MovieChat Forums > Resident Evil: The Final Chapter (2017) Discussion > I wonder, about the Ashfords...

I wonder, about the Ashfords...

posted 7 years ago by XantherOuri
8 replies | jump to latest

This may be just me trying to give Anderson too much credit, even though I was heavily disappointed to see him retcon the whole backstory of Dr. Ashford creating the T-Virus and Anti-Virus for Angela...with not only another 4 movies after that and no canon explanation of what happened to her, but basically writing in a VERY similar set of characters in their place, I almost wonder if there was some legal reason for basically just scrubbing them from the series. What if they were so disappointed with how Apocalypse turned out (there are parts of it I like, but its EASILY the weakest movie of the series), that they didn't allow their likenesses to be used in any of the sequels? I don't know the legailty of if they'd be able to do that, or how they even felt about their appearances in the movie, this is all just speculation. It would make it a LITTLE more excuseable on Anderson's part of his last-minute throw-in of "Dr. Marcus and Alicia".

~*~Fight Your Fears And Survive~*~

[–] berryluis 7 years ago

Well the actress Sophie who played Angela Ashford has become really good and she's very pretty I think she could've returned to be some side villain or a shocking plot device at the end. I think it's just Andersons lazy writing.

[–] chakramstrike 7 years ago

Well the novelizations of the first three movies had a ton of side story that wasn't in the films. The novelizations as with all or most books based on films was from the script...probably an early draft...but they don't normally add anything unless it's in the script or the directors give the writers an ok to do it.

The only novel that deviated from this was the retribution novelization. The writer added in a clone subplot that didn't really add anything to the book only to pad it out. I think the Clone was of Becky or even alice herself. But an umbrella employee rescued the Clone and wanted to give her a life outside of umbrella prime. Either way it didn't add anything and was honestly quite boring.

[–] remcatalin-27191 7 years ago

Free advice,stop looking for logic and reason where is none,just enjoi it how IT is.

The extraordinary is in what we do,not who we are

[–] whatisthisidonteven2017 7 years ago

Dr. Ashford can be seen during the intro / recap. He hasn't been featured in any of the ones in the previous movies. For that reason I doubt they had trouble using his character / likeness, or that Anderson hoped we forgot about him - if that was his purpose he definitely wouldn't be in the intro.

It's just a matter of not caring about continuity, the series had spotty to poor continuity since the second film, although at the time it didn't matter much that Mabius didn't return as Nemesis as we wouldn't be able to recognize him anyway, or that Isaacs didn't return as Birkin. Then in the next movie, Jill and Angie are gone, then the next one seems to ignore the desert environments of the previous one and so on.

Anderson to this day still claims the movies respect the games and do not contradict them - they are just side stories - and that the original movie is a prequel to the games. I don't think he cares about continuity.. and he definitely doesn't care about anyone but Alice. To his mind, because the film closed the Alice chapter, he did a good job. Case in point, in interviews he says he always knew how it was going to end and he kept these revelations about Alice, all those years, a secret, even from his wife. He seems to genuinely believe he told a complete story, because for him it's all about Alice, the other characters or events don't matter, they are there so that Alice has something cool to do.

[–] XantherOuri 7 years ago

Dr. Ashford can be seen during the intro / recap. He hasn't been featured in any of the ones in the previous movies. For that reason I doubt they had trouble using his character / likeness, or that Anderson hoped we forgot about him - if that was his purpose he definitely wouldn't be in the intro.

Never saw it, unless you're talking about where there were literally dozens of clips playing on the screen during the intro, in which case no wonder I missed it. They didn't draw attention to it, though.

Anderson to this day still claims the movies respect the games and do not contradict them - they are just side stories - and that the original movie is a prequel to the games...in interviews he says he always knew how it was going to end and he kept these revelations about Alice, all those years, a secret, even from his wife.

Never read these interviews, got links? Just curious.

~*~Fight Your Fears And Survive~*~

[–] whatisthisidonteven2017 7 years ago

Never saw it, unless you're talking about where there were literally dozens of clips playing on the screen during the intro, in which case no wonder I missed it. They didn't draw attention to it, though.

It's one of the clips in the intro, but not one on the side or something (where there are literally dozens as you said), it's one of the central ones, that has been deliberately placed there (as a reference to the events of Apocalypse). They didn't draw any more of a particular attention to it than its placement, nor do I imply the inclusion of it means anything about the storyline; what I'm saying is if there was a legal reason to never reference the actor and his character, they would make sure to not show him, as he went unreferenced for 3 movies now! Since he was included in this one, I believe there can't be a legal reason.

Also, in earlier movies of the franchise the actors used in these clips weren't getting credited (with the exception of Mabius in Apocalypse, because it used an extensive amount of footage of him), but Retribution credited a whole bunch of them for appearing barely a second during the intro. Larter, Miller, Glen, Purefoy, and so on (although Vavasseur for her short clip of Angie did not receive credit). That makes it possible that Jared Harris (who played Ashford) received credit for his clip in this movie, but I don't really know.. I'll find out when the movie is released on home video.

Never read these interviews, got links? Just curious.

You have to read several interviews to get all that, but here are a couple:

http://en.gigazine.net/news/20170104-resident-evil-paul-w-s-anderson-interview/
http://screenrant.com/resident-evil-final-chapter-paul-ws-anderson-interview/

[–] destroyerwod 7 years ago

Paul is so full of himself. He had no idea what he wanted to do, probably kept making those sequels cause they brough $ and kept him and his wife relevant...

Do you know James Marcus is actually the bad guy from Resident Evil 0? Thats another random name (just like Ashford) he took from the game that had no link to the actual character.

Paul has butchered, hacked into pieces, sh*t on and vomit over the RE liscence as hard as he could, plain and simple.

And i just hope the terrible editing and jump cut sh*tfest of the last movie make peoples realize how bad he is and he never get the rights to another video game franchise !!

Alice is the worst character of all time, she need to die in the last movie. Chris/Jill are RE !!!

[–] eric_m_bi 7 years ago

Originally, Final Chapter was supposed to reveal Angela's fate but it's clear that got rewritten, perhaps to allow Anderson's and Jovovich's daughter a part in the script, or maybe they thought audiences would be disturbed to see Angela die on screen. :/