By Variety | Created at 2026-09-18 05:39:50 | Updated at 2026-09-18 09:53:04
9 hours ago
SPOILER ALERT: This article contains major spoilers for “Resident Evil,” now playing in theaters.
“Resident Evil” is one of the longest-running horror video game series, and for a time it was the highest-grossing film series based on a game (until Universal’s “Super Mario” movies dethroned them). The games started out as scary, third-person shooters that packed in scares even while the graphics were low on pixels.
The original Capcom game released in 1996 and introduced gamers to heroes Chris Redfield and Jill Valentine who must escape a spooky mansion filled with zombies. They later uncover the Umbrella Corporation, a pharmaceutical company that let loose a zombie virus while experimenting with bio-weapons. The 1998 sequel ramped things up and brought in Chris’ sister Claire Redfield and Leon S. Kennedy, who had to escape the zombie-infested Raccoon City. Later sequels, remakes and reboots spread the zombie virus into hillbilly homes, vampire villages and further around the world as the Umbrella Corporation’s disease took hold.
The games have been massive hits for gamers and horror fans alike, and they were adapted into six live-action movies helmed by Paul W.S. Anderson and starring Milla Jovovich. After a failed reboot with 2021’s “Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City,” the film franchise is getting revamped again by “Barbarian” and “Weapons” director Zach Cregger, who’s made a fully original story separate from the games. The movie takes place in Raccoon City and features the Umbrealla Corporation, but star Austin Abrams’ character Bryan is simply a medical courier who’s in way over his head during a not-so-routine delivery.
Check out all of the video game references from Cregger’s movie below.
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Undead Dogs
A seemingly normal dog chases Bryan when he looks for refuge in an abandoned barn after encountering his first zombie. He climbs up to the rafters for safety then foolishly chucks the ladder down at the dog, forcing him to painfully jump down to the ground to escape. But the dog keeps pursuing Bryan and rams its head through the barn wall in an attempt to bite him. When the dog gets stuck, its head opens up to reveal horrifying tendrils that snap at Bryan. In the video games, zombie dogs are one of the most classic and earliest enemies players encounter.
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Puker
Bryan encounters a monster that spews acidic vomit at him while he’s stuck in the hospital elevator, and it’s inspired by a classic video game zombie. “Resident Evil 7: Biohazard” featured a Fat Molded that used used projectile vomit as a weapon, and many other horror games use a similarly nasty enemy type.
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Revenant
The Revenant is a horrifying creature in “Resident Evil Revelations 2” that’s stitched together from various bodies and parts. Sound familiar? It’s basically the same monster that chases Bryan and pulls in more living and undead bodies with its tendrils to grow larger. Bryan himself turns into a version of the monstrosity at the end of the movie.
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T-Virus Tendrils
While it’s not named in the movie, the T-Virus is the Umbrella Corporation’s infamous experiment gone wrong. The virus spread wide and turned everyone into undead zombies with a hunger for flesh. Many of the monsters sport long tendrils that players must shoot to fully defeat them, much like in the movie.
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Raccoon City
Raccoon City is one of the most notorious locations in the “Resident Evil” universe and the home of the shady Umbrella Corporation, which also appears in the film. Like the new movie, Umbrella has a laboratory in Raccoon City, where the zombie virus inevitably breaks out and spreads from.
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Umbrella Corporation
Image Credit: ©Sony Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
The Umbrella Corporation is a pharmaceutical company that secretly performed experiments with bio-organic weapons in the “Resident Evil” universe that lead to the spread of the zombie apocalypse. In the movie, Paul Walter Hauser and Zach Cherry play bumbling Umbrealla scientists trying to stop the outbreak.
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Locks
Locked doors are a classic video game trope. They block your access to the next level, a powerful upgrade or merely prevent you from wandering too far off from your goal. Sometimes they require a key, a code or you can blast it apart with a gun and force your way through. The “Resident Evil” games have used all of these mechanics, but Bryan encounters some particularly sturdy locks in the movie.
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Weapons
Image Credit: ©Sony Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
Weapons (no, not Cregger’s “Weapons”) obviously play a large role in killing zombies and protecting yourself in the apocalypse. Most “Resident Evil” games start out the same way as Bryan’s journey: You start out unarmed and narrowly escape the first enemy, then you find more powerful upgrades to bolster your firearm cache. Bryan picks up a handgun, shotgun and assault rifle, three classic guns from the video games.
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Flashlights
Image Credit: ©Sony Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
A useful tool in life and video games, “Resident Evil” flashlights illuminate dark areas but can also alert zombies to your location. Bryan uses one to make his way through the snowy wilderness, a dank sewer and Raccoon City — luckily, he doesn’t run out of batteries, like in the video games.
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Looking for Ammo
Image Credit: ©Sony Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
Every gamer knows the feeling of being low on ammunition as a horde of zombies creep closer. The “Resident Evil” games give you just enough bullets to scrape by, but you’ll need to search every drawer, cupboard and locked safe to find more. When Bryan finds the shotgun, he frantically explores the farmhouse for ammo as an undead woman pursues him.
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Stalkers
Image Credit: ©Sony Pictures/Courtesy Everett Collection
The “Resident Evil” series has plenty of horrifying, lumbering villains who slowly chase you throughout a level, and the movie has a similar, stitched-together monster that relentlessly trails Bryan. Nemesis, Mr. X, Lady Dimitrescu andJack Baker are some of the video games’ scariest stalkers who follow your every foostep.
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First-Person POV
The “Resident Evil” games started out as a third-person shooter, meaning the camera was fixed behind the player’s shoulder and followed them. Later games transitioned into first-person, which put you directly into the character’s shoes and let you see through their eyes. Cregger recreates several shots like this, where you see down the barrel of Bryan’s gun like a first-person game.
