‘Resident Evil’ Canceled After One Season at Netflix

Resident Evil is being discontinued one and a half months after streaming its first season, reported Deadline.

Based on the popular video game with the same name, Resident Evil is a series that followed two split timelines during an outbreak of a deadly virus, received mixed reviews from fans and critics alike, and overall did not seem to live up to the legacy of the survival horror video game series that premiered in 1996 and continues to do gangbusters with its sequels to this day.

The show did really well in the first week of its steaming with 72 million hours in its first three days on the service. In week 2 (its first full week), it held onto the number 2 spot for the week with 73 million. But in week 3 it failed to keep viewers interested enough to binge it or watch more episodes. It saw a 63% drop in viewing hours globally. The response from fans and general audiences was overwhelmingly negative: On Rotten Tomatoes, the series held an audience score of only 22%, while on Metacritic fans were even crueler when showing how they felt about it – it has a 1.4 user rating.

The reviews are mixed from the critics and were thrashed by fans making it stand on 55% on rotten tomato currently. As of September, the series is currently only carrying a 4/10 on IMDb (this s up from 3.4 on the weekend of release) and a 26% on RottenTomatoes. The show was also sandwiched in between the final episodes of Stranger Things and the high-profile launch of The Sandman on Netflix’s release schedule. 

Netflix assembled a compelling, diverse cast for Resident Evil which included Ella Balinska, Paola Núñez, Lance Reddick, and Adeline Rudolph. Additional cast members included: Tamara Smart, Ahad Raza Mir, Connor Gosatti, and Turlough Convery. Andrew Dabb developed the series for television and served as executive producer and showrunner as well. Mary Leah Sutton was a writer and executive producer on the show. Robert Kulzer and Oliver Berben of Constantin Film also executive produced.

This isn’t Netflix’s first foray into the world of Resident Evil, though. Its 2021 movie, Resident Evil Infinite Darkness, holds that title, but that anime series wasn’t well-received either. Resident Evil: Infinite Darkness is an animated series that premiered in 2021, and centers around Claire and Leon trying to fight off hordes of zombies in the early 00s. Up until this point, Netflix has made no mention of the animated show’s future.

This is not the first time when Netflix is being called out for disappointing the audience with its adaptations. Netflix has rightly or wrongly developed a reputation for adapting either anime or video games and doing the source material an injustice. Many of the fan reviews seem to cite this in their reviews. One IMDb review, for example, is headlined “This is NOT “Resident Evil”!” adding: “When the rights to make these type of shows are sold or loaned out there should have to be some ground rules. Netflix has hurt so many franchises by making subpar material it isn’t funny at all, truly. I will not bore you, there are lists of every movie and show Netflix and other streaming services have completely destroyed.”