As Zach Cregger prepares to bring Resident Evil to the big screen once again, he’s venturing outside the canon for a new story.
The director, who is rebooting the franchise for Sony, recently explained that although he’s “not breaking the rules of the games,” the movie depicts a story “outside of the characters of the games.”
“I am the biggest worshiper of the games, so I’m telling a story that is a love letter to the games and follows the rules of the games,” he told Inverse.
“It is obedient to the lore of the games, it’s just a different story,” added Cregger. “I’m not going to tell Leon’s story, because Leon’s story is told in the games. [Fans] already have that.”
At CinemaCon in March, Cregger echoed teased that his adaptation is “built in the spirit of those games and follows one central protagonist from point A to point B, as they descend deeper into hell.”
‘Resident Evil: Afterlife’ (2010) (Screen Gems/Courtesy Everett Collection)
Co-written with Shay Hatten, Cregger’s Resident Evil landed at Sony in March. Meanwhile, Austin Abrams is in talks to star in the reboot.
“I’ve been a rabid fan of these games for decades, and to be able to bring this amazing title to life is a true honor,” he told Deadline at the time.
Based on the 1996 Capcom video game, Resident Evil has been adapted into seven movies since 2002, including a 2021 reboot, surpassing $1.2 billion at the box office. In 2022, Netflix canceled its Resident Evil series after one season.