History & Analysis of Albert Wesker from Resident Evil

Captain Albert Wesker, the treacherous leader of Raccoon City's S.T.A.R.S. (Special Tactics and Rescue Service), began as a regular (but highly brilliant) human man. Many fans of the franchise, including myself, believed that Wesker was gone for good after being impaled by the Tyrant (the final boss of the first Resident Evil title).

The development team behind Resident Evil: Code Veronica (which began as an exclusive for the Sega Dreamcast) surprised us by bringing Wesker back to life but with the ability to use superhuman feats with the added bonus of glowing red pupils (which are concealed behind Wesker's shades). With Wesker leaving Antarctica at the end of RE: CV, it was established that he was going to be a recurring main antagonist of the franchise.

Voice actor D.C. Douglas did a tremendous job of voicing Wesker this villain would be one of Capcom's flagship villains. It also helped that Douglas made blooper videos on YouTube while doing the voice of Wesker.

Despite Wesker being a total @$$hole, Douglas' voice made him a lovable villain.

Wesker would make a cameo appearance in Resident Evil 4 (in both the original and remake) revealing that Ada Wong (who debuted in Resident Evil 2) was working for him all along. He would return in Resident Evil 5 as the main antagonist with the goal of unleashing the Uroboros Virus upon the world and remaking all living things in his image.

Douglas definitely had plenty of fun afterward as he uploaded an Old Spice parody video called “Old Uroboros.”

The iconic villain met his end in Resident Evil 5 by the combined efforts of Chris Redfield and Sheva Alomar but his legacy will never be forgotten. Wesker, despite being officially dead and burnt to a crisp, committed many crimes that launched a domino effect that well affected future installments of the franchise.

Wesker's personality and (acquired) superhuman feats put him on the same level as M. Bison (the main villain of Capcom's Street Fighter franchise). It was a matter of time before Wesker would make an official fighting game debut which was in Marvel vs. Capcom 3: The Fate of Two Worlds.

Wesker is a true man of mystery as there is a lot more to him to be revealed, even after his death in Resident Evil 5. In the first Resident Evil title, Wesker is the leader of Raccoon City's S.T.A.R.S Team which was instructed to investigate the disappearances and murders taking place around the Arklay Mountains. The S.T.A.R.S Team, which is divided into two teams, dispatched its Bravo Team who also went missing.

Alpha Team, with Wesker leading, was dispatched to where Bravo Team's helicopter crash landed.

Joseph Frost, one of the Alpha Team members, gets mauled to death by the zombified dogs. The rest of Alpha Team makes it into the Spencer Mansion and gets split up. The surviving members of both teams explore the mansion while dealing with the monsters and traps, and learn that the Spencer Mansion is a secret bioweapons research facility that belongs to the Umbrella Corporation. They learn that Umbrella is also responsible for the outbreak that created the zombies and monsters.

That is just the tip of the iceberg, though, they learn that Wesker is a former Umbrella researcher.

The S.T.A.R.S. Team mission was an elaborate ploy orchestrated by Wesker to gather valuable test data which he plans on selling while betraying Umbrella in the process. Wesker's plan is foiled when the Tyrant gets free from its stasis tank.

Wesker “dies” on the spot and is officially declared dead when Spencer Mansion explodes.

When players take control of Chris Redfield in RE: CV, he (surprisingly) crosses paths with Wesker who easily manhandles him. In the PlayStation 2 port of RE: CV, a special movie called “Wesker's Report” was released. The special is narrated by Wesker, who was voiced by Richard Waugh at the time, who explains that Wesker was leading the group while still working for Umbrella.

Wesker believed that Umbrella was near its end and decided to jump ship, which led to him selling information to other organizations. The special movie revealed that Wesker actually faked his death by injecting himself with the T-Virus, which did not zombify him but allowed him to retain his human form but with superhuman abilities.

Wesker survived but his plans were ruined.

In the events of Resident Evil 2, Wesker worked behind the scenes by employing Ada to grab a sample of the G-Virus. The dynamic is further explored when playing Ada's scenario in Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles.

At the end of RE: CV, Wesker takes off with Steve Burnside's corpse which was still infected by the T-Veronica virus.

Resident Evil: UC shows that Umbrella's crimes were revealed to the world when Chris and Jill Valentine head to a facility in Russia. While Chris and Jill are cleaning house, with the detachment of U.S. Marines serving as fodder for the zombies and monsters, Wesker infiltrates the facility to get more test data.

Wesker would work behind the scenes in Resident Evil 4 where he once again worked with Ada but now employing Jack Krauser.

With Umbrella being destroyed, Wesker aligns himself with Tricell (the company introduced in Resident Evil: Degeneration) in Resident Evil 5. He managed to kidnap and brainwash Jill Valentine in the process, too, which ultimately led to Jill's slowed aging (which is talked about in Resident Evil: Death Island).

After a few scuffles, Wesker meets his end in Resident Evil 5. It is obvious that Douglas had loads of fun voicing Wesker in the game.

Wesker's legacy lived on in death as Resident Evil 6 revealed Jake Muller, a mercenary, as Wesker's out-of-wedlock son. Jake is partnered up with a grown-up Sherry Birkin, who debuted in Resident Evil 2 at the age of 12 and became a federal agent.

In Resident Evil 0, the prequel to the remake of Resident Evil, Wesker and William Birkin (the antagonist of Resident Evil 2) assassinated James Marcus (the antagonist of Resident Evil 0) to take his Progenitor Virus. This is where Wesker and Birkin parted ways, respectively, with the former luring the S.T.A.R.S Team and the latter continuing work on the G-Virus.

