was the only character in the film actually trying to stop the virus from getting out, and should really be considered the hero of the first film.
  • And the Fandom Rejoiced: While the reception of how they are executed on screen will definitely vary post-release, this is guaranteed to happen at least once with each movie in terms of which characters or monsters will show up.
  • Cliché Storm: The films are one long-lost father away from hitting every major cliche in the book.
  • Critical Dissonance: Despite being presented as universally reviled and an affront to God himself by critics and fans of the original series, so far all of the movies have sold very well.
  • Critical Research Failure: Hair and nails don't keep growing after death. This wouldn't be so bad if one of the human characters said it, but a supercomputer making the same mistake is a different story.
  • Ethnic Scrappy: LJ, an obnoxious, offensive and stereotypical black guy. He drops the minstrel bullshit in the third movie thankfully, but he still pays the price for having been so annoying in the first place.
  • Idiot Plot: All of the films.
    • The mass-infection in The Hive could have been prevented if the laboratories had isolated air circulation systems.
    • The infection of Raccoon City, and by extension, the world, would have been prevented if the Red Queen AI had informed corporate headquarters that the lab was now crawling with zombies.
      • Considering that they sent in a team to shut her down, they probably wouldn't have listened anyway. One still wonders why they apparently didn't have any remote monitoring systems in place. There is no way the lab could be run without some sort of telecommunications to the outside world, even if only Umbrella HQ.
  • Mary Sue: Alice, who's sort of a combination between the God Mode Sue and the Black Hole Sue. With every new film, she has a major power boost, starting off as a Badass Normal in the first film, which is soon elevated to Badass Abnormal with the introduction of superhuman strength and speed at the end of the first film. She then gains telekinetic powers at the end of the second film, and then an army of clones at the end of the third film. It was one of the reasons Sienna Guillory refused to come back for the third film as she didn't like getting overshadowed by Alice (the one scene where she could've gotten a badass moment, the match flicking scene, was typically hijacked by Alice). She only appears in Afterlife because by that point its the end of the film when Alice has done all she has and she a (albeit mind controlled) bad guy by then. Time will tell how she'll fare in Retribution
    • Creator's Pet: Alice's status as this is furthered by the fact that Milla Jovovich is married to Paul W.S. Anderson, who directed two installments (with his third on the way) and produced the other two.
  • Money, Dear Boy: Milla Jovovich flat out admitted this was was why Afterlife was made.
  • Took the Bad Film Seriously: Sienna Guillory spent ages studying Jill Valentine's movements and mannerisms for her role in Resident Evil: Apocalypse and as such is one of the better things about it.
  • Replacement Scrappy: Alice for a few fans. Moreso after the reveal of Welcome to Raccoon City Movie in 2021.
  • Video Game Movies Suck: Zig-zagged; they're disliked by critics and fans of the games, but they do well enough at the box office. Degeneration is somewhat of a subversion since it was produced by Capcom and, unlike the live action versions, is part of the game's continuity with the focus being on canon characters Claire and Leon.
  1. Specifically, "It seems even this refuse possesses T's regeneration ability."