Resident Evil (2022)

Every scene is a cliffhanger. The end of every episode is a bigger cliffhanger. You will binge-watch like you have never binge-watched before. If it is your sort of thing in even the slightest way.

Resident Evil is a zombie caper that knows what it’s here for. And that is to fill the screen with rampaging hordes of undead and to reassure horror fans that there is life after The Walking Dead. Those boxes are ticked in dead impressive fashion.

Resident Evil marks an ambitious new direction to start charting the next phase. Where the latest big-screen installment faltered by looking too hard in the past, Netflix’s entry finds its stride while looking to the future.

Not everything in this show clicks. The biggest problem is the character of Jade, who is, regrettably, super-annoying in both timelines. ... Most of the show works quite well, however.

Given the six choppy hours that preceded “Resident Evil’s” rousing two-part ending, it’s hard to trust future seasons will stick with the bananas spirit Season 1 stumbled upon.

As a new Resident Evil title, the series passes the test of including just enough nods to the franchise to keep longtime fans happy, while not alienating new viewers at the same time. ... The two-timeline structure, however, is the show’s weakest link. Though intended to create enough questions to keep people watching, the abrupt shifts between the present and future make it difficult to get fully invested in both storylines.

Plagued by some of the most frustrating storytelling choices currently spreading throughout TV: constant jumping back and forth across a split timeline; “strong female characters” who often lack interiority; a padded episode count that causes the narrative to sag in the middle. When Resident Evil attempts to be serious, hard-edged sci-fi (which is often), it’s indistinguishable from all the other zombie-related content out there.

“Resident Evil” doesn’t reinvent the zombie wheel, as it juggles too many storylines without honing in on one vision for the series. Fans of the series of the genre may find some enjoyable moments amid this apocalyptic tale. Reddick also gives a dynamic performance as the show progresses, but his absence from scenes leaves viewers hungry for more.

The same beats get repeated, neither timeline’s emotional journey feels all that tense, and the outbreak as a whole is far too drawn out. A zombie apocalypse stretched out over two timelines shouldn’t feel this overly labored and passé.

Ultimately though, after an okay opening episode, Resident Evil settles into an action-adventure slog rather than anything remotely new or scary. The complete absence of “horror” here is an egregious sin.

This slapdash approach doesn’t make use of the franchise’s rich 26-year history, nor does it tell a compelling enough story to make it feel fresh. Much like the putrefied flesh of a grotesque zombie, Resident Evil stinks.

If you’re going to make an “RE” show, either lean into its rich history or do something that adds an entirely new chapter to it, but don’t fall into the unconfident valley in the middle, which is where this show feels content to live.

The whole thing is shonky. The writing, by necessity, is largely expository and clichéd (“Scientists said the world would end in 2036,” Jade’s opening monologue announces. “But they were wrong: the world ended a long time ago”), though they also find room for some weird asides, courtesy, mainly, of Paola Núñez’s very evil Evelyn Marcus.

A very bleak series. Unfolding in the present and future, it's not particularly engaging in either time frame, feeling less like an evolution than an uninspired variant of what's come before.

Save for a typically sturdy Lance Reddick turn, it’s the sort of half-baked thriller most fans will likely abandon mid-adventure.