A new Resident Evil series clip finds Ella Balinska’s Jade Wesker facing a zombie traffic jam

Road conditions during a zombie apocalypse are never optimal, and in Netflix’s latest Resident Evil series clip, Ella Balinska’s Jade Wesker encounters an undead traffic jam. In the scene, Jade questions why she and her fellow survivors can’t hit the road, and the answer is that an ocean of undead is obstructing the roadways. This moment in the series depicts a classic Resident Evil scenario. Many games in the franchise have featured pathways blocked by zombie hordes, infected dogs, and the most sinister obstacle of all, impenetrable caution tape.

The Resident Evil series will show events playing out in two different timelines:

In the first timeline, fourteen-year-old sisters Jade and Billie Wesker are moved to New Raccoon City. A manufactured, corporate town, forced on them right as adolescence is in full swing. But the more time they spend there, the more they come to realize that the town is more than it seems and their father may be concealing dark secrets. Secrets that could destroy the world.

Cut to the second timeline, well over a decade into the future: there are less than fifteen million people left on Earth. And more than six billion monsters — people and animals infected with the T-virus. Jade, now thirty, struggles to survive in this New World while the secrets from her past – about her sister, her father, and herself – continue to haunt her.

Resident Evil stars Lance Reddick (The Guest) as Albert Wesker, Ella Balinska (Charlie’s Angels) as the adult Jade Wesker, Tamara Smart (Artemis Fowl) as teenage Jade Wesker, Siena Agudong (Upside-Down Magic) as Billie Wesker, Paola Nuñez (Bad Boys for Life) as Albert Wesker’s associate Evelyn Marcus, Ahad Raza Mir (Hum Tum) as Jade’s husband Arj, Connor Gosatti (3rd Night) as teenager Simon, and Adeline Rudolph (Chilling Adventures of Sabrina) in an unspecified role.

The new Resident Evil series clip teases the latest attempt to adapt the classic video game franchise that blends horror, survival, and conspiracy into an action-packed adventure. Showrunner Andrew Dabb recently explained to Entertainment Weekly that his Netflix series “took all the games and smashed them together.” This approach may sound like a risky venture, but Dabb sounds confident about the process. Dabb says that he and the writing team “treated the events and mythology of all the games as if they were the backstory for their show to launch a brand new story for the franchise.”

I’ve said this before, and I’ll repeat it, I think telling a new story in the Resident Evil universe is the way to go. Many adaptations have tried and failed to recreate the magic of the video game series. It’s possible that forging a new path will create something fresh in a familiar world. I think Resident Evil fans will welcome the opportunity, seeing as trying to recreate iconic moments from the games has yielded mediocre results.

Are you excited about Netflix’s Resident Evil series? Do you think this will finally be the time filmmakers do the series justice? Let us know in the comments section below.