Transcript
Speaker: Welcome to Pixel It, a podcast about reading books adapted from video games.
Speaker: Because the only thing better than playing a video game is reading about one.
Speaker: I'm Kevin the Arcadologist along with Phil the Conquistador and today we'll be discussing the opening chapters of S.T.
Speaker: Perry's Resident Evil The Umbrella Conspiracy.
Speaker: As a content warning, there will be spoilers and descriptions of gore in this episode.
Speaker: And now, on with the show.
Speaker: Phil, you mentioned that you had done a little research, brief research into S.D.
Speaker: Perry.
Speaker: Can you tell me a little bit about her?
Speaker: Yes, I'm actually really kind of excited about this because not only did I read a few of these Resident Evil novelizations when I was a teen, but S.D.
Speaker: Perry and her dad, Steve Perry, actually wrote a bunch of Aliens and Predator and Aliens vs. Predator novels.
Speaker: and wrote all seven of these original Resident Evil novelizations, which sometimes are based on one of the video games and sometimes are actual original novels.
Speaker: So in this case, where we are reading a novel based on the first Resident Evil video game, which I never finished.
Speaker: You never finished the first game?
Speaker: Never finished it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: I even have the remake.
Speaker: I kept telling myself I was going to play it while I was reading this, but there's no evidence that that actually happened.
Speaker: The book starts with a prologue and it starts out with kind of like the classic.
Speaker: It's like newspaper clippings prologue.
Speaker: To be honest, it's not that different from the way the game starts out.
Speaker: If I recall correctly, it kind of starts out with a voiceover and ominous talking about these bizarre murders that have happened in the Arclay Mountains on the outskirts of Raccoon City.
Speaker: The clippings like the.
Speaker: They hint at these cannibal murders that are happening out there, different bodies that have been found and vague speculation on what could be causing all of this.
Speaker: It's actually, I got to be honest, a pretty decent kind of prologue for what we're going to get into.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: It's a nice way to get the book started.
Speaker: My feelings on the book going forward after that, you know, it goes up and down, but it starts out on a stroke.
Speaker: Precisely.
Speaker: We've got to say something nice about it right off the bat.
Speaker: It's a compliment sandwich.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: But it acts as kind of like the lore dump for for what we're we're heading into.
Speaker: Obviously, whatever's in the books can't be necessarily considered quote unquote canon for the video game series because it's you know, the games dictate their own canon.
Speaker: I did notice, though, that it did provide a little bit of extra context that's never really provided in the games as to what the S.T.A.R.S.
Speaker: organization is.
Speaker: In the games themselves, S.T.A.R.S.
Speaker: always kind of seemed like, oh, well, we don't want to call them SWAT, so we're calling them S.T.A.R.S., you know what I mean?
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Yes, they're merch.
Speaker: They're mercs, and it's problematic on a whole other level of cop relationship.
Speaker: They do have some disparaging remarks for the local Raccoon City Police Department in here that are actually kind of more politically charged when read nowadays than I'm sure they were meant to be in 96.
Speaker: Yes!
Speaker: Yeah, it certainly it is kind of funny looking back at this book that was written, you know, 23 or so years ago and reading some of the things that they say about the Raccoon City Police Department and the police chief and all that stuff.
Speaker: And it's like, it's a little awkward reading this now.
Speaker: There are actually a lot, and I made a point of noting a few of them.
Speaker: I'm sure you did the same thing.
Speaker: There are actually a lot of moments in this book that I was just like, oh boy, this is not going to age well.
Speaker: You have no idea how not well this is going to age.
Speaker: Right into chapter one, we're following the perspective of one Jill Valentine.
Speaker: Jill Valentine.
Speaker: Jill Valentine, everybody's favorite.
Speaker: One of the things that is never really dealt with in the Resident Evil franchise is thorough backstories for the characters.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: So all you really know about Jill is she's in her early 20s and she's a member of stars.
Speaker: When we first meet her in Resident Evil one, you never really learn much beyond that.
Speaker: The book actually does an interesting job of kind of fleshing her out a little bit more that she is the daughter of some master thief named Dick Valentine.
Speaker: He's a master thief.
Speaker: He's the best of the best, except he got caught very romantic.
Speaker: It is very European art thief, the way they describe it.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Which you really don't get nowadays.
Speaker: No, it's a shame.
Speaker: It's one of the first things that doesn't age well.
Speaker: We just don't have, we do not have vaguely European art thieves on the scale that we use.
Speaker: We don't have the cat burglars that we can really look up to anymore.
Speaker: The gentleman thief.
Speaker: The gentleman thief.
Speaker: You know, when I was a kid, I really thought that that was a valid...
Speaker: profession that you could go to trade school for.
Speaker: I actually was planning on becoming a professor.
Speaker: That's actually when we met.
Speaker: We met in grad school.
Speaker: I wanted to be a professor.
Speaker: And if that wasn't going to work out, I wanted to be a gentleman thief.
Speaker: And unfortunately, these days, both of those career paths are not exactly the fun time frolics that they used to be.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: Well, I think the thief would probably be better
Speaker: better use of your time than being a professor.
Speaker: Oh yeah, it pays better too.
Speaker: Yeah, I thought it was really interesting the way they did her because it's like kind of like she's this former criminal because her dad was, you know, teaching her how to be a criminal, like slowly getting her into that lifestyle piece by piece.
Speaker: But then she got kind of like invested in her community and
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: It's like this kind of weirdly heartwarming leave it to beaver kind of like, well, I like my community.
Speaker: So she's kind of like our Han Solo.
Speaker: She started out at some point as like devil may care kind of person.
Speaker: But now she's doing it for a good cause, man.
Speaker: She really cares about the little people.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: It gets right into the two little girls that she had befriended that lived across the street that ultimately became victims of these cannibals, these cannibal murderers.
Speaker: She becomes ingratiated in her community.
Speaker: She leaves the thieving life behind.
