Resident Evil (2022) / YMMV

Critical Dissonance: Critics gave very lukewarm ratings to it, with it having a 54% on Rotten Tomatoes. Audiences were much more critical, giving it a 26% score.
Ensemble Dark Horse: Richard Baxter AKA "John Thicc" has received some praise for having the best choreographed fight scene in the show where he single-handedly mows down an entire horde of zombies and militiamen with a level of military precision that would make the Baba Yaga proud.
It's the Same, Now It Sucks!: A case where this reaction combines with They Changed It, Now It Sucks!. A lot of Resident Evil fans weren't impressed that the series went the same route as the Paul W.S Anderson films and focused on a Zombie Apocalypse only loosely connected to the games' storyline. Although the games have featured several large-scale zombie virus outbreaks and occasional apocalyptic close-calls, none of the games focus on worldwide societal collapse (most of the threats in the games are contained more to a single, specific area). As such, many fans were frustrated that after finally getting a new live-action Resident Evil adaptation, it went the same route as the films rather than going with a plot more in line with the games. It doesn't help that over the past decade or so, there had been a glut of zombie apocalypse movies, shows and games, so 2022's Resident Evil missed an opportunity to do something different.
Magnificent Bastard:
- Albert Wesker is one of two clones of the original who retains his brilliance while lacking his sociopathy. Initially appearing as a kind, if odd, man, Wesker shows his ruthlessness when his daughter Billie is accused of attacking another student, leveraging his position at Umbrella to force the student's father to drop the issue lest his career be ruined. When Billie breaks into an Umbrella facility and is bitten by a zombie dog, Wesker pretends that he was actually attacked to keep her safe. When Umbrella captures a reporter, Wesker reluctantly tortures the man under CEO Evelyn Marcus' orders in order to not arouse suspicion of himself. After his daughters uncover a series of intricate clues designed to help them escape Umbrella if needed, Wesker murders the reporter to keep Billie's infection from being revealed. When Evelyn discovers Billie's infection, Wesker blows himself up in an attempt to kill her, allowing his daughters and clone brother to escape Umbrella.
- Richard Baxter is a quirky yet ruthless Umbrella agent sent to capture Jade Wesker. After nearly capturing her in their first meeting, Baxter tracks her to Dover and uses Umbrella's resources and his own investigative skills to foil both of her attempts to escape to France. Retaining his sense of humor even after being shot and captured by a psychotic cult, Baxter picks the lock to his and Jade's cage and frees his fellow Umbrella agents to stage an escape. Baxter then proves himself to be an excellent combatant, wiping out a horde of zombies and several cultists with precision and flair.
Memetic Mutation:
- "Zootopia porn is canon to Resident Evil."^Explanation
- Comparing Wesker to Blade.^Explanation
- The "Don't Start Now" dance became a meme almost immediately, to the point where there are even crossovers with the similarly bizarre "Have Sex" dance.
Narm: Apparently, video calls in this universe are made through MS Paint◊ and later Notepad◊.
Narm Charm: The "Don't Start Now" dance is completely out of place and random... but the actress' enjoyment of the moment and commitment to it is hard not to, in the very least, admire. Story-wise and in context, it actually demonstrates, though oddly, how much control Billie has over Evelyn and, by extension, Umbrella.
Nightmare Retardant: Richard being torn apart by a horde of zombies goes from scary to hilarious when the only reaction he has to it is a monotone "Oh, fuck."
Questionable Casting: Lance Reddick as Albert Wesker left quite a lot of people scratching their heads given that the show was described as following the games' canon, spawning a good deal of pre-release Epileptic Trees as to how the Race Lift might've happened in-universe, such as Grand Theft Me. (As it turns out, the events of the games happened in the show timeline in Broad Strokes, but Wesker was indeed Black all along in this universe.) Unlike most cases though, his ability to portray the character was never in doubt, and his performance is commonly cited as one of the main redeeming aspects of the show.
Special Effects Failure: There's a scene of a video call between Jade and Ángel Rubio where, if one pays attention to the Windows 10 taskbar underneath, you can notice Jade is somehow having a video call through MS Paint, and with no internet connection to boot.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: In Episode 4, Richard Baxter began to really shine as a character through his Teeth-Clenched Teamwork with Jade. Developing a solid Straight Man and Wise Guy rapport with her while showing off impressive combat skills. Unfortunately, Baxter ends up being unceremoniously Devoured by the Horde in the very same episode, which led to a ton of viewers expressing disappointment with how he was killed off so soon.
They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: Some people who were interested in the Even Evil Has Loved Ones idea of Wesker, the remorseless murderer out to take over the world, caring about his daughters found it rather a cop-out that the Wesker who cares about his daughters is only a clone of the Wesker who tried to take over the world. In general, the first five episodes spend a lot of time on humanizing moments with the notorious villain, only for Bert to claim that not only is clone-Albert not the original, but that (rather than, say, being a clone that the original Wesker uploaded his mind into) the clone has nothing in common with the original (despite showing traits such as skill at lying and deception, scientific genius, etc), leaving it unclear whether the clone even has the original's memories (a reference to William Birkin suggests that he might) or whether they really do have nothing in common except genetics. Considering the original Wesker only has two brief scenes, both of which only show him at his most villainous, and is now supposedly dead...it comes across like the season spent a lot of time supposedly giving depth and complexity to Wesker's character, only to reveal it wasn't actually him and that we still know almost nothing about the real Wesker of this universe beyond the basic "evil, mad scientist, wears sunglasses, has superpowers, died in a volcano".
Took the Bad Film Seriously: Even by detractors, Lance Reddick as Albert Wesker has been near-universally praised as the only positive aspect of the series. Which is more a testament to Lance's strength as an actor and his ability to capture Wesker's menace as a villain rather than the actual writing of the show, which is widely regarded as being a Cliché Storm.
Uncertain Audience: Critics and viewers weren't sure whether the series wanted to be a high school drama with horror elements or a full on Zombie Apocalypse story, as the plot keeps jumping between two separate plotlines. Needless to say, people who were there for the zombies and monsters quickly got bored of the high school drama, while people who were there for the high school plot weren't interested in the zombie After the End story. Even existing fans of the franchise were alienated, as the high-school drama isn't common in the series, and the actual zombie bits are so In Name Only that it's hard to appreciate. All of this led to a rather tepid reception upon release.
Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Jade certainly didn't win many fans, as most of her screen time is dedicated to showing how much better things would be if she didn't exist. As a teen, she assaults Billie's bully, which led to Billie almost getting expelled, while being invited by Albert to visit the lab led to her kicking off the Zombie Apocalypse; she also destroys all of the evidence against Umbrella in Albert's basement by plugging out the computer forcefully. She's no better as an adult, including bringing a zombie to her ship just to test a pheromone while her daughter was in the room, leading to the zombie escaping and killing her pregnant best friend. Her abrasiveness is intended to show her as a tough survivor, but viewers find she tends to come off as self-absorbed or downright callous. While her impulsiveness is an intended character flaw, the amount of damage she tends to cause via her reckless actions and her apparent failure to learn from this even as an adult (which includes repeatedly endangering her own child) just made her look worse to viewers.
Visual Effects of Awesome: The CGI used to create the giant caterpillar looks fantastic.

YMMV / Resident Evil (2022)

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