Review by C.J. Bunce
Your next encounter with Raccoon City may be the best yet. In the first volume of writer-artist Zino Kodakujii’s manga Resident Evil: Death Island, available now here at Amazon, readers will get an adaptation of the 2023 animated movie that really brings the games, movies, TV series–the whole franchise–together. Featuring a mash-up of key players dating back to Capcom’s original 1996 Biohazard game, it’s a great entry point for anyone who isn’t yet familiar with the franchise. The artwork re-creates these characters from different games in a way fans haven’t seen them before–it may be the best treatment yet of these sci-fi, horror, and action heroes.
Taking place after the similar CG-animated movie Resident Evil: Vendetta, this story breaks the action into eight missions. The impetuous but skilled Claire Redfield leads the way, investigating what giant entity could have taken a bite out of a dead orca. The action begins with an infected human coming at her from the ceiling. Meanwhile at Alcatraz Island, Leon Kennedy is tracking a scientist with links to classified military secrets. How is he connected with the dead mutants and the local illegal drug scene?
As Ingrid Hunnigan radios key information in, Kennedy encounters the first twisted Dr. Moreau-inspired creature. Claire joins brother Chris and Jill Valentine on the island, which is still a tourist site when a zombie outbreak erupts. With Kennedy and Jill reunited it appears the band is truly back together as they try to eliminate their next threat, a particularly nasty Licker variant.
What connects a creepy order with a possible cure with biodrones and the missing scientist? Dr. Rebecca Chambers must join forces with Hunnigan to reveal the truth. And the rest of the book finds the franchise’s four heroes on a rollercoaster of fight scene choreography, gruesome horror attacks, bizarre creatures, and a battle to contain this version of the T-virus outbreak.
The artwork and character building in the manga are actually better than the animated film. There’s something about Zino Kodakujii’s art that is more animated and visually striking than the more “stiff” characters of the movie’s animation.
Survival, horror, sci-fi, and action are genres of the manga adaptation of the CG animated film Resident Evil: Death Island. The tie-in to the Japanese survival/horror-themed video game Biohazard (renamed for the U.S. market) is a staple in the action movie genre–not only one of the world’s bestselling game series since arriving in 1996, it’s the world’s most successful video game tie-in movie franchise ever.
For fans of the franchise or anyone looking to jump onboard, get your copy of writer-artist Zino Kodakujii’s manga Resident Evil: Death Island, available now here at Amazon from Titan Manga.
