Zach Cregger Just Confirmed ‘Resident Evil’ Will Be His Only Franchise Movie, Ever

Zach Cregger has built one of horror’s most distinctive resumes in just a few years, and he’s done it almost entirely on his own terms. Between ‘Barbarian’ in 2022 and last year’s ‘Weapons,’ which earned Amy Madigan an Oscar for Best Supporting Actress, Cregger has become known as a filmmaker who writes his own strange, subversive stories rather than stepping into someone else’s world.

That reputation is exactly why his next project felt like such a curveball. Cregger is now directing a full reboot of ‘Resident Evil’ for Sony, based on Capcom’s long-running survival horror games, with the film set to hit theaters September 18. It’s his first time working with material he didn’t dream up from scratch, and fans have understandably wondered whether it’s the start of Cregger going full studio franchise player.

According to Deadline, the answer is a firm no. Cregger has confirmed that ‘Resident Evil’ will be the first and only franchise movie he ever makes, dismissing any idea that this is the beginning of a broader pivot into tentpole filmmaking.

His reasoning comes down to how he sees himself as an artist. Cregger has said he considers himself first and foremost a writer, someone who wants to build stories around his own ideas rather than being locked into satisfying the predetermined story beats and expectations that come with an established IP.

So what made ‘Resident Evil’ the exception to his own rule? By his account, it comes down to genuine love for the source material paired with an unusually open mandate from the people who own it. Cregger has described being given a blank check by Capcom, Sony, and producing partner Constantin Film to tell whatever story he wanted inside the world of the games, rather than being handed a mandate to hit specific franchise beats.

That freedom is a big part of why the film looks so different from previous ‘Resident Evil’ adaptations. Rather than following established characters like Leon Kennedy or Jill Valentine, Cregger’s version centers on an entirely original character named Bryan, played by Austin Abrams, alongside a cast that includes Paul Walter Hauser, Zach Cherry, and Kali Reis. It’s less a retelling of any specific game and more, in Cregger’s own words elsewhere, a movie that happens to exist inside ‘Resident Evil’s’ universe while still feeling unmistakably like one of his films.

There’s also some real evidence backing up his one-and-done stance. Cregger already has two entirely original projects lined up for after ‘Resident Evil’: a prequel centered on Madigan’s mysterious ‘Weapons’ character Aunt Gladys, and a sci-fi thriller called ‘The Flood’ being produced with Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment for Warner Bros. Both are the kind of self-generated, idiosyncratic projects that made his name in the first place, suggesting his detour into franchise filmmaking really is just that, a detour.

Of course, plenty of online commenters have already predicted he’ll change his tune the moment a big enough offer lands on his desk, and it’s a fair bit of skepticism given how often filmmakers say never and mean not yet. But for now, Cregger’s stance reads less like a marketing line and more like a genuine philosophy about the kind of career he wants to build, one rooted in stories that are entirely his own rather than ones built to hit franchise checkpoints.

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