Great characters always leave their mark, and in the world of Resident Evil, there are a vast assortment sharing that distinction. However, for many there is one name alone that continually rises above the rest, Barry Burton.
An Editorial By Clark Thompson
Resident Evil is my favorite video game of all time. Surprisingly however, I’ve only played as Chris Redfield three or four times over countless playthroughs spanning the last 17 years. Is it because I dislike Chris, or his campaign?
Chris is a fucking tank. It’s simply due to the distinct lack of Barry Burton. I’ve routinely promised myself I would remedy this character related imbalance only to ditch the idea at the last minute in favor of more Burton.
The first time I played Resident Evil I played as Jill Valentine. A choice that imbued my respective experience with a majestic quality I would have otherwise missed out on. That majesty coming in the form of the flowing red beard, flawed logic, compulsive confusion, tactical prowess, and eloquence encapsulated in Barry Burton.
No other character in the series evokes such a sense of excitement with little more than their presence alone. You never knew when he was going to pop up, let alone the hilarity and heroism these encounters would entail. You see, Barry embodied the truly unique quality of being completely laughable in most respects, while also being a deeply admirable and valued companion.
As a gamer new to Resident Evil’s horrific scenario, where ammo is scarce and threats are many, I was all too eager to have Barry in my corner, if for no other reason than to bear witness to the awesome might of his Colt Python revolver. You felt safe when he was around. A towering, brawny gun nut who looked better suited to wrestling great apes in a caged arena rather than being part of a modern special forces unit.
Even more than the added sense of security, you couldn’t wait to hear what ridiculous shit he was going to spout. To say Barry Burton has a way with words would be immensely underselling the gravitas of his performance. He is the Adam West of the Resident Evil universe. But instead of calculated verbal ineptitude, his unwieldy use of prose seemingly boiled down to a fumbled script reading, and possibly some base difficulty in perceiving the proper usage of the English language.
However, the mystery deepens further when you discover that the man responsible for both the vocal performance and on-screen likeness of old red beard, Barry Gjerde, made his living providing quite competent voice over work for commercials and corporate videos in Japan, where he continues to work as, of all things, a translator.
So how then did this travesty of form occur?
Who knows. But as one mystery deepens, another yields. No longer must we ponder the warrior’s spirit of Barry. Mr. Gjerde, it turns out, is of Nordic descent, which easily explains the mighty stature and battle ready demeanor of our main man. Barry Burton is a fucking Viking!
By now even those not in the know would probably recognize his most famous line, which was directed towards Jill in the opening ten minutes of the game. The duo are about to split up to further investigate the mansion when Barry cautions Jill to take a certain item with her that may later come to her aid. The line is as follows. “And… JILL! Here’s a lock pick. It might be handy if you, the master of unlocking, take it with you.”
As if the mere words spoken weren’t enough on their own, his brilliant enunciation elevates the line to grand spectacle. For many, this was the moment Barry changed from a supporting character, to an outright obsession.
One of the first things this guy does is pose a question, which is responded to with the same question, to which he responds by answering his own original question. Upon entering the dining hall of the Arklay Mansion facility, Barry bends down to examine some blood on the floor.
Barry: “What!? What is this?”
Jill: “What is it?”
Barry: “Blood.”
This scene is followed by a display of Barry’s tactical prowess as he unloads his magnum into an approaching zombie, causing the first fatality by exploded brain case in the series. Barry Burton is all business, even if answering his own ill-conceived questions seemingly preoccupies him.
Barry’s multiple encounters with Jill quickly become a gleaming highlight of the experience. As the introductory segment of the adventure winds down and we move onto the guard house, there’s a bit of a Burton dry spell. That is, after a curious scene where he can be heard seemingly talking to himself from the other side of a closed door. When Jill questions him about it, he explains that talking to himself is starting to become a habit. He then hilariously states the following in a poor attempt at humor. “I’ll just go and get some fresh air, and be EATEN by a monster.”
At this point, one might think he’s hit his ceiling, but nothing could be further from the truth. For those of you who don’t know, this part of the original game featured RE‘s first depiction of mutated flora, in the form of the gigantic Plant 42. Upon encountering it for the first time, this thing was terrifying. Swatting at you with giant tentacles, and dropping acidic organic material on you from above.
