My first exposure to Resident Evil was through the movies.
I actually did not begin playing the video games until Biohazard in 2017.
Realizing a much better experience lay in the games, I ditched rewatching the movies until this year, when Zach Cregger released the latest Resident Evil adaptation.
Before going to the theater, I watched all seven movies.
Now that I have seen the most recent film, I will rank all eight from worst to best, spoilers included.
Unfortunately, we are going to have to get through a lot of bad first before I can talk about the good.
8. Resident Evil: The Final Chapter.
The Final Chapter was actually a first watch for me.
Back when the movie came out, I heard the terrible reviews it was getting, even in comparison to the other Milla Jovovich movies, so I decided to steer clear of it.
When I sat down to watch the film, I wondered if it was bad as everyone had warned me it was.
Was it?
It is at the bottom of this list, so what do you think?
Resident Evil: The Final Chapter is an absolutley atrocious movie with the worst action editing I have ever seen put to film.
Every single action scene is depicted through disorienting quick-cuts, with multiple cuts per-second from different angles.
This makes it impossible to tell just what the hell is going on, and makes every action sequence deeply unpleasant to look at.
Say what you will about the other Milla Jovovich movies, but at least we could tell what was happening.
The story is just as poor, with countless retcons and bland characters, many of whoms names I do not think we were even told.
As for the game characters who were adapted, they were done just as much of a disservice.
Wesker is killed by a freaking door for god’s sake.
The only good thing I can say about this movie is that Iain Glen gives a good performance as the villain, even if his character is retconned into being alive.
Otherwise, this movie is a travesty with the worst editing I have had the displeasure of witnessing.
There is no doubt in my mind this is the worst Resident Evil movie.
7. Resident Evil: Retribution.
The penultimate movie in the Paul W.S Anderson series, Retribution is better than The Final Chapter, although that is not saying much about its quality.
To get my few positives out of the way, I like those cast as the video game characters, especially Kevin Durand as Barry Burton.
There were also a few scenes I would call so bad that they are enjoyable, at least on an ironic level.
And that is all I have for positives.
Retribution begins with an awful slow-motion rewind scene which completely undercuts the ending of the previous movie.
From there, we follow Alice as she explores various apocalypse biomes developed by Umbrella.
She is aided in her escape by characters from the games and gains an adopted daughter along the way, all of whom disappear in the next movie.
Along with characters from the games, those from previous movies return as clones but they all pretty much have no personality so there is nothing of value there.
Retribution honestly feels of little value, especially since it all builds up to a cliffhanger that is abandoned in the final movie.
But at least the action is understandable, so that puts it above The Final Chapter.
6. Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City.
Alongside the latest adaptation and The Final Chapter, Welcome to Racoon City was the other first-time watch for me.
Starting the movie, I expected it would be high on this list because I had heard it tried to be faithful to the games.
Unfortunately, that did the movie no favors.
Welcome to Raccoon City jams the stories from the first two Resident Evil games into a single movie, creating an extremely bloated movie, with too many characters to focus on in such a short amount of time.
Despite the bloated nature of the movie, it also somehow felt too small scale.
Welcome to Raccoon Small Town would have been a more accurate title than Raccoon City.
And even though this adaptation tried to be faithful in some aspects, it absolutely failed in others, especially with the characters.
The characters from the Milla Jovovich movies were more faithful to the games, which I cannot believe I am saying.
The director, Johannes Roberts, clearly knew a lot of details about the original story so, for the life of me, I cannot understand why he decided to depict Leon Kennedy as a bumbling buffoon who primarily serves as comedic relief.
Claire was the only character who felt even remotely like her video game counterpart.
That and a very-well shot scene where Chris fights zombies in the dark were the only saving graces of this movie.
Otherwise it was a big disappointment, which bumped it this low on the list.
5. Resident Evil: Afterlife.
From here on out, I find the movies on this list to be enjoyable.
Not necessarily great, but the kind of film you can just turn your brain off while watching and have a good time.
Still, that does not mean Afterlife is devoid of issues.
For one, the trend of undercutting the previous movie’s ending continues here, with all of the clones from Extinction being killed off in the opening scene.
Sure, that scene itself was good, but it was disappointing to see.
I also personally found a few logical inconsistencies with the movie, which drew my brain out of its off mode to question things.
Also, there is entirely too much slow motion.
This is epitomized by a fight scene between Claire and a bioweapon, which takes place entirely in slow-mo.
However, although there was a lot of bad, there is also some good.