Speaker: Dick Valentine is in jail.
Speaker: And she joins STARS.
Speaker: That's pretty much where we...
Speaker: We leave her off until we it kind of jumps over to the point of view of everybody's favorite Chris Redfield.
Speaker: The boy next door, the Captain America, the late, the great Chris Redfield.
Speaker: He's not late.
Speaker: He's as far as we know, still alive.
Speaker: Chris Boulder Puncher Redfield.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And he's like immediately they throw him into like the good cop role.
Speaker: And he's also on top of all of that.
Speaker: He very quickly, they like hint at that.
Speaker: He's not he's not happy the way this investigation has been going.
Speaker: You know, he's got a bad feeling.
Speaker: He's got a bad feeling.
Speaker: He's got a friend who is on the inside and who's disappeared.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And no one's listening to him.
Speaker: No one's listening to him.
Speaker: And so he's just keeping it to him.
Speaker: So he's like he's like the scientist in a Roland Emmerich movie.
Speaker: The day after tomorrow is coming and nobody is listening to Chris Redfield.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: And it's just they're just not listening to him.
Speaker: And I and I love and speaking of Roland Emmerich, I actually this is my first quote for this whole thing.
Speaker: He there's this great exchange, which I was just like, oh, right.
Speaker: This is the 90s.
Speaker: And she's writing for a 90s audience.
Speaker: It goes like this.
Speaker: Barry scowled good naturedly.
Speaker: Old Barry could easily kick your ass into next week, little man.
Speaker: Joseph looked at him mocked seriously.
Speaker: Yeah, but would you remember it afterwards?
Speaker: And it's like Barry's the older guy in the group, so they're making fun of the fact that he can't.
Speaker: I'm jumping ahead here but like the whole team is yeah I think it's and it's this weird like Resident Evil Universe ageism where like Chris is like 24 right and Jill is 22 and Rebecca is we haven't met Rebecca yet but she's 18 you know how old just turned 18 you know how old Barry is 38 I think he's 35 in this
Speaker: Oh, no, no.
Speaker: He's 38.
Speaker: Oh, he's 38.
Speaker: I'm writing that down because that's my age.
Speaker: He's your age.
Speaker: He's 38.
Speaker: He's my age and it really fucked with me.
Speaker: He's 38.
Speaker: They're calling him the old man.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: He's the old man of the group.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: He's the good natured, grizzled, old veteran of the team at 38 years old.
Speaker: My God.
Speaker: I can't believe they haven't forced him to retire yet.
Speaker: And then, of course, we get, in Barry's moment here, we get the intro, basically the intro to the Spencer House, the mysterious Spencer House, and all the dark lore associated with it, and its connection to, everyone hold their breath, the Umbrella Corporation.
Speaker: Oh, God, no.
Speaker: Anybody.
Speaker: My God.
Speaker: That's that's that's the name of the book.
Speaker: I wonder if there's going to be a conspiracy there.
Speaker: Insert insert Leo DiCaprio pointing at the TV meme.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: You know, and it's disappointing, though, because I don't recall at any point in these books when a character looks at another character and says, we're facing a resident evil or something.
Speaker: It just doesn't happen.
Speaker: And I feel like that's a huge letdown.
Speaker: It is a huge letdown.
Speaker: Something I noted about Barry and the way he's described, I highlighted it because I thought it was absurd.
Speaker: Barry Burton was only six feet tall, but built like a truck.
Speaker: I noticed that too.
Speaker: I was like, isn't the average height of a man like 5'8"?
Speaker: Why is it?
Speaker: Why are we height shaming Barry Burton?
Speaker: Meanwhile, Rebecca was seven and a half feet tall, and Chris Redfield could barely fit under the overhang of a gas station.
Speaker: Everybody else on Starz was at least six foot five.
Speaker: That should be noted.
Speaker: At a magnificent nine foot four, Wesker was of average height for the team.
Speaker: What the hell?
Speaker: I noticed that too.
Speaker: So, yeah, Barry was only 38.
Speaker: He had been with stars for 15 years.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And the the lore dump with George Trevor, who is the architect of the Spencer Mansion.
Speaker: The whole George Trevor stuff.
Speaker: It's it's an interesting piece of lore and information.
Speaker: George Trevor actually doesn't really become super integral to the story until the remake comes out and they really flesh out.
Speaker: his role, his involvement, and more importantly, his, I believe it's his daughter, is one of the most horrifying villains in the Resident Evil franchise history, Lisa Trevor.
Speaker: She's basically just this invincible creature that stalks the mansion.
Speaker: Well, that's, I've always found that sort of thing, the adaptation stuff is fascinating because it's like,
Speaker: you know, how much of this did they give the author and how much of it did the author just kind of wing, you know, and, and, and honestly, is there a chance that maybe S.C.
Speaker: Perry wrote something in here that they came back to later and like, Oh yeah, let's put that in the remake or something.
Speaker: I highly doubt that, but you know, it,
Speaker: I have my doubts, but, you know, I don't know.
Speaker: I don't know if if, you know, if the Capcom team was was really into taking outside sources.
Speaker: I do know it was probably around this time or the year later or a year later when I'm trying to remember who on the Capcom team said it, but they had hired George Romero to write a treatment for the first Resident Evil movie.
Speaker: Oh, wow.
Speaker: I did not know that.
Speaker: It's actually online.
Speaker: It's not a treatment.
Speaker: It's a full-on script.
Speaker: It's out there.
Speaker: If you Google it, you can probably find it online.
Speaker: And it's fine.
Speaker: It's a lot closer to the game than the Resident Evil movie that we ended up getting.
Speaker: It actually featured the characters from the game in the movie.
Speaker: What?
Speaker: That's crazy.
Speaker: That would never work.
Speaker: And they said his script was, quote, not very good.
Speaker: I would probably say that they probably had given S.D.
Speaker: Perry some sort of Bible of stuff that she could put in the book.
