It can be tough to do a successful screen adaptation of a video game, and many have fallen short, even if they turn out to be commercial successes. With The Last of US due to air on HBO next year, as well as the release of Uncharted earlier this year, taking a game and putting it on the big or small screen is evidently proving lucrative. Then there's the recent Resident Evil Netflix show, which doesn't seem to have gone down well, but the showrunner has been discussing future plans for the adaptation.
Andrew Dabb has been speaking to Polygon about some ideas going forward for the Resident Evil TV show. It seems as though, according to the interview, there may be some opportunity as the series progresses to incorporate more characters from the games, such as Jill Valentine or Claire Redfield. Dabb also specifically mentioned that they would like Resident Evil Village's Lady Dimitrescu to make an appearance. In fact, he pretty much said that he "wants it all," including the "plant monster." So it's possible the show could have a lot more tie-ins with its original source material.
It's hardly surprising that the eighth game's tyrannical matriarch was mentioned as a possible character to be featured in the Netflix adaptation. Lady Dimitrescu became a rising star of the Resident Evil universe from the moment she was first revealed in the summer of 2020. It was a later appearance, though, that caused her to become the subject of much internet infatuation, despite her being a brutal antagonist of the game. Dabb didn't go into any details about her or any other character's possible appearance in the show, but fans will likely be interested to see whether the idea does come to fruition.
Unfortunately, despite what Dabb is saying about the future, the Resident Evil Netflix adaptation is doing poorly with fans and critics. As of this article going live, it currently has a critic score of 49% and an audience score of 26% on Rotten Tomatoes. IMDB is currently showing a rating of just 3.6 out of 10.
Whether the subsequent seasons will be a little truer to the games remains to be seen, but it does seem like this could be a possibility. For many, Resident Evil is the most iconic video game franchise around, producing some truly terrifying moments and helping to usher in the era of the survival horror genre. It's a shame, then, that the show is just not impressing viewers, possibly due to its detachment from the source material.
Resident Evil is now streaming on Netflix.
Source: Polygon