I liked the Luther West character, and the adaptation of Chris Redfield was good (even if his character was never mentioned again afterwards).
The final fight with Wesker was also a lot of fun, and its final moment with the exploding plane was a good bit of payoff that made me laugh.
Speaking of, the payoffs in this movie were also really good, like Alice loading coins into the shotgun.
So, although there is a lot of bad, there is enough good in Afterlife to make it at least enjoyable.
4. Resident Evil: Extinction.
I remembered not liking Extinction when I was younger, so I was quite surprised to find myself enjoying it on rewatch.
Sure, it is not stunning, but it has a lot of good qualities, like the action scenes.
The crow scene felt inventive, and the scene of Alice and the gang fighting advanced zombies in Vegas had a lot of fun.
Carlos’ sacrifice after this scene is the best written death in the Jovovich movies (not like it had much competition though).
Iain Glen is also once again great as the antagonist, and I really liked the practical elements of his final transformation.
The way they brought back the lasers for Alice to defeat him was a nice touch, as well.
Although I liked the practical effects, the CGI is very dated, but that is the case for almost all of these films.
Also, Extinction just often does not feel like a Resident Evil movie.
The wasteland gives off more of a Mad-Max vibe, and Alice’s telekenetic abilities felt especially ridiculous here.
Even if it does not feel like Resident Evil, though, Extinction still provides enough good for me to rank it higher than I originally thought I would.
3. Resident Evil: Apocalypse.
Before rewatching Apocalypse, I was confident it would be my favorite of the Milla Jovovich movies.
This was the first Resident Evil movie I watched after all, so it had a lot of nostalgia for me.
Unfortunately, the action was less stellar than I remembered, with a lot of shaky-cam and bad editing, which made me rank it a spot lower than I expected.
Still, Apocalypse is one of the better Jovovich movies.
The characters from the games it adapts, like Jill, Carlos and Nemesis are all great.
Even some of the movie-original characters, like L.J, are a lot of fun.
His “Because I usually drive a cadillac” lines still gets a laugh out of me to this day.
I would also say that I like this depiction of Raccoon City the best out of any movie.
It actually felt like I was seeing the collapse of a city, rather than a small town like in Welcome to Raccoon City.
While not outstanding, Apocalypse will always be a movie I feel nostalgia towards for introducing me to the Resident Evil franchise.
2. Resident Evil (2002).
Yes, I think the Resident Evil movies starring Milla Jovovich get worse as they go along, with the first being the best of them.
Sure, it might not make for the most interesting of lists, but I am being true to myself here.
Much like with Extinction, I was surprised by how much fun I had with this movie on rewatch.
Watching the fall of the Hive in the opening scene is tense, and what follows is a very solid zombie flick.
The laser scene is a highlight, being probably the most memorable moment from the Jovovich films.
As for the undead, they are well done in this movie, with the depiction of Spencer’s zombie being particularly unnerving.
What I especially like about this adaptation was that, if you removed the Hive being located beneath Raccoon City and set the story elsewhere, it would still feel like the movie fit into the universe of the games.
If there were never any sequels, then this could have been a decent, standalone story set in the world of Resident Evil.
For better or worse though, there were sequels, and if those films lead to Zach Cregger’s adaptation then I am at least grateful for that.
1. Resident Evil (2026).
Speaking of which, is anybody surprised that the latest adaptation of Resident Evil is my favorite?
Even having only seen it once, I can confidently say this movie is leagues above the rest.
Set during the fall of Raccoon City, the film follows medical courier Bryan, who gets caught up in the madness.
We follow him as he goes through scenes which could all work in a video game format.
I would say the first act is definitely the best with its tension building and terrifying jump scares.
The reveal of the infected dog, and the farm owner attacking Bryan both nearly made me jump out of my seat.
The rest of the film is almost as good with one grim set-piece after another, many of which I am going to remember for a while.
There is the infected girl, the rats bursting through the fat guy in the sewers, the raining zombies, the acid elevator and, most disturbing of all, the maternity ward.
All of this builds to the tragic ending where Bryan fails to get the cure and transforms into the kind of monstrous abomination we would expect to fight as Leon or Claire.
The entire movie is basically the backstory for a Resident Evil boss.
Despite the tragedy of this ending, I do think it could have hit harder emotionally if there was less humor in the third act, which is my only criticism of the film.
As it stands, Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil is the first live-action film in this franchise I can truly call a great movie.
It tells a simple story, full of intense and terrifying set-pieces, which all build to a tragic ending, which places it firmly at the top of this list as the best Resident Evil movie.