Speaker: Like, here's the basic plot of the book and here's some other here's stuff that you find in the mansion that you can kind of fold in.
Speaker: Let's move on to chapter two.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: These people, the whole point is all of these people, these stars representatives, are coming in for a meeting.
Speaker: They've been called to a meeting where, you know, they're informed basically that the dead, all the people who've been dying, it's this, you know,
Speaker: serial murdery kind of horrific story that's been plaguing the town for for months at this point and all the dead are assumed to have been killed by a cannibalistic cult yes uh that's that's what they go with that's that's their only real idea i and i just want to read the passage i highlighted it because uh it's like
Speaker: I can't imagine anyone outside of the 1980s saying this with a straight face.
Speaker: This is Jill.
Speaker: She looked up at Wesker and made her pitch.
Speaker: My theory at this point is that there are there's a possible ritualistic cult hiding in the mountains, four to 11 members strong with guard dogs trained to attack trooders in their territory.
Speaker: It sounds like a movie pit.
Speaker: All right, we're making this movie.
Speaker: All right, so it's a cult.
Speaker: There are killer dogs everywhere.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah, this will work.
Speaker: And it's the 90s.
Speaker: It's basically like the plot of Dragnet.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: The Dan Aykroyd, Tom Hanks, Dragnet.
Speaker: Just set it in Los Angeles and there you go.
Speaker: I found it kind of amazing how they all kind of agree after that, like when her pitch, they all agree that that's probably the best bet.
Speaker: But they also agree that the idea is crazy, which don't get me wrong.
Speaker: In real life, I would expect that to be their reaction.
Speaker: You know, I'm expecting to be like a cannibalistic cult.
Speaker: Really?
Speaker: Okay.
Speaker: Like,
Speaker: But, you know, so there's a level of reality there, which is kind of in contrast to the campiness.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That Resident Evil became known for.
Speaker: It's really amusing.
Speaker: And this this whole scene is happening.
Speaker: They're all gathered around a dry erase board where Wesker is writing down words on the dry erase board as to.
Speaker: Well, yeah, this this this one word from what you said.
Speaker: Yeah, we're going to write this down.
Speaker: So he writes down territoriality.
Speaker: It's a brainstorming session.
Speaker: It's a brainstorming session.
Speaker: Meanwhile, the Bravo team has already left.
Speaker: The Bravo team is already on an advanced scouting mission.
Speaker: Meanwhile, the Alpha is... It makes me crazy, by the way, that the Bravo team was the one who had left first.
Speaker: That didn't sit well with me, but that's just a personal thing.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: No, but you're right.
Speaker: You and I have both been in writer's rooms.
Speaker: That's what this is.
Speaker: This is a writer's room.
Speaker: It became a writer's room.
Speaker: And I just want to rewind back to the beginning because I had to highlight one of the things that I am always kind of...
Speaker: on the lookout for whenever I read the cop, military procedural type things is kind of like jargon, but out of place jargon.
Speaker: So who said this?
Speaker: I think I'm assuming it's Wesker saying this.
Speaker: The RPD has already established a perimeter search spanning sectors one, four, seven and nine.
Speaker: It's the central zones we're concerned with.
Speaker: And Bravo will sit down here.
Speaker: And I'm like, it's just it's meaningless.
Speaker: Sectors one, four, seven and nine in the central zone.
Speaker: Out of how many sectors?
Speaker: And then later, much later, a chapter from now, I was like, well, we're going to have to sit down in sector 22.
Speaker: And like 20.
Speaker: How is it a proof?
Speaker: It's like what is the perimeter?
Speaker: Is this like a gerrymandered?
Speaker: Is this like a gerrymandered congressional district?
Speaker: Well, they don't.
Speaker: Alright, over in these sectors, everyone's going Republican.
Speaker: It's really the best way.
Speaker: I know it looks weird.
Speaker: I know it looks like a fishhook.
Speaker: I know it looks like a T that had sex with a Q. That's the way the people are living.
Speaker: I swear.
Speaker: That's the town.
Speaker: It's a weird town.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: I know.
Speaker: Now, uh...
Speaker: Yeah, speaking of Weskers, we do get our introduction to him.
Speaker: He's the new captain.
Speaker: He's very professional, but he's still got to prove himself to the crew.
Speaker: He's that guy.
Speaker: Everyone's kind of, you know, a little, how's this guy going to do?
Speaker: He's the new guy, you know, but he's in charge.
Speaker: He's got authority, so no one knows how to take it, which is another 90s trope.
Speaker: It's beautiful.
Speaker: Yeah, he's got his aviators and his high and tight blonde haircut.
Speaker: I'm not sure they do.
Speaker: They actually give a physical description of Wesker's hair in this.
Speaker: I'm trying to remember.
Speaker: I don't recall.
Speaker: It's like it's it's very clear in my mind, like the way Albert Wesker looks is is in my head.
Speaker: I can close my eyes and see his face.
Speaker: I don't see eyes.
Speaker: I see sunglasses and the high and tight blonde.
Speaker: It's almost like, you know, if, if, if Guile from street fighter had realistic hair, that's Wesker.
Speaker: I'll from street fighter.
Speaker: It's forgotten about his America tattoo and become a contractor.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: He, he, he, he joined up with black water or one of those, those mercenary groups.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Now that would be a dark take on the character.
Speaker: Yeah, no, I'm going to fold that into my Street Fighter adaptation that I'm working on.
Speaker: I see that you do.
Speaker: They've been... Yeah, and like you mentioned, the first team, the Bravo team, sent in... They went in first, they radio in, and they almost immediately...
Speaker: lose the signal in the copter, which suggests a crash at the Spencer estate.
Speaker: And I've written here in my notes, shit has hit the fan.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: That's how you know.
Speaker: It has.
Speaker: Yeah, that's how you know the game is about to start.