It seemed like things were going to be rough, that is until a couple of well placed flame round bursts from the bazooka shriveled it up like George Costanza’s penis after a dip in the pool.
However, that wasn’t the end of the battle. The plant quickly regained its size and grabs Jill. At this point Barry enters the scene with his now infamous catch phrase, “What the hell is this!?” He proceeds to lay waste to the foul abomination by blasting it into oblivion with his newly acquired flamethrower. And then, again in his signature style of broken verbiage, he leaves the player gut hurt from laughter at his weird response to Jill’s gratitude.
Jill: “You saved me!”
Barry: “Yeaaahhh.”
Jill: “That was close. Thanks Barry.”
Barry: “Don’t mention it. What a monster! I can’t believe… What THE HELL is this place anyway!?”
By this point Barry has been elevated to a comedy legend, making all subsequent encounters an utter joy. But the joy is cut short, as it’s revealed that Barry is under orders from rogue captain Wesker, and has turned on you in favor of keeping his family alive. But again, Barry proves not to be a pushover when he introduces Wesker’s skull to the butt of his magnum.
Mere moments later he royally fucks up by inadvertently letting the beast known as the Tyrant loose from it’s holding tube, taking a claw slash to the mid section in the process. This sends him sailing into some nearby computer equipment, leaving Jill to do battle with the hulking beast.
When the Tyrant is felled, Barry again proves you can’t keep a good Burton down by rising to his feet with little more than some residual embarrassment at his admittedly clumsy maneuver.
My first official run of the game was soon complete, but it was funny, with all the harrowing, spooky and gory mayhem I experienced and loved, the one thing I kept coming back to was this Barry Burton fellow. I just couldn’t shake him from my mind. This soon led to many late nights of joking exclusively at this characters expense, while simultaneously celebrating his awesomeness.
The moment Barry reveals to Jill the mutilated body of their teammate, Forest, on the second floor balcony still resonates with me. Barry exclaims what truly sounds like: “It’s Forest. OH MY CAWD!”
Of course I know it’s supposed to be God, but to this very day all I hear is Cawd. Still waiting to hear back from Capcom regarding my brilliant idea for a spin off game, “Barry Burton’s: Oh My Cod Fishing.”
Well, after that, another Resident Evil game came and went without so much as a mention of Barry, and my hopes for his return to the series were dashed. That is, until his small cameo at the end of Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, where he extracts Jill via helicopter from an overrun Raccoon City moments before a tactical nuclear strike. You hear him before you see him, and I distinctly remember jumping to my feet and yelling “It’s Barry!” at the top of my lungs, rushing from my bedroom to gather my little brothers for this monumental occurrence.
Needless to say I was overjoyed at this development, as I was when reading his epilogue card acquired after the game’s completion that depicted him bidding farewell to his family in favor of helping his comrades end the menace of Umbrella Inc. However, that was the last time Barry Burton would return to the core series in any kind of narrative capacity, which to me and many others felt like a slap in the face.
There’s no Burton to be seen save for an incredibly shitty Gameboy color game, Resident Evil Gaiden, and a cameo in Resident Evil 5‘s mercenaries mode, which really doesn’t amount to jack shit. Burton fans have been continually fucked over since the dawn of the new Millennium.
A simple Youtube, or Google image search yields dozens of Burton related materials by a devoted fan base of people just like me, who were completely enamored by the character the first time they slogged through that zombie infested mansion.
That is why Barry Burton is Resident Evil’s greatest character. He was only ever a supporting role in a single scenario of a single game in the series, yet his memory still burns in the minds of his many fans. Not to mention the desire to see him triumphantly return to the series someday. Perhaps an entirely new generation could discover the potency of this legendary character.
To put it bluntly, he’s really powerful, especially against living things.
Clark Thompson is a 31-year-old horror fanatic currently residing in Kelowna B.C. His main goals in life are to one day experience a zombie apocolypse,and/or undergo surgery to have his heart mounted on the exterior of his chest. You can reach him at clarkthomspon@yahoo.ca or on facebook Clorkwork Torange.
