Editorials
A Wish List for the ‘Resident Evil’ Franchise
The Resident Evil we know and love (to hate) is growing up. I’ve looked at the last decade like it’s been one long identity crisis, when the truth of it is we’ve just been overprotective of little Resi.
We were there in the mid 90s to witness its first steps. We laughed at the clumsy way it once spoke, spewing nonsense like “Jill Sandwich” as it waddled about trying to shove shaped “keys” into their corresponding holes. We were there for its countless awkward phases, we got uncomfortable when it developed a fascination with leeches, and we were relieved when it tried, and succeeded, in reinventing itself. When it got curious about its Wii, we tried our best to dodge its many questions.
Next year, it will be old enough to drink, and though we can remember what it was like to be that young, we can’t understand what it’s going through right now. It was never struggling to find its identity, that was just a clumsy way of saying we don’t approve of what it’s become. And as much as we’d like to have total control over its future, we can only help guide it. Where it goes and what it becomes is out of our hands.
I’m done hovering just so I can chastise every mistake and bad decision. I’ve given up my best years already, it’s time to take a step back. But before I go, here are some ideas that Resident Evil ought to consider seeing as I sacrificed everything for it so take notes you ungrateful little shit or I swear to Christ I’ll leave you with Konami.
Let’s start with what we know about. For example, we know Capcom is working on Resident Evil 7. We also know that it won’t be another bloated amalgam of five different games, thanks to the lessons learned after the spectacular failure of the last big release. But whether or not RE7 makes good on the numerous promises we’ve heard about “bringing the series back to its roots” doesn’t matter. Not really. What matters to me is the frightening lack of insight that went into everything else.
Resident Evil 6 wasn’t scary. It tried to be, but it lacked an understanding of how to set about constructing an effective scare. The game relied too heavily on poorly realized ones, such as having zombies play opossum so they could startle us the moment we turned our backs to it, despite how obvious it is that that’s what’s happening. Capcom even knew this, and I know they knew it because they made it so you can’t fire a cautionary bullet into each of their heads, since that’d ruin their shitty scare.
That’s lazy game design, and for as ambitious as Resident Evil 6 was with its grand ideas and scope, it was exceedingly lazy in executing them. This ruined potentially cool ideas, like its impressive cast of boss fights, which it recycled over and over again until they became torturous. The quick-timed events (QTEs) that sort of worked in Resident Evil 4 were abused until they became controller-snappingly stupid, and so on.
The point is, Resident Evil 7 needs to be a real reboot. It needs to wipe the slate clean, and rid itself of all the excess crap this franchise has accumulated over its many clumsy attempts at attracting new players. We need a stripped down survival horror experience that’s tightly paced, polished and free to focus on the little details that make good games great, rather than waste its limited imagination by spreading it too thinly over too much bland content.
One campaign with optional co-op — Dead Space 3 did a wonderful job of this — a new-and-improved wave survival mode, and possibly another secret campaign that gets unlocked after the first has been completed. That’s a nice tradition to keep going. Oh, and bring back the Merchant. I miss him so.
I like what I’ve seen of Umbrella Corps, even if its announcement has felt somewhat passive aggressive. Capcom knows we’re desperate for another Outbreak, and they’ve answered our pleas by giving us games like this and Operation Raccoon City, or the Resident Evil equivalent to a flashing neon sign that says something like, “Hey, Call of Duty fans, Resident Evil has guns too!”
The time, cost and effort it took to ship these games could have been spent on a third Outbreak, and/or even a remaster of the first two games. This short-lived series was always ahead of its time, and it’s also the only real chance Capcom has at releasing a game that appeals to fans of the series and the shooter crowds they’d like to get at.
Outbreak is a long shot, and it’s hardly the only Resident Evil that’s worth remastering. Code: Veronica could use one, if only to remove the bitter taste that was left in my mouth by the deeply unnecessary remaster we got back in 2011. Nemesis seems like another obvious choice, but I’d rather see it remade following the release of Resident Evil 2.
A remastered Chronicles bundle — the on-rails shooters Umbrella Chronicles and Darkside Chronicles — has some appeal, especially if it comes with VR support. It could be beneficial to ease the tech in quietly, naturally, rather than go all out with a standalone VR release. This would lower the stakes considerably by highlighting the strengths and weaknesses for improvement before any significant investment has been made in the tech. It’d also leave time for Capcom to gather community feedback that could guide the development of future VR titles.
Capcom might not need to play it safe. Resident Evil should pair nicely with virtual reality headsets like the Oculus Rift and PlayStation VR, and by all accounts, their “Kitchen” demo sounds it’s one of the more impressive uses of the tech we’ve seen so far.
It felt appropriate to end this wish list with Revelations, aka my second favorite spin-off, behind Outbreak. The first game was notable for being the singular bright spot in one of the worst years this series has ever had. It’s fitting that 2012 would be a year of such harsh revelations, as we watched a historically reliable franchise deliver what was arguably the worst game in the main series. It was certainly the worst reviewed.