Speaker: Something, and I don't know if this bothers you as much as it bothers me, is the consistent use of copter as opposed to
Speaker: With the apostrophe?
Speaker: With the apostrophe, or as opposed to just riding helicopter occasionally.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: Copter.
Speaker: Copter.
Speaker: We really needed it.
Speaker: I would say we really needed to save those four letters, but we had an apostrophe.
Speaker: So it's really the three that we're worried about.
Speaker: And let me let me be honest.
Speaker: I'm a I'm a chopper guy.
Speaker: I don't.
Speaker: I was just going to say no one calls them copters.
Speaker: People call them choppers.
Speaker: They're choppers.
Speaker: They're not copters.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: It's been a chopper since Predator.
Speaker: You can't call it.
Speaker: I was just going to say.
Speaker: A perfectly good get to the chopper moment.
Speaker: Waste it.
Speaker: Never, never, never to be seen.
Speaker: Copter is just awkward.
Speaker: It's still two syllables.
Speaker: But it's got the P and the T right next to each other.
Speaker: I'm not a fan of Copter.
Speaker: I'll never understand that decision.
Speaker: And it was appearing a lot in this chapter, so I was not...
Speaker: It happens a few times, yeah.
Speaker: Right up until the copter disappears.
Speaker: Right until the copter, they're in sector 22, tail end of C, except I've lost the signal, the transmitter's offline, and that's more of the, that's just, you know, more gerrymandering.
Speaker: The chapter does end with the alphas on their way to rescuing the betas, which I have also written here in my notes.
Speaker: Insert MRA joke here.
Speaker: Well, the bravos, not the penis.
Speaker: Oh, bravos, bravos.
Speaker: Well, in that case, that was my problem.
Speaker: That's my Freudian slip.
Speaker: You can call off the men's rights activists.
Speaker: Thank God.
Speaker: Well, I've got to go talk to somebody.
Speaker: Apparently, that was just in my head.
Speaker: I got no one to blame but myself for that.
Speaker: The only person you have to blame is your inner incel.
Speaker: Thank God, that guy is a shrimp.
Speaker: I can take him.
Speaker: A lot of this chapter just felt like filler.
Speaker: We got a lot of little vignettes and background of most of the important players.
Speaker: Now we have this weird little interstitial scene of Jill and a mystery man.
Speaker: Ah, yes.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: And that brings us to chapter three.
Speaker: Glorious chapter three, where Jill is confronted in the locker room by a mysterious gentleman, let's say, who goes by the name of Trent.
Speaker: Which is the most 90s mysterious guy name.
Speaker: It's like it could have been Trent or it could have been like Clive.
Speaker: Like those would have been acceptable names for mysterious trench coated man.
Speaker: I believe he is wearing a trench coat.
Speaker: Oh, yes.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: Here, I've got a wonderful piece of quote here that I just I just I love.
Speaker: This is this is just brilliant.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: This is just the best description of anyone in this book so far.
Speaker: She trailed off as he shook his head, grinning broadly, his dark eyes twinkling with mirth.
Speaker: You mistake my intentions, Miss Valentine.
Speaker: Excuse my manners, please.
Speaker: My name is Trent, and I'm...
Speaker: A friend to the stars.
Speaker: And it sounds like he's about to tell her, like, you know, and if you solve my three riddles, I'll bring you untold riches.
Speaker: His eyes are twinkling with mirth.
Speaker: And he gives her this, like, disc reader.
Speaker: Yeah, I highlighted the eyes twinkling with mirth, grinning broadly.
Speaker: What I really like about this book is that there are opportunities for the purplest of prose and she goes for it.
Speaker: There's some wonderful gore descriptions in this book, I have to say.
Speaker: For whatever other weaknesses it has, some of the descriptions of death and mayhem are actually pretty over-the-top and fun.
Speaker: Yeah, no, they work for the brand that works.
Speaker: Oh yeah, it's completely on brand.
Speaker: So that works, but yeah.
Speaker: You get into this guy and- Let me couch all of my criticisms with this.
Speaker: Everything that happens in the book is actually very on brand for the game itself.
Speaker: Every bit of dialogue, it all dovetails very nicely into the gore but schlockiness that is Resident Evil.
Speaker: Everything is serious, so self-serious, but you can tell there's a little wink and a nod behind it.
Speaker: Very much so.
Speaker: It's self-aware, at least.
Speaker: Yes, precisely.
Speaker: It is not trying to be anything beyond a Resident Evil novelization.
Speaker: You know, that's the thing.
Speaker: I will say the author, she's clearly having fun with a lot of this.
Speaker: And just like that, like any other mysterious man, he was gone.
Speaker: He's gone.
Speaker: He's gone.
Speaker: He's a like a melodramatic old spy movie.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: So that that is that is Jill's Jill's interlude with Trent.
Speaker: Meanwhile, over by the helicopter, you know, Wesker's getting a little impatient because Jill is taking her time getting the crap out of lockers.
Speaker: Yeah, and everyone's taking their time, and I like that we get, you know, everyone's finally showing up piece by piece, person by person, and we're getting a lot more of that, like,
Speaker: expository sort of like okay you know this is what's happening and we're going and eta three minutes all that stuff and then we get this weird moment that happens throughout the book uh with chris specifically with any time someone of the opposite sex is within 54
Speaker: I know what you're going to say.
Speaker: Yeah, it's like Jill comes in.
Speaker: She's been taking her sweet time, you know, talking to the mysterious stranger, and no one knows where the heck she is, and she kind of, like, shows up last second.
Speaker: And the quote here is, abruptly she unhooked her belt and moved to sit next to him, being Chris.
Speaker: He caught a faint scent of her skin, a clean, soapy smell, which is the first of our, like,
Speaker: Is that meant to be sexual?
Speaker: Yeah, there was like a there's a description of his eyes earlier.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: In the previous chapter.
Speaker: And and then there was the next paragraph.
