Just ask acclaimed director Zach Cregger, who went into his loose but spiritually faithful film adaptation of the Resident Evil game series thinking he was prepared for the discourse it would engender. He was not. “I think I was frustrated at the conversation around Resident Evil and how much of the conversation really didn’t have anything to do with the movie,” Cregger said recently on The Town With Matthew Belloni podcast. “It had everything to do with whether the movie was living up to the different standards that different fans of the games had. Whether it was using the characters or not, or what did I get wrong in the lore? It was just a lot about, ‘Why isn’t this like the source material, or why is it good that it’s not like the source material?’ All the conversation just felt like it was about not the movie.” Fans have sniped at the director over his choices to set his film in a present-day Racoon City, to trade the games’ rainy atmosphere for snow, and for focusing on a new character rather than the franchise’s recognizable cast of characters, among other points.
Now, some might say that Cregger, an avowed fan of the long-running zombie game franchise, should have realized that gamers are an, let’s call them “entitled,” lot when it comes to their favorite properties. And Cregger himself admitted to IGN prior to the film’s release, “I think I was naive. I thought fans of these games, like me, would be thrilled that somebody was coming along and turning Resident Evil into a survival horror movie.” But while Cregger’s take on Resident Evil has been a success both critically and commercially, making some $400 million worldwide against its $75 million budget, and is a much more legitimate slice of film artistry than the Paul W.S. Anderson films, fan backlash has made Cregger wary of making a follow-up—or indeed any other pre-existing IP.
“I don’t want to write something where I have to make sure I’m tagging different data points to satisfy X,” Cregger told IGN. “I just want to satisfy me. And the only reason that I think Resident Evil is OK for me to do is because I’m enthusiastic about the games and I like the story that I thought of with the games and I’m making it for me. I think this movie is cool, and I hope it checks the fan boxes because I’m a fan and I’m checking my boxes.” With frustration you can hear through the written word, Cregger concludes, “I’m making the Resident Evil movie that I wish existed, so I can do that with a clean heart and a clear conscience and not feel like I’m getting fucked by some weird industry thing.”
Keep scrolling for more great stories.