Revelations was proof that Capcom hasn’t completely forgotten what makes this series so special. If anything, it proved RE6 was just a very, very bad idea, and not the “beginning of the end” some doomsayers claimed it to be. Revelations was the much-needed lifesaver the franchise needed to rescue itself from the murky depths that threatened to consume it. It was legitimately scary, atmospheric and challenging, without sacrificing any of the content we’ve come to expect from a modern Resident Evil.
More than that, it was eager to innovate. It put a welcome twist on the Mercenaries survival mode — now dubbed the Raid mode — brought back weapon customization, introduced us to a freaky cast of enemies and the handy Genesis OCD Starter Kit. When its sequel released last year, it built on that out-of-the-box approach with an episodic format and the most robust survival mode to date.
Capcom hasn’t said anything about our getting a Resident Evil: Revelations 3, but I hope they’re thinking about it. It’d be a shame to see another promising spin-off series end before it’s had time to come into its own. If it continues, I’d like to see the episodic structure return with it, and it’ll need more Barry, obviously.
So, what do you think? On a scale of 1 to Angry Mob With Torches and Pitchforks, how strongly do you disagree with me? It’s okay, I can take it. Let me know where you’d like to see this series go next in the comments.
Five decades ago, Stephen King published the story of a bullied girl with telekinetic powers and forever changed the world of horror.
Carrie follows a high school misfit who seeks revenge for a hideous prank by psychically destroying her senior prom. The name Carrie White has become synonymous with the concept of a formal dance thanks to a flawless adaptation from Brian De Palma. Now fifty years after the film’s release, Mike Flanagan is putting his own stamp on the troubling story.
Rather than a feature film, the writer/director will expand King’s relatively slim debut novel into an eight-episode miniseries for Amazon Prime set to premiere on October 7.
Flanagan is no stranger to the world of Stephen King. A long-time Constant Reader, he first made waves with his daring adaptation of Gerald’s Game (2017), a novel many fans considered un-filmable. His underrated Doctor Sleep merges the disparate plot of Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining with King’s original source material, and his 2024 genre-bending tearjerker The Life of Chuck faithfully executes one of the author’s most metaphysical novellas.
He’s currently mired in pre-production for an expansive adaptation of The Dark Tower series, keystone to King’s connected universe, and Warner Bros. recently announced that Flanagan will helm a new version of The Mist, King’s 1980 novella which sees a small Maine town overrun by otherworldly monsters.
Considering the vast array of the author’s previously unadapted material, an obvious question arises. Why reimagine Carrie in 2026? Noting the timeless nature of the content, Flanagan expressed his desire to bring the story of a bullied girl into modern times, mirroring his approach to Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House and Edgar Allan Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher. He explained, “The only way to approach it was to build something new out of the ingredients of Carrie. Otherwise, there’s really no purpose in trying to retread ground that’s been so beautifully walked before.”
His miniseries will maintain the novel’s bloody bookends while delivering “big surprises” along the way.
A New Prom Night Nightmare
The roughly 60-second teaser introduces Summer H. Howell as Carrie White just before the moment of catastrophe. Standing in a prom dress, she smiles at her applauding classmates with an ominous crown perched upon her head. Moments later, Carrie unleashes a rage-filled scream into the night air while promgoers rush for the exit doors. But careful examination of this scene shows Carrie wearing a different, albeit dirty dress as she seems to telekinetically punish her peers.
In an exclusive first look with Entertainment Weekly, Flanagan explains that in his version of the story, “the events of that prom are going to be completely different.” An open trunk emitting a crimson glow does hint at the pig’s blood dumped on Carrie’s head, but it’s likely Flanagan’s formal dance will be a different kind of horror altogether. Despite these changes, the series may end with the widespread destruction outlined in the source material. Unlike any previous adaptations, King’s novel ends with the near-total destruction of Chamberlain, Maine. A flaming street in Flanagan’s trailer promises similar carnage no matter what prank sparks Carrie’s deadly revenge.
The Monstrous Addition of Social Media
On the opposite end of this fiery conclusion is an extreme act of bullying that brings together the story’s main cast. King’s novel begins as Carrie gets her first period while showering in the girls’ locker room. Completely unaware of the concept of menstruation, the sheltered girl thinks she’s bleeding to death. Her classmates respond with vitriolic rage. Led by ultra-mean girl Chris Hargensen (Alison Thornton), they mock the terrified teen while pelting her with tampons. Glimpses of this disturbing event reveal that Flanagan has excised the scene’s nudity while adding a seismic update. As Carrie sobs in the shower stall, Chris and her friends film the breakdown with their phones.
Other scenes note the presence of social media, bringing King’s fifty-year-old story into the digital age.
Flanagan’s adaptation promises to explore the destructive power of social media, an often invisible entity with a potential for harm rivaling Carrie’s own powers. While King’s tormented heroine suffers in front of a small group of girls, Flanagan’s version of the incident will likely become a viral video, potentially circling the globe on social media. Similar to Katt Shea’s criminally underrated The Rage: Carrie 2, which includes elements of revenge porn exploitation, Flanagan’s modern retelling will distinguish itself by exploring the nebulous cruelty of online bullying, a force ten times more powerful than the irl pranks King first envisioned.