Speaker: So this is the thing is like we're reading this as as as two people in their 30s in a post in a post irony poisoned world in 2021.
Speaker: Which is a fair point Which is a fair point This was written in 1998 But the next paragraph is Her voice was pitched so low He had to lean in to hear her Over the throbbing of the engine And I had to pause for a minute And it was like Throbbing?
Speaker: That's an interesting choice of words For the engine What are we going to talk about Jill?
Speaker: Tell me Jill, what's going on?
Speaker: Yeah, oh yeah
Speaker: And it's all so she can like, she like basically implies to Chris that it's like his misgivings are probably right.
Speaker: And she gives, because before Trent, and they mentioned Trent in quotes, which I always thought was funny.
Speaker: He leaves, he basically gives her the standard X-Files, trust no one sort of advice.
Speaker: And she passes on the same advice to Chris being like, we should trust nobody because we're mysterious and it's the 90s.
Speaker: The X-Files is at its peak at the moment.
Speaker: So basically everyone, they roll out, they're on their way to go rescue the Bravos, not the Betas.
Speaker: We could lean into them being betas.
Speaker: Well, you know, they got caught with their pants down.
Speaker: What's more beta than that?
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Or less beta, depending on how you interpret that sentence.
Speaker: But it brings me to my first pointedly, oh, that didn't age well quote.
Speaker: And this is for anyone who's reading along.
Speaker: on the top of page 45.
Speaker: And basically they're going through their guns.
Speaker: You know, they make a big deal out of Barry's 357 Python.
Speaker: I know exactly what you're going to do.
Speaker: You know exactly what I'm going to do.
Speaker: Of course you do.
Speaker: They make a big damn deal out of these big damn guns.
Speaker: And Joseph, who we will not have to worry about for very long, spoilers, says, I hope we don't need these, Joseph said, slapping in a clip, and Barry nodded agreement.
Speaker: Just because he paid his dues to the NRA didn't mean he was some trigger-happy dumbass looking to kill.
Speaker: He just liked guns.
Speaker: Oh, how the times have changed.
Speaker: This is... If they ever were that way to begin with, I don't, we don't have any evidence that that's really what the NRA was about in the 90s.
Speaker: No, we don't.
Speaker: You can't, anyone who would dare write that sentence in 2021 with a straight face deserves to be like a defense attorney for criminals.
Speaker: Like that's just, if you can do that with a, say that with a straight face, then you are...
Speaker: a liar on like a trumpian level scale i mean 1998 uh who's who is it is it still charlton heston uh oh it would have i think it yeah yes i get heston i believe so yeah he was actually starting in 1998 he was um when he started wow yeah uh five term president of the nra from 98 to 2003. uh
Speaker: And then it was Wayne Lumpier.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: God.
Speaker: Yeah, so cold dead hands.
Speaker: Cold dead hands, baby.
Speaker: Cold dead hands, but I'm not a gun nut.
Speaker: I'm not a gun nut, I just like guns.
Speaker: on second thought the more you the more you delve into the explanation of it the more you're like actually that might still work today yeah yeah so it's really it's really an early heel turn for barry um uh
Speaker: It's just immediately anyone reading in 2021 is like, oh, I should trust this guy.
Speaker: He paid.
Speaker: I don't know if he is who he says he is.
Speaker: He did.
Speaker: Huh?
Speaker: He paid his dues.
Speaker: OK.
Speaker: Great.
Speaker: Just great.
Speaker: Love that for him.
Speaker: We truly love that for Barry.
Speaker: So, yeah, they land.
Speaker: They got the guns.
Speaker: Barry pays his NRA dues.
Speaker: Yeah, he was checking his phone and paying them on their website.
Speaker: This is ahead of its time.
Speaker: That was how forward thinking Barry was.
Speaker: He was an early adopter to digital payments to the NRA specifically.
Speaker: Yeah, everyone told him it would never go anywhere.
Speaker: Who's laughing now?
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then right before they get out of the helicopter, Joseph says something like, hey, I just got, you know, I just invested in this thing.
Speaker: It's called Bitcoin.
Speaker: And I got 10 Bitcoin in my in my crypto wallet.
Speaker: Hopefully nothing happens to me.
Speaker: And and the love of my life is able to access them in the event of my death.
Speaker: And they all like hugged him and told him that they would never let anything happen to him.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And then special member of this team.
Speaker: And then there was a standing ovation.
Speaker: and an eagle flew through the air and gutted a liberal college professor that man was albert einstein um and yeah that's how this and then the book ended it's the end of the book uh no we're just getting started it was fast that was the that was the end of chapter three and uh now we're now we're
Speaker: I'd like to point out here at the beginning of chapter four, I used the word copter.
Speaker: I write copter in my notes.
Speaker: And I immediately felt like, oh no, they got me.
Speaker: I've been tricked.
Speaker: God damn it.
Speaker: You're a copter person now.
Speaker: You're not a chopper person anymore.
Speaker: I'm a copter person.
Speaker: Oh man, it's just saying it.
Speaker: I feel like I'm a toddler spinning around with my arms outstretched.
Speaker: I'm a copter.
Speaker: They find the Bravos or the Betas as they had been referred to.
Speaker: Correctly.
Speaker: They find their helicopter.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: They find the copter.
Speaker: It's just kind of like smoking and sitting there and not working anymore.
Speaker: And so they start spreading out and, you know, doing a little little search in the perimeter.
Speaker: Say, hey, what's up?
Speaker: And then things take a turn for the worse.
Speaker: The worst.
Speaker: When it seems like they they find a hand, a hand, a disembodied hand.
Speaker: And pretty much immediately, our good friend, Bitcoin innovator, Albert Einstein, Joey boy, Joseph, really just my favorite character in the whole book.
Speaker: Oh, he was so good.
Speaker: So good.
Speaker: Gets his throat ripped out by a dog.
Speaker: Just taken down in the prime of his life three days before retirement.
