It ain’t just raining zombies for Resident Evil, it’s also raining money.
Per Variety, Zach Cregger’s latest flick has made $103.8 million, with $60 million of it from North America. Along with being “way above” projections, the domestic milestone makes for the highest-grossing start to these live-action movies, a record previously held by 2010’s Resident Evil: Afterlife opening to $26 million. And that’s not all: this has now beaten 2025’s Weapons as the biggest domestic open in Cregger’s career.
Prior Resident Evil movies weren’t anything to write home about critically, but this new one’s gotten great reviews. The word of mouth has similarly infected audiences, who’ve been hit with a solid burst of marketing over the summer. (“From the director of Barbarian and Weapons” is pretty good incentive to see a new horror movie, turns out.) And it doesn’t hurt that as a franchise, Resident Evil’s had a pretty good run of games between remakes and new installments: this year’s Resident Evil Requiem has been a hit, and a Code Veronica remake is due in 2027.
Next up for Cregger is the sci-fi horror flick The Flood (not those guys) and co-writing a Weapons prequel and the Siren Head movie. He’s previously said he’s got an idea for another Resident Evil movie and would be open to it, so it’s just a matter of waiting to hear whether he’ll continue to play in this universe. Even if this is just a one-and-done, it’s certainly found an audience and made a good start to the spooky season.
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