Resident Evil’s Best New Protagonist Is Debuting This Fall

Ill-equipped or not, playable characters in Resident Evil games are usually skilled in combat and unafraid of the terrors that lurk behind every corridor corner. Even Resident Evil 7 and Resident Evil Village’s Ethan Winters, who is audibly terrified throughout both games, knows his way around multiple types of pistols, shotguns, rifles, and so forth.

However, even if characters like Chris Redfield and Billy Coen are not visibly disturbed, the characters' avatars have always been less important to the experience than how the player chooses to navigate these games’ labyrinths of locked doors and environmental puzzles (not so much in action-heavy entries like Resident Evil 4, Resident Evil 5, and Resident Evil 6).

And, for the first time, a new installment is about to finally depict a faithful interpretation of what it feels like to traverse a Resident Evil game as a scared player and not know what is beyond each fixed camera angle until they head that way themselves.

It remains to be seen how terrific he will be, but if the Resident Evil movie’s Bryan, played by Austin Abrams, can truly evoke the same behaviors and tendencies that novice gamers experience when playing a Resident Evil game, it is possible he could become one of the best Resident Evil protagonists that the franchise has ever had.

Instead of a video game character being the avatar that the player acts through or role-plays as, the protagonist of Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil movie is essentially taking on the role of the player, and how they might maneuver in the world of the game if they were suddenly dropped into it. This evidently manifests in crucial shots being missed when Bryan is low on ammo and not knowing how to use firearms proficiently, as well as being rightfully horrified at the sight of every new B.O.W. abomination in and around Raccoon City.

This is undoubtedly the right route for the movie to take, too, as the narrative is typically what proves unmemorable or lackluster in Resident Evil games. Meanwhile, the actual gameplay and the survival horror formula they have cultivated are what make them special.

To be fair, Resident Evil protagonists have never needed to be relatable. It is fun to play characters who are not paralyzed with fear, as many ordinary people might be in the same scenarios as, say, Jill Valentine or Leon S. Kennedy.

But, fearful characters can be more empathetic, with Resident Evil Requiem’s Grace Ashcroft being a prime example—an admission of Capcom’s, really—of how survival horror gameplay is more immersive when the protagonist is scared, too. This same ethos, if it has any weight, is precisely why a character like Bryan is essential to Cregger’s Resident Evil if it is to be a horror movie rather than an action movie.

Resident Evil is scheduled to be released in theaters on September 18, 2026.