Speaker: Down he goes.
Speaker: Absolutely eviscerated.
Speaker: And I'm not... Just tore to shreds.
Speaker: To shreds, you say.
Speaker: Just absolutely destroyed by a dog.
Speaker: Yeah, one of those Zambo dogs.
Speaker: We don't know that they're zombies yet.
Speaker: We don't know that they're zombies yet.
Speaker: But they are skinless, and that's a... They are skinless, and that's usually a giveaway that something is wrong with them.
Speaker: You see a skinless dog, usually you're dealing with a zombie.
Speaker: Every now and then, mites.
Speaker: But that's mostly zombies.
Speaker: Sometimes it's just mange, bad case of mange.
Speaker: Yeah, exactly.
Speaker: You get cream, steroids, they're fine.
Speaker: But either way, if your dog is, if it's mange or zombie and your dog kills Joseph, consider, consider a muzzle.
Speaker: That's just good safety practices.
Speaker: Be a good neighbor.
Speaker: Be a good neighbor.
Speaker: State Farm is there.
Speaker: Joseph dies.
Speaker: Joseph's dead.
Speaker: He's dead.
Speaker: He's not coming back.
Speaker: He's dead.
Speaker: He's not coming back.
Speaker: The team does not take it well.
Speaker: No.
Speaker: He just dies.
Speaker: Because Joseph was their favorite, and they just waste a ton of bullets on these dogs that just aren't dying.
Speaker: They do.
Speaker: They do.
Speaker: They learn immediately what anyone who's played a Resident Evil game learns pretty quick.
Speaker: Don't shoot the dog.
Speaker: Just run.
Speaker: Save the ammo and run around it.
Speaker: You're better off just holding that sprint button because I got to tell you, they are a son of a bitch to actually hit.
Speaker: Yeah, they are.
Speaker: And it's not worth it.
Speaker: Just run.
Speaker: You'll probably take one hit, but you'll be OK.
Speaker: There's some green herb in the next room.
Speaker: Exactly.
Speaker: Yeah, it's it sucks.
Speaker: And they are running from these dogs.
Speaker: And then pilot Brad, who's my second favorite character after Joseph, he chickens out.
Speaker: And he takes that copter.
Speaker: He takes it out of there without the team.
Speaker: He flies out of there.
Speaker: He is like, you know what?
Speaker: I am making a business decision right now.
Speaker: And he peaces out.
Speaker: And you know what?
Speaker: I was not expecting this out of somebody whose nickname is Chicken Heart.
Speaker: I assumed that it was...
Speaker: I assume that it was like an ironic nickname.
Speaker: It wasn't.
Speaker: It was literal nickname, which also.
Speaker: You expect you expect more from a guy known as Panty Waist McGee.
Speaker: And and they, you know, you can't put your faith in anybody these days.
Speaker: No, you can't.
Speaker: So, yeah, he he peaces out and and they're left holding the doggy bag.
Speaker: Oh, I see what you did.
Speaker: Yeah, I was waiting.
Speaker: I might insert like a laugh track on that one.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, we're going to have a talk about that.
Speaker: It's just a lot of running.
Speaker: There's pages and pages of running.
Speaker: 55 pages of running.
Speaker: I'm not screwing with you people.
Speaker: It's a lot of running.
Speaker: It's a lot of running, lungs aching.
Speaker: And finally, they get to the mansion, which Wesker has led them to more or less.
Speaker: Maybe Wesker isn't what he seems.
Speaker: But yeah, Wesker kind of knew exactly where the mansion was from.
Speaker: They are now in...
Speaker: the mansion where the evil has taken residence.
Speaker: Oh!
Speaker: Boo!
Speaker: Look at what you did!
Speaker: Look at what you did!
Speaker: Kevin!
Speaker: Kevin!
Speaker: Oh, I'm not mad.
Speaker: I'm impressed.
Speaker: Our chapter ends with Wesker silently cursing Brad Vickers again and wondered if they were any better off inside than out.
Speaker: And that is what we call foreshadowing.
Speaker: That's the foreshadowing.
Speaker: Somewhere a foreshadowing angel got its wings.
Speaker: Just beautiful.
Speaker: Absolutely.
Speaker: All right.
Speaker: So we're we're we're cooking now.
Speaker: We're cooking a little bit.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: We're in chapter five.
Speaker: What's what's going on in chapter five here?
Speaker: Now, well, in Chapter 5, we get, you know, it's actually, I heard the music in my head.
Speaker: Now, I didn't play, I never finished Resident Evil 1, but I played the crap out of Resident Evil 2.
Speaker: And the moment you get into that mansion, and that, it just, you can hear that sparse, weird piano music in my head.
Speaker: And that,
Speaker: That's the thing about this book.
Speaker: You can't help but feel correctly, I believe, that this book is written for people who have played the game.
Speaker: Yeah, this is not for people who are... Here, let's be honest, there are probably some people out there that were only allowed to read the books and couldn't play the game or whatever.
Speaker: But the target audience of this book is people who could see the game room by room in their head.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: And the whole thing, and I think this is actually a pretty decent, kind of almost, kind of a vaguely cosmic horror-y description on page 56, without having to get into a ton of the details.
Speaker: We've got a quote here that says, Jill took a deep breath and decided immediately that she didn't like it.
Speaker: There was a sense of wrongness to the vast room, an atmosphere of vague oppression.
Speaker: It felt haunted somehow, though by who or what she couldn't say.
Speaker: And I really do not appreciate the description of my bedroom in 2021.
Speaker: But that's we have fun.
Speaker: We have fun.
Speaker: We have fun.
Speaker: And there's an offhand mention, by the way, of an antique typewriter.
Speaker: I like that that that she folded the the literal typewriter at which you save your game into the book.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: A little Easter egg.
Speaker: And there are a few of those in the book.
Speaker: But that's that's the first one that I noticed where it was like, oh, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yep.