The franchise further revealed that Wesker is one of many children brought into Spencer's “Project Wesker” initiative. Resident Evil: Revelations 2 reveals the existence of a “sister,” Alex Wesker, who is the game's main antagonist.

The big footprint that Albert Wesker left behind is part of a larger legacy.

Douglas still has fun with his fellow Resident Evil voice actors, especially Roger Craig Smith who is one of the voices of Chris Redfield. There is a small cameo by Steve Blum, famous for voicing Spike Spiegel in Cowboy Bebop, who had a minor role in Resident Evil: Degeneration.

The first Resident Evil game used 3D polygons for the gameplay and live-action FMV (full-motion video). Pablo Kuntz, one of many Westerners living in Japan at the time, was cast to provide the voice and live-action portrayal of Wesker, which makes him the original Wesker.

Kuntz was 25 years old when he played Wesker.

Despite Wesker being an iconic villain, Kuntz neither played video games nor remembered his role as Wesker. He had no idea that the acting was for a video game. Prior to being a model, Kuntz had graduated from college in Canada and became an English teacher in Tokyo.

Kuntz, on advice from a college friend, took up modeling and acting in Tokyo. This led to Kuntz being signed by a few agencies and that led him to being in Resident Evil.

It was only in 2022, Kuntz played the first Resident Evil game for the very first time. He shared the joy with his son.

In the live-action film adaptaions by Paul W.S. Anderson, Wesker was portrayed by two actors. The first actor to portray Wesker is Irish actor Jason O'Mara in the 2007 film Resident Evil: Extinction.

Canadian actor Shawn Roberts (who is a veteran of zombie cinema) portrayed Wesker in the 2010 film Resident Evil: Afterlife. O'Mara took on the role again in the final installment, Resident Evil: Retribution.

British actor Tom Hopper portrayed Wesker, a friendlier version, in the film reboot Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City.

The late Lance Riddick portrayed Wesker in the Netflix original series. It is the first time that a non-white performer took on the role of Wesker. This series reinvented Wesker by having an original version and three clones. I enjoyed Riddick's performance of Wesker but I felt the writing and storyline was a complete waste of his talent.

The production team made Riddick's version of Wesker look like a cheap knockoff of Marvel Comics' Blade.

After watching each live-action adaptation of Resident Evil, Constantin Film needs to give up the live-action rights to Resident Evil. The rights need to go to a company that understands the lore and will not lowball the production which is why the live-action series of The Last of Us was successful and every live-action adaptation of Resident Evil failed.

In his Resident Evil 5 incarnation, Wesker wishes to unleash Uroboros onto the Capcom and Marvel worlds.

He would again be voiced by D.C. Douglas.

Douglas reprised the voice role of Wesker in the online collectible card game Teppen with his own story mode, where he crosses paths with many people such as Mega Man X.

Wesker would also appear in Dead By Daylight and a Wesker skin would be available to use in Capcom's Lost Planet.

After the first Resident Evil game was launched (on the PlayStation, Sega Saturn, and PC), nobody thought that Wesker would make a return. Unless you're superhuman, no normal human will ever recover from getting impaled by a Tyrant. The development team did a good job of building Wesker from scratch and turning him into one of the most iconic video game villains.

As a villain, Wesker is on par with M. Bison from Street Fighter and Kazuya Kazama from Tekken.

There was the feeling Wesker would eventually appear in a non-Resident Evil game and all those years of waiting had paid off, though I would have loved to see an interaction between Wesker and Bison. The two villains share much in common such as the thirst for power though they use different methods.

If there was an official crossover between Resident Evil and Street Fighter, Wesker is the perfect rival to M. Bison and Gill. If there was an official crossover between Resident Evil and Darkstalkers, Wesker is the perfect rival to Jedah Dohma. If there was another crossover between Capcom and SNK, Wesker would make a perfect villain who could cross paths with the likes of Geese Howard and Rugal Bernstein.

Once a normal human, Wesker is a superhuman who can throw down with the best.

Wesker is officially dead but he's not truly dead...

I wasn't familiar with the work of D.C. Douglas until Resident Evil 5. Even though Douglas has an impressive resume of acting credits, he is known to most because of his portrayal of Albert Wesker. What made Douglas even more famous and popular for the role is his comedy fanservice videos. In one video, Douglas reprised the voice of Wesker for a COVID-19 public service announcement.

This comedy video short would reunite Douglas with Smith. Nicole Tompkins, the voice of Jill Valentine in the Resident Evil 3 remake, also makes a cameo appearance.

Douglas really gives back to the fans.

He created a fanservice mini-series called “Life with Al” in which he plays a version of himself who gets Wesker as a roommate.

Douglas is also known for being an outspoken critic against right-wing pundits (which cost him the job doing voicework for Geico).

He created a fanservice video reciting Donald J. Trump quotes in the voice of Albert Wesker.

The Resident Evil modding community created a pre-Alpha build of the original Resident Evil game which was supposed to have a science-fiction theme. Wesker's name was originally “Albert Hustler” who was (allegedly) killed at the beginning of the game as his corpse lies in the foyer. He is revealed alive near the end of the game but still meets the same fate.

If the original project wasn't scrapped, Wesker wouldn't be the iconic villain that he is today.

What was supposed to take place in the future was changed to take place in modern times. It sucked that Gelzer and Dewey were cut from the final product, but it was a valuable stepping stone for Wesker's development.