So remember earlier this year when Resident Evil: The Final Chapter came to theaters and signified the end of the video game franchise’s movie run? Well, it turns out it wasn’t exactly final after all.
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Variety is reporting that the franchise will make a return in reboot form, as part of an original six-movie franchise that will be produced by Constantin Film.
Details about the franchise haven’t been revealed just yet, but Marin Moskowicz, chairman of the board for Constantin Film, noted that the franchise would be completely new, and won’t lean on characters from the previous films, like Milla Jovovich’s Alice.
It’s not really a surprise that Resident Evil is coming back to theaters. Despite the franchise not doing blockbuster business here in the U.S., The Final Chapter did pretty well overseas, earning $312 million worldwide, including nearly half of that in China alone.
It’s not likely that director Paul W.S. Anderson, who directed a few of the films in the series, will return, as he’s hard at work on bringing another Capcom franchise to the big screen, Monster Hunter, which is set to arrive sometime in late 2017 or early 2018. So that means the new Resident Evil will go in a different direction.
The question is if Constantin will turn back to the video games to introduce characters that haven’t had a chance to shine yet. After all, Capcom recently did a little rebooting of its own with the series, releasing the more survival/horror based Resident Evil 7: Biohazard earlier in the year. The game was definitely a turn for the better from the criticized Resident Evil 6, which was more action than horror, and became a big-seller for Capcom. The company hopes it’ll sell even more copies this year, with the strength of incoming downloadable content, including free and premium.
Whether Resident Evil can return to form has yet to be seen, but it’s nice to see Constantin is considering a fresh approach instead of trying to continue Alice’s story. We’ll let you know what the studio has in mind in the months ahead – but here’s hoping for a reboot with the same caliber as Biohazard.