A Completely Reimagined White Family
In addition to modernizing these canon events, Flanagan hints at updates to Carrie’s oppressive upbringing at the hands of her mother, Margaret White (Samantha Sloyan). Dead before the novel begins, we never meet Carrie’s domineering father Ralph, known to carry a bible alongside his gun. Flanagan’s White household will be an altogether different beast. In his version of the story, Carrie and her mother have been hidden away in the unassuming home, forced out of hiding by Ralph’s unexpected death. Perhaps we will finally meet this elusive man whose shadow hangs over his wife and child. Considering the White family’s fundamentalist lifestyle, this reimagining hints at tradwife culture and a home ruled by staunch patriarchal control.
Whereas King’s Carrie has been tormented by her classmates since Kindergarten, Flanagan’s Carrie will be a wide-eyed newcomer to public school, eager to make friends and engage with her peers. We glimpse Carrie cozying up to Chris and the equally popular Sue Snell (Siena Agudong) as she navigates a new social scene. Of course, we know this kindness is part of an elaborate plot designed to lull Carrie into a false sense of camaraderie, setting up an atrocious act of public humiliation. These brief moments of feigned compassion put Sue’s own complicity into question. Will Flanagan’s version of the character find the courage to defend Carrie from vicious bullies or will she succumb to peer pressure and join in the mob mentality?
Perhaps the biggest deviation from King’s original text is the relationship between Carrie and her mother. King’s Margaret White is a horrifically abusive religious zealot whose worldview has been hardened by internalized misogyny. She shames Carrie for menstruating, locks her in a closet to “pray,” and regrets not killing her child in infancy. She’s also responsible for Carrie’s social ostracization. Known to berate her neighbors for their “sins,” Margaret forces her daughter to live by an extreme code of conduct and disallows any potential friends lest they corrupt the girl with their worldly ways.
Flanagan’s version of the character is perhaps just as much a victim as Carrie herself. Also trapped inside her home, his Margaret is overly vigilant, her own trauma manifesting as strict control. Describing a more sympathetic depiction of the iconic villain, Flanagan explains, “Our Margaret White is a woman who fiercely loves her daughter and wants to protect her from this world … [She] doesn’t know how to do that and thinks the way to protect her is to close her off; not punitively, but to create this private utopia.”
Despite this potential softening, Sloyan’s Margaret may still have a sharp edge. Though she has appeared in many Flanagan projects, from Hush (2016) to The Fall of the House of Usher (2023), she is best known for her role as the abhorrent Bev Keane in the poignant saga Midnight Mass (2021). Perhaps inspired by King’s Margaret White, Bev is pious and sadistic, willing to punish anyone who does not adhere to her warped approximation of Catholicism.
Flanagan specifically wrote Margaret with Sloyan in mind, likely remembering the actress’s eerie ability to create deceptive empathy and shift our allegiances on a dime.
Expanding Stephen King’s Telekinetic Universe
While most of King’s story deals with an unthinkable prom night in Chamberlain, Maine, large sections of the semi-epistolary novel see experts debating the nature of telekinesis. Do Carrie’s frightening abilities represent a new phase in human evolution or is the prom night carnage merely a fluke? King settles the debate with a shocking denouement in which a young mother recounts her infant daughter’s ability to dangle her crib toys in midair. We’re left to wonder if she will become another tormented girl who surprises the world with metaphysical strength.
Flanagan plans to build out this brief scene while amplifying themes of female empowerment. After introducing our main cast of characters, episode two will open with an unrelated story in which we meet another girl with the TK gene. Each subsequent chapter will expand this world, building out a roster of telekinetic young women. Considering King’s fondness for stories about powerful kids, often described as possessing “the shining,” Constant Readers will no doubt have their eyes peeled for various Easter Eggs nodding to the author’s vast catalogue.
Giving Carrie Her Own Voice
Perhaps the most striking distinction in Flanagan’s new trailer is the extent to which we hear Carrie’s voice. The sneak peek is fully narrated by the titular prom queen as she demands accountability. “I want to know why,” she explains while detailing Chris’ elaborate plan. Aside from the aforementioned coda, King’s book essentially ends with the aftermath of the prom night tragedy, leaving little time for Carrie to reflect. His shifting narrative does bring the reader into her fragile mind, though not before she’s been cowed by relentless cruelty. We watch Carrie sink into bloodthirsty revenge, but never hear a considered desire for justice or repair.
Flanagan’s original monologue allows Carrie to voice her pain and mourn the life she could have had. We’re also treated to a mug shot-style photo of Chris with a bruised and bandaged face, implying that the mean girl will have to answer for her senseless sadism.
Flanagan is known for filling his series adaptations with heartwrenching speeches that cut to the heart of his thematic intentions, and this teaser seems to follow suit. After years of fans, critics, and scholars analyzing Carrie’s pain, perhaps his modern retelling will offer the titular anti-hero a chance to finally speak for herself.
You must be logged in to post a comment.