Before There Can Be Retribution, There Must Be an Afterlife

First off let me say, I didn't even start out planning to review this movie, but as soon as it started the witty commentary came to me so I had to write about it. Now as per usual I don't want to spoil the movie for anyone, but sometimes accidents happen and plot points might be given away (ie if a character were to die in a rather comical way) so for those who don't want any chances of having the movie spoiled avert ye eyes and don't read on after the jump.

So since when is the character only in the first two minutes of the film
poster worthy?

So right off the top this movie gives a nice chunk of symbolism because guess what, all the people about to become zombies are using umbrellas! You get it? They're using umbrellas and the people who made the zombies are the Umbrella corporation? No you don't get it do you, well fine moving on then. Now Alice appears in this hi-tech outfit right at the beginning, where exactly did she find this? And of course then there is BAM telekinetic powers, wasn't really expecting that, but hey maybe it is just a forgotten detail from the last film so they get the benefit of the doubt on this one. I did remember there were clones, but what really confuses me is where the hell did Alice get enough of these fancy uniforms to outfit an entire clone army? And why do these clone uniforms need belly buttons? I bet when they aren't destroying massive underground compounds the clones all talk about who's the hottest, they never show the malformed one. She probably goes first to give the enemy low expectations.

You can tell they aren't the real Alice because the real one is smart
enough to have short hair, less for zombies to grab.

We are introduced to an evil chairman in this first fight sequence of the movie, and guess what... HE'S CANADIAN(Shawn Roberts)!!! Even more awesomer, he's one of the leads in A Little Bit Zombie!!!! (for those who don't know, that is the zombie movie I'm going to see at its world premiere next weekend) Now as far as his character in this movie, every time I saw him in the film I kept wanting him to go "Mr. Anderson". While we are on Canadian cast members in the movie, later on in the film we meet a character played by Norman Yeung, one of the evil metal heads in Todd and the Book of Pure Evil, which I watched the season finale of tonight and was left wanting more. (You hear that Space channel, YOU MUST ORDER A SEASON 3)

One thing I've never understood, why do the heros never foresee the villain using a self destruct button? (this gets rectified at the end of the film since I warned you I might spoil the movie in this review) Now in Alice's next scene she does have an awesome costume because somehow her sleeves hide guns, and that just makes sense for easy access. But where does she get all of these costume changes from? I'm pretty sure zombies don't quite have the dexterity to make such elaborate pieces of clothing. This movie concerns me because it ruins my two zombie contingency plans at once. Just when I thought the Great White North and the Seven Seas were safe, they may be zombie free, but they are still filled with evil. Well I suppose if I am evil I'll just fit right in then.

Now when we meet this new group of survivors we meet the token black man who happens to have been a basketball star before shit got real. You can't really blame him for his lack of knowledge, but something about storing your gun aimed right at you junk just doesn't seem wise. Also every time they mention this place that is allegedly "safe" my mind just keeps jumping to Admiral Ackbar and his famous quote of "It's a trap!". And what does it say about America when consistently their prisons appear to be the safest place in a zombie invasion, are inmates really more dangerous than throngs of the undead? Well make that they were the safest place, until the zombies learned how to dig freedom tunnels.

These survivors don't seem to have their priorities in order because they keep a guy locked up because they think he is a killer. Then they best lock Alice up along with him because heavens forbid they were to focus their killing skills on killing zombies in large quantities. Of course at this point we are introduced to this film's super zombie who carries a massive strange weapon, so pretty much a rip off of pyramid head in Silent Hill. But wait for some reason Umbrella Corp. thought "let's pound some really long nails into this guy". Are they supposed to help keep his hood on? The zombies in this one have also evolved to do that weird tongue mouth thing that just reminds me of the dogs in Blade Trinity, and then that concept is taken to yet another level when we are once again introduced to the deadly dobermans.

One thing that really gets me is when Alice the lead finishes off her revolvers and sword, but there are still aquatic zombies coming at her. She just kind of stands there when it is quite obvious to the audience she still has guns strapped to her back. Especially frustrating is that she is about to go to an armoury, that means you can use up the ammunition you have right now, no need to save it. She makes up for it a bit when she actually uses the guns attached to her back because they shoot coins of death, so that is pretty rad.

She takes quite the risk later because how does she know this cable that has already been weakened from her plane's crash landing will survive an explosion. Without taking that into consideration she holds onto it and jumps off the roof as she detonates explosives. Another logic point she seems to miss, if bullets don't work on a zombie, a ZOMBIE FACE KICK isn't going to do very much either. At least you make his head explode later with your gun so once again you earn back an inkling of respect. I do feel sorry for the characters in this series who don't have names from the video games, because there nomenclature has just made them extremely expendable.

Oh they have made it onto the ship "Arcadia", how long is it going to be before we see the umbrella logo.... aaand there it is. Who could have ever predicted that this ship could be a trap? I am completely and utterly baffled by this development. Once again Alice is just standing there watching the other characters from the game fighting the boss. To be fair she can't exactly get past the insane looking deadly dobermans, so the logic fault falls on her comrades this time. Had they just taken a second to shoot the dogs who are stopping Alice then it would have been three on one not just two. The battle could have been won much sooner. Finally evil is defeated for now and wait a second, is that the token black guy emerging from a storm drain alive? Well that is nice for a change.

My final thoughts are that this was definitely an entertaining movie jam packed with action and I'm looking forward to Retribution coming out. Also my day was made when I found out Milla Jovavich played Katinka in Zoolander. Oh and one final thought, if they make a 6th movie, my friend Camille should definitely play Alice's daughter or younger version of herself, seriously she looks a lot like her.