{"id":83595,"date":"2026-09-09T21:24:02","date_gmt":"2026-09-09T13:24:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=83595"},"modified":"2026-09-09T21:24:02","modified_gmt":"2026-09-09T13:24:02","slug":"resident-evil-movie-director-reacts-to-backlash-says-he-was-naive-to-think-gamers-would-embrace-him","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=83595","title":{"rendered":"Resident Evil Movie Director Reacts To Backlash, Says He Was \u201cNaive\u201d To Think Gamers Would Embrace Him"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.gamespot.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Screenshot-2026-09-09-at-8.21.45-AM.png?w=300\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">One of the talking points surrounding the upcoming Resident Evil movie is that director Zach Cregger took an original idea and slapped the Resident Evil name on it. That&#8217;s not true, Cregger has said, and now he&#8217;s shared more of his thought process as it relates to some of the blowback from fans of the games. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">He told IGN that, in retrospect, he feels it was &#8220;naive&#8221; to think that fans of the games would immediately embrace his pitch for his Resident Evil movie.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;I thought fans of these games, like me, would be thrilled that somebody was coming along and turning Resident Evil into a survival horror movie. I was like, \u2018That\u2019s great.\u2019 I did not really appreciate the sentiment that, \u2018We\u2019ve been waiting forever for Leon\u2019s story.\u2019 And I appreciate that, and I\u2019m sorry that\u2019s not the story I\u2019m bringing. I get it, I understand the frustration,&#8221; he said. &#8220;I understand it so well because I haven\u2019t seen the earlier [Resident Evil] movies, because they don&#8217;t look like the Resident Evil that I love, so how could I be frustrated with fans who have that same attitude?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Cregger went on to say he hopes fans of the game see his movie &#8220;regardless of their skepticism or their disappointment&#8221; that he&#8217;s not re-telling a story from the games. He said he hopes fans of the games &#8220;feel seen&#8221; when they watch the movie and see &#8220;all of the love for the games that are in this movie.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;This is not me just telling a story and slapping Resident Evil on it so I can get a budget. This is me telling a Resident Evil story. I understand the resistance, I do, because I have it myself. It is coming from a true place of love,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video is-provider-youtube wp-block-embed-youtube wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"RESIDENT EVIL \u2013 Official Trailer (4K)\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/mNd1gb19A-c?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In a separate interview with The Playlist, Cregger said the press tour he&#8217;s doing to promote Resident Evil feels more like an &#8220;apology tour&#8221; given all the negative sentiment from fans. &#8220;I feel like I\u2019m running for office, trying to get these people not to call me a LARPer,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;Now, I\u2019m just like, &#8216;You know what? See the movie.&#8217; If you still feel the same way after you\u2019ve seen it, then whatever you think is fair. You\u2019re going to decide if I\u2019m an actual Resident Evil fan or a fake. What can I say? I think the movie is going to speak for itself,&#8221; he added.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Also in the interview, Cregger addressed the possibility of working on another Resident Evil movie project in the future. He said he &#8220;can&#8217;t help&#8221; to think about &#8220;other places this story could go,&#8221; adding that he has &#8220;ideas.&#8221; At the same time, Cregger pointed out that his movie isn&#8217;t even out yet. &#8220;Let&#8217;s see what happens,&#8221; he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In a different interview, Cregger said he&#8217;s done with franchise movies and will only make original projects going forward. His next movie is The Flood, a sci-fi film set in space. Cregger previously directed Barbarian and Weapons.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Resident Evil releases in theaters on September 18, starring Austin Abrams as a medical courier who visits Raccoon City where all hell breaks loose. <\/p>\n<p><br \/>\n<center><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.gamespot.com\/articles\/resident-evil-movie-director-reacts-to-backlash-says-he-was-naive-to-think-gamers-would-embrace-him\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read Full Article At Source <\/a><br \/>\n<center\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of the talking points surrounding the upcoming Resident Evil movie is that director Zach Cregger took an original idea and slapped the Resident Evil&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":83596,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[7167,2626,5755,503,7906,1543,29763,10378,4418],"class_list":["post-83595","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tech-gadgets-reviews","tag-backlash","tag-director","tag-embrace","tag-evil","tag-gamers","tag-movie","tag-naive","tag-reacts","tag-resident","wpcat-32-id"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83595","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=83595"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83595\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/83596"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=83595"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=83595"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=83595"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}