Not so long ago, video game adaptations were treated as a novelty that meant certain doom for whichever studio decided to greenlight one. Before Mortal Kombat 2 or Markiplier’s Iron Lung, video game movies frequently looked like 2005’s Doom or 2009’s Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li — cash-grab attempts at using a property with a built-in fanbase to court box office success. The results were often dire, but those early works did pave the way for the genre’s current renaissance, where both direct adaptations and stories set in the world of popular games can thrive.
Of that older era, one of the most surprising successes was Paul W.S. Anderson’s adaptation of Resident Evil, which sired a six-movie franchise despite veering wildly away from the games’ tone and story. A 2021 reboot, Welcome to Raccoon City, put forth a valiant effort and managed to be a fun action-horror, but lacked the games’ chilling, dread-inducing atmosphere. Now there’s a third try on the way, this time from horror darling Zach Cregger, and while it’s also opting to go with its own story, it certainly looks more in line with the desperate, survival horror energy of the source material.
