One might think that Ethan Winters is an unfortunate hero because of all that he had suffered in both Resident Evil 7 and Village, but in fact his real misfortune lies somewhere else.

Back in Louisiana, as the unexpected twist towards the finale of Village revealed, Ethan was brutally murdered by Jack Baker, as soon as he stepped his foot in the Baker residence while looking for his lost wife Mia. Being exposed to the highly infectious Mold, like the rest of the Baker family, he nonetheless came back to life, albeit he had no idea that, from that moment and on, he would be a walking corpse. The Mold in his body made him super strong, which is why he was able to sustain all sorts of pain and damage and recover from all kinds of injury in seconds. For some reason this never rang a bell, maybe because it was a situation that had never crossed his mind. Because if you remember Sherry in Resident Evil 6, who was able to self-heal from a seemingly mortal wound in front of a gobsmacked Jake, she was well aware that such a thing could happen to her, since she knew about her medical history and the fact that, when she was little, she had been exposed to the virus which gave her regenerative powers. But Ethan didn't know or, to be more accurate, none of the people who knew about it ever bothered to tell him. Mia obviously knew, because she was there; Zoe also knew, for the same reason. Jack, Marguerite and Lucas knew as well, and quite possibly Jack's brother Joe was at some point informed about it. All the hints that Jack Baker threw at Ethan during their dramatic encounters, suddenly made sense once we were informed about Ethan's condition. It was not due to the miraculous medicine in the green bottle that Ethan was able to heal himself so impressively fast, even stick his cut arm or leg back to their original places. At least it was not only due to the medicine. For the most part, it was because he was already Mold inside, and thus able to regenerate even from lethal hits.

Given this, one big question comes to mind. When the story of Village begins, it's been already three years since Ethan and Mia returned from Louisiana, with Ethan being a walking corpse filled with Mold all along. How can it be possible that he never suspected something was going wrong with himself? Of course being Mold inside was not something evident to the naked eye. But he surely underwent extremely detailed medical examinations after he was rescued from the Baker residence. Didn't his blood analysis betray anything weird? From Mia's dialogue with Chris in Miranda's lab near the end of Village, it is made very clear that Mia knew about Ethan while Chris had no idea, something that again doesn't make sense, because Chris was the one responsible for Ethan and his family and supposedly knew everything related to them.

Although Mia's decision to conceal such critical information from both Ethan and Chris was irresponsible and dangerous, let's say that for the sake of fancy and imagination, some things were left unsaid, in order to open the path for a new story. Now this brings us to Village. Apparently Miranda, in her century-long struggle to bring her daughter back to life, had been experimenting on humans, trying to find the perfect host for the resurrection of her little Eva. Just like Simmons in Resident Evil 6, who had Carla experiment on both women and men in order to find the perfect candidate to create his Ada clone, Miranda as well experimented on all sorts of people. This explains why she used grown men (Moreau and Heisenberg), grown women (Donna and Alcina) and young girls (Bela, Cassandra, Daniela), as well as plenty of other people of all ages and sexes in her tests. She didn't care, because once she found the right candidate, she would turn them into raw material, like she finally did with Rosemary, and make them born again as Eva. Obviously she experimented on Mia too. How she found out that little Rosemary was gifted with the powers of Mold, is unclear, but it is very possible that, during her research, she discovered that Mia, being one of the people who was greatly involved in Eveline's case, had been exposed to the Mold herself and kidnapped her in order to experiment on her and see if she could use her as a candidate for Eva; in the process she found out that, since Mia had been cured in time, was to no avail for her plans, but learned that she had a daughter who could be used instead.

This leads to one more big question. Since Miranda knew that Rosemary had the powers of the Mold, for which her mother was apparently not responsible, how come she did not conclude that the baby's "gift" could very well come from her father? She was an experienced scientist after all, and had the luxury of researching everything for more than a century. Certainly she knew that Rosemary couldn't have been born with Mold powers just out of a whim of Mother Nature. She inherited them from someone. Since that someone was not her mother, the only other option was Ethan.

Until Rosemary was found, Miranda's experiments were a disaster. Even almost perfect candidates, like Heisenberg, didn't respond to her tests as expected in the end, and all of them suffered serious and unexpected side-effects. Alcina became an unnaturally tall, blood-thirsty creature who could grow claws from her fingers; her three daughters turned into vampires. Donna's face got partly misfigured, and she developed the ability to create hallucinations and move inanimate objects, preferably her beloved dolls. Moreau grew gills and a hump and his whole body resembled a fish. Heisenberg was turned into a human magnet, capable of manipulating electricity and attracting metallic and iron items all around him. And all the other candidates apparently had side-effects, therefore the hordes of lycans that ended up inhabiting the previously peaceful village.

