Sony has released the first trailer for the new Resident Evil movie, giving fans their first proper look at Zach Cregger’s take on Capcom’s survival horror series.
The film follows Bryan, a medical courier played by Austin Abrams, who is sent on a delivery to Raccoon City and ends up caught in a night of horror. The trailer keeps the focus on a smaller scope and more grounded setup, unlike the larger outbreak story video game series it’s based on.
This will surely draw the ire of a certain subset of fans, but considering the overall quality of Resident Evil adaptations, any good and competent interpretation is more than welcome.
And beyond that, it still uses the basic Resident Evil ingredients fans expect: Raccoon City, isolated danger, infected creatures, and an ordinary person thrown into something much bigger than himself.
Cregger is writing and directing the movie after breaking out with Barbarian and following it with Weapons. The cast also includes Zach Cherry, Kali Reis, and Paul Walter Hauser. Sony is currently set to release the film in theaters on Sept. 18, 2026.
This is not the first time Resident Evil has been adapted on screen: the franchise previously became a long-running film series led by Milla Jovovich, starting with 2002’s Resident Evil and continuing through six movies that moved further into action as they went on. The series then rebooted with Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City in 2021, which tried to move closer to the early games. In 2022, Netflix also adapted the series into a live-action series titled just Resident Evil, but this adaptation wasn’t received well either.
Cregger’s version looks like another reset, but instead of just rehashing the story, he decided to give it his own, more horror-oriented spin. The director is also a big fan of the series, and promises that fans will not be disappointed:
Over the last couple of decades, I have played a s**t ton of Resident Evil. If you love the games, you will feel their influence everywhere in the movie.
Zach Cregger at CinemaCon, quote via HollywoodReporter
Let’s hope that this time around, the adaptation is as successful as Resident Evil Requiem was for the game series a couple of months back.