Speaker: And so they're all they're all kind of taking their time.
Speaker: And Chris decides that he's going to go and inspect a noise that they all hear, which, as we all know, is always the smartest decision.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Go by yourself to inspect the noise after you've been chased by mange ridden zombie dogs.
Speaker: S.T.
Speaker: Perry actually writes in something about the stars are trained to actually go off on their own or to to move without partners or backup or something like that.
Speaker: Yes, she did.
Speaker: And that's good writing, actually.
Speaker: That's it.
Speaker: Well, not well, it's not good writing, but it's it's at least some level of an excellent.
Speaker: It's like I give her a ton of credit for justifying for writing in justifications for dumb decisions that characters make.
Speaker: That's the reason you never hear about the stars anymore.
Speaker: They all died one by one.
Speaker: We'd love to tell you how they died, but they were all by themselves and we never found out.
Speaker: We never found out.
Speaker: They all disappeared.
Speaker: Never found out.
Speaker: They literally went extinct.
Speaker: The Shriners had a longer legacy than the Stars.
Speaker: I highlighted this.
Speaker: That Beretta that Joseph had found out in the field, the pale blood-spattered fingers still wrapped around it, a Stars team member dead or dying, and thanks to Brad, they didn't even have a Band-Aid to offer.
Speaker: I was just thinking, like...
Speaker: I think somebody who's missing their hand is going to need a lot more than a Band-Aid.
Speaker: Hey, hey, listen.
Speaker: I know that your hand is missing, but don't worry.
Speaker: I've got a SpongeBob Band-Aid.
Speaker: Although, anyone who's played Resident Evil 7 knows that hands can be reattached with...
Speaker: you know, basic, basic tools.
Speaker: You just need a staple gun and some of that goop to pour on it, and you're good to go.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And a few rednecks to help you out.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: That's a beautiful thing.
Speaker: It's a beautiful thing.
Speaker: There's that novelization.
Speaker: I'm sure it exists.
Speaker: Actually, I'm not going to say I'm sure it exists, but I would love it to exist, and actually, I would love... We will find out.
Speaker: I wouldn't mind writing it myself.
Speaker: Oh, God, I'd have fun with that one.
Speaker: Holy cow.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Telling you what, right at this point, listeners,
Speaker: the newest Resident Evil game, Resident Evil Village, has not yet been released.
Speaker: But I have already preemptively been denied the opportunity to write the novelization of that one because they did not, they got the 150 page fan fiction of the 900 foot tall woman with the boobs in the hat from me.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: with the Mary Sue character Bill feeling.
Speaker: And they really did not, they didn't take me seriously.
Speaker: They didn't appreciate that one.
Speaker: Oh, they did not appreciate that.
Speaker: They didn't get what I was... They didn't pick up what I was putting down.
Speaker: You know, I think you should really just carry on with that fan fiction, though.
Speaker: I mean... Oh, yeah.
Speaker: No, I just hit my 500th page.
Speaker: Our second child was born recently.
Speaker: Let me tell you, the internet will celebrate it.
Speaker: It will.
Speaker: The internet celebrates a lot of weird stuff, and that's one of them that I know I'll find my tribe through that one.
Speaker: I suppose this is a good time to announce that I recently became engaged.
Speaker: Yeah, yeah.
Speaker: Congratulations.
Speaker: I mean, I've congratulated you several times, not on a podcast, but she is really over my crush on Lady Diabetes.
Speaker: Yeah, I bet.
Speaker: That's why I never even mentioned it to my wife.
Speaker: Oh, you're a smarter man.
Speaker: She is over it.
Speaker: Her biggest complaint was, who wears a hat that big?
Speaker: It's not practical.
Speaker: And I knew, I was like, there she is.
Speaker: She's the woman.
Speaker: There it is.
Speaker: That's the woman for me.
Speaker: The woman.
Speaker: She's the one.
Speaker: So while while he's investigating, Chris finds our first zombie round of applause.
Speaker: And and he's remarkably intuitive about it, too.
Speaker: I got a quote here.
Speaker: from page 62, where it says, he hit the door with one shoulder, was vaguely aware that it latched closed behind him as he stared at the fallen, stinking heap.
Speaker: Dead!
Speaker: That thing's the walking goddamn dead!
Speaker: All in hyphens.
Speaker: The cannibal attacks and raccoon, all of them near the forest.
Speaker: He'd seen enough late-night movies to know what he was looking at, but he still couldn't believe it.
Speaker: Zombies.
Speaker: Yes.
Speaker: So we get straight to the core here.
Speaker: I actually really appreciated this because let me tell you, one of my pet peeves about almost every piece of zombie fiction that has come out in the past 20 or so years, aside from Resident Evil, is the refusal to just actually acknowledge them for what they are.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: but they've it's like kind of gauche to call him a zombie i guess you you come off as like cheesy and right just like just just call him a zombie come on get it over with we all know what we're stop trying to construct some new it's it's basically that scene from from mean girls um stop stop trying to make fetch happen right right stop trying to make walker happen
Speaker: And we are sick of it.
Speaker: We do not watch your show anymore.
Speaker: Miss Perry, SD Perry, she just writes that, oh, he's seen the movies.
Speaker: He knows what he's looking at.
Speaker: It's a zombie.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: And meanwhile, in every movie in the past 20 years,
Speaker: It's like, oh, what is it?
Speaker: It's the undead, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker: And they somehow.
Speaker: They ought to be dead.
Speaker: They never, they somehow dance around using the term zombie for like 20 goddamn minutes until some slang term pops up.
Speaker: And it infuriates me because it is it is it just feels like it's it's a writer who is just tap dancing around and is just like, look at how clever I am.
Speaker: Look at how clever I am.
Speaker: Just say it.
Speaker: Just just go Z-O-M-B-I-E period news.
Speaker: Just move on with your goddamn story.
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: They want to they want to make their own version of it.
Speaker: They want to brand their own thing.
Speaker: And it's like, come on, man, you didn't.
Speaker: You did.
Speaker: You didn't invent this.
Speaker: You're you're it's like it's like having vampires and then never using the term vampire.
Speaker: It's like a vampire.
Speaker: The masquerade had somehow called itself vampire.
Speaker: The masquerade and never used vampires otherwise or something like that.
Speaker: It's like I am going to I am going to point out as a huge vampire.
Speaker: The masquerade fan.
Speaker: They actually do avoid using vampire pretty frequently.
Speaker: They're either called kindred or canine.
Speaker: You know, that's because today I learned.
Speaker: Yeah, there you go.
Speaker: They do have a lot of... But it's a little more gracefully done, I find, and it's got decades of crap to back it up.
Speaker: And also, it's my favorite role-playing game, so maybe I forgive it for that.
Speaker: But otherwise, you're absolutely right.
Speaker: You need to stop this stupid shit.
Speaker: Everyone else, other than the thing that I like, is wrong.
Speaker: Just call it the thing that it is.
Speaker: That's all I'm saying.
Speaker: The thing that it is.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: And speaking of that writing there, there was there's actually some really gruesome stuff described here.
Speaker: And I will say that the thing that impressed me that continues on, by the way, she doesn't she doesn't do it once and forget about it.
Speaker: The author.
Speaker: She describes the stink of
Speaker: of the corpses, the walking corpses.
Speaker: And that's like one of the one things that you're not going to be able to experience in the video game.
Speaker: And she kind of grabs onto that so that it, it's like a really clever way of, of establishing the difference between reading a book of Resident Evil and, and playing the game.
Speaker: And I appreciate that, you know, adaptation.
Speaker: That was, that was kind of cool.
Speaker: It's leaning into the strength of the different mediums.
Speaker: It's one of the last times she'll be able to do that in this book, by the way.
Speaker: So strap in.
Speaker: It's one of the last moments that you're like, oh, I see why they made this into a book.
Speaker: And like, there's some, okay, yeah, there's a value here.
Speaker: Like, it's one of the last moments.
Speaker: So really, really savor that.
Speaker: Also, I really enjoyed that she wrote this sentence.
Speaker: Behind him, a wet movement is,
Speaker: I never knew that I needed to hear the word wet used like that until that moment.
Speaker: Oh, yeah.
Speaker: That's like a... That's a morning... That's the only way you can describe a morning after a night of drinking gin.
Speaker: A wet movement.
Speaker: It is not pleasant.
Speaker: You're not proud of yourself.
Speaker: It's not a BM.
Speaker: It's a WM.
Speaker: I just want the listeners to get to know who I am right off the bat.
Speaker: I'm establishing my character here.
Speaker: Gin and wine and southern is three words that really come up right away.
Speaker: That's pretty much me.
Speaker: Gin and wine and southern.
Speaker: I mean, you know what?
Speaker: I'm not gonna argue with that.
Speaker: That's about it.
Speaker: That's pretty solid, to be completely honest.
Speaker: I think I'm just disappointed that you got my number.
Speaker: There's a brief interlude where they write about, we hear about Barry's wet work that he did down in Ecuador.
Speaker: Oh, right, right.
Speaker: Some random ass, yeah.
Speaker: Barry had once done covert hostage rescue in Ecuador, where a group of farmers had been held for weeks by a band of insane guerrilla rebels.
Speaker: Several of the hostages had been killed early in the siege, and after the stars managed to capture the rebels, Barry had gone with one of the survivors to record the deaths.
Speaker: Their four victims had been shot, their bodies stuffed behind a small wooden shack after the rebels had taken over.
Speaker: Yeah, he has his, like, Alfred, some people just want to watch the world burn moment.
Speaker: It was basically the only reason it gets brought up is because the zombies remind him of the dead farmers who had been left out in the sun and their skin had been like peeled back and all that stuff.
Speaker: As the book really gets into it.
Speaker: And as you mentioned earlier, yeah, she really doesn't hold back on the descriptions of dead bodies.
Speaker: No, it's it's and you know, if you're a gore fan, if you like horror stuff, that's it's it's good.
Speaker: It's good stuff.
Speaker: It's well written.
Speaker: Hey, thanks for listening to episode one of Pixel It.
Speaker: If you haven't already, subscribe and leave a five-star rating.
Speaker: On the next episode, we dive deeper into Resident Evil The Umbrella Conspiracy.
Speaker: Here's a sneak peek right now.
Speaker: Not to get off on too much of a tangent, but, you know, we're here.
Speaker: We're here.
Speaker: It's that time.
Speaker: It's that time.
Speaker: And I swear, ladies and gentlemen and ladies and gentletems, we're going to get past a few more chapters tonight.
Speaker: Don't you worry.
Speaker: But we're not.
Speaker: We're not.
Speaker: This is as far as we go.
Speaker: They go back to the fancy ass atrium of the estate.
Speaker: And Wesker is gone.
Speaker: And a loud chord plays.
Speaker: This is just a reminder for later.
Speaker: Future Kevin, make sure you cut it out.
Speaker: Insert a loud MIDI chord being played.
Speaker: Thanks, man.
Speaker: Future Kevin, you're doing God's work, my friend.
Speaker: Yeah, he's a really great guy, and he's 100% for sure going to cut all this back and forth about the MIDI chords out.
Speaker: But we know they're there.
Speaker: We know they're around.
Speaker: We know they're around.
Speaker: They're not Bigfoot.
Speaker: Zombies are more like Bigfoot.
Speaker: Actually, probably even less plausible than Bigfoot because we have photos of Bigfoot.
Speaker: And also less friendly.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker: You know, like Bigfoot, like if I found out Bigfoot was real tomorrow, I'd be kind of pumped.
Speaker: If I found out zombies were real tomorrow, I wouldn't feel good.
Speaker: I'm not feeling good thinking about it right now.