Then Miranda found Rosemary, who seemed to be the most perfect candidate of all. Or at least Miranda thought so; I would guess this was for two reasons: one because Rosemary had already Mold powers, and two because she was only a baby, therefore she was like a blank canvas. Pretty much like Lily in The Evil Within 2, who was chosen as the perfect STEM core because she was little and innocent, in a similar manner Rosemary's choice seemed ideal, because a baby has no will of its own and cannot pose any resistance. The tragic irony for Miranda is that when her "ceremony" is complete and she holds whom she believes to be the new Eva in her arms, Rosemary does not react. The whole process of recreating Eva didn't have the slightest effect on her. 

This practically means that Miranda was confident about the success of her "ceremony" with Rosemary, simply because, in theory, everything about the little girl seemed perfect. But in practice, things were much different. Rosemary may have had the typical qualities, but in the essence she was unable to respond to Miranda's highly ambitious resurrection process. What Miranda apparently didn't know was that, while confronting Ethan, she had possibly her ideal candidate within her reach. "Gifted" with his regenerative powers, that, apparently, had accustomed well in his body after all this time, Ethan had been transformed into a super powerful bio-weapon, although he didn't have the slightest clue about it. Consider this: we have been playing with a bio-weapon for two full games, while being unable to see it at its full potential. If Miranda had bothered to experiment on him instead of Mia, she certainly would have discovered his "secret" and would have left Rosemary alone; she would have attempted to turn Ethan into raw material instead and resurrect Eva through him. If anything, Ethan by default possessed the ability of coming back to life, therefore Miranda would only need to do half the job, compared to all the fuss she had to go through with the four Lords of the village. And who knows, maybe this time her ceremony could have been a success. Or maybe Ethan could have side-effects too, in his case insane powers that would turn him into an almighty entity, able to devour Miranda in the blink of an eye. And this is exactly where Ethan's misfortune lies. In the fact that he had been a superhero all this time, but nobody ever knew nor made good use of his powers, not even himself. Instead, he lived and died like a mundane mortal, sacrificing himself for practically no reason, since Miranda had already been defeated, both Rosemary and Mia had already been saved, and Chris had already everything set for the destruction of the Megamycete.

The Tragic Fate of Ethan Winters: In the Aftermath of Resident Evil: Village

Resident Evil: Village concludes the story of Ethan Winters in a most dramatic way, or at least this is how it seems with the data that we have so far. For this is Resident Evil, after all, a universe where we have seen characters come back from the dead enough times so as to have hope that maybe this wasn't the last that we saw of the saga's latest lead hero.

Ethan Winters has been (and possibly still is) a curious case; we only had the chance to accompany him in two games, after he was introduced to us quite abruptly in Resident Evil 7, a game which, moreover, drove the series to a new path. To begin with, Resident Evil 7 was in first person. Excluding the on-rails games that were The Darkside Chronicles and The Umbrella Chronicles, this was the first time that a title of the saga was in first person. Personally I didn't mind that; some of my most favorite games happen to be in first person, so playing a Resident Evil story in such a mode was quite enjoyable. What I didn't like much was how the developers, probably following the example of Outlast, insisted in never showing Ethan's face to us, even making his in-game model headless. This was a strange condition for a Resident Evil game, coming from a series where the characters always played an important part, their personality being an essential element of the stories. Code Veronica, for instance, would have never been the same if we were unable to actually see Claire's reactions on screen, the feelings that her facial expressions would betray. Or if we were never able to witness Leon's thoughtful face as he was approaching the village in Resident Evil 4, or his emotional state as he watched innocent people being eaten alive by zombies in Resident Evil 6. Specifically I am talking about the cutscenes - even if Ethan never showed his face in-game, he could very well appear normally in the cutscenes, like it usually is the case in first person games.

In Resident Evil 7, this was not so much of an issue, of course. Almost until the end, we were in the process of adapting to the game's new tactics and of getting to know the cast, including its protagonist. All this changed with Resident Evil: Village. This time around, Ethan's story became a lot more personal, focusing on his close family and the two most beloved people in his life: his wife and his baby. It was unavoidable that the time we got to spend with Ethan in Village, brought us much closer to him and we got to know and like him more. 

The story takes place a few years after the Baker house incident. Ethan and Mia, who now have a baby, a girl called Rosemary, are under the protection of Chris Redfield who, incidentally, has meanwhile differentiated himself from the BSAA for unknown reasons. I'd like to think that he was so heartbroken after Piers's death, that he couldn't go on working in the same environment any more. At some point, Chris bursts into Ethan's home, inexplicably shoots Mia dead and kidnaps Ethan and the baby. Something goes wrong however, and Ethan ends up alone at the snowy outskirts of a mountainous village in Eastern Europe, where he begins a desperate search for his baby, while at the same time trying to figure out why Chris, who was so caring and protective over him and his family, killed Mia in cold blood.

With the help of a local merchant, the Duke, and with his own investigation, he discovers that Rosemary has been abducted by Mother Miranda, a weird woman who poses as a prophet in the area and has the villagers worship her as some kind of god. Miranda has four prestigious residents of the region under her command, treating them as her "children" and giving them orders on a regular basis. As it turns out, Miranda, as well as her children, are all mutated; Miranda has been carrying experiments in order to be able to resurrect her dead daughter, by making use of a parasitic organism that grew deep in the mountains of the area, and found the perfect host in Rosemary. This is not what is important, however. It is not the first time that we see such a scenario in a game (The Evil Within 2 comes to mind, and I'm sure there's many more). An unexpected revelation happens when Chris confesses to Ethan that the Mia he killed was not the real one; it was actually Mother Miranda, who apparently was able to shape shift; and he did not even kill her, as she was able to come back to life soon after. But even this is not the clue of the story. 

After we witness Ethan's shocking death in the hands of Mother Miranda, we see him wake up in a cold place where he is greeted by a familiar face. It is Eveline from Resident Evil 7, who informs him that he actually died back in Louisiana, during his very first encounter with Jack Baker: the patriarch of the family of creeps beat him to death in the attic, minutes after his arrival, but since he was infected with the Mold he was able to resurrect, never realizing his actual state. That is why he could re-attach his cut hand or leg, and could never die no matter how badly he got hit. So Ethan was in fact dead all along, and moreover, thanks to his unwilling mutation, was potentially extremely strong. His altered DNA was passed on to his daughter, making Rosemary practically a super-weapon, which is why Miranda so ardently wanted to take advantage of her. In the end, Ethan sacrifices himself after sending Chris away with Rosemary, in a scene that is very similar to Piers's sacrifice in Resident Evil 6.

I was truly hoping that, in the sequence where Chris finds Ethan's unconscious body after Miranda rips his heart out, the developers would sort of reward us with a revealing view of his face at last. But of course this didn't happen. I like to believe that maybe in a future game they will introduce a seemingly new character - maybe a bad guy - who will actually be Ethan, but since we have never seen him, we probably won't be able to recognize him. And yes, I know we have seen Ethan's model in full, but we have never seen his in-game face, how his features change with every emotion, how he looks when he is happy and how when he is sad. The developers claim that they did it this way so that the players could identify better with the protagonist, but I don't think it can work this way. This is not Outlast where emphasis is put on the horror factor. This is a game where the character has a serious backstory that we know very well; he has a personality and he has his own place in this fictional world. 

Although I can't say that Ethan was one of my favorite characters in the saga, I still liked him a lot and especially in this game I grew to feel him like a friend of sorts. We've been through thick and thin with him, after all. His personality was highlighted more, we were able to form a more precise idea about his character and his attitude. Truth is, however, that it was the lead baddies, Miranda's four "children", that stole the spotlight. 

Lady Dimitrescu, the unnaturally tall vampire with the extending nails and the three bloodthirsty daughters, was the first to catch out attention. A beautiful woman with an attractive figure, but at the same time terrifying due to her height and her cannibalistic habits, however turned out to be a minor boss with the least important role in the story, despite the incredibly enchanting atmosphere of her castle which brought back memories of Ramon Salazar's residence.

Then it was Donna Beneviento, one of my favorites. Hiding behind a black veil, always carrying her horrific doll, she looked like a female mock version of Ethan: like with him, we could never see her face (except in a portrait and, after she died, we had the chance to briefly catch a glimpse before she dissolved), and she was holding on to her doll, just like Ethan was desperate to hold his daughter again. Interestingly enough, the House Beneviento incident is not only the most compelling part of the plot (its atmosphere and setting remind me a lot of The Evil Within, by the way), but moreover is the one that is most closely connected to Ethan's story. House Beneviento is a huge and complicated puzzle, created mostly by hallucinations, where all the parts are related to Ethan and his family: his wedding song, films from his life, a giant doll depicting Mia, a gruesome gigantic embryo that hunts him around mocking his baby daughter. The code to open a locked door is his wedding anniversary with Mia, and even Angie, Donna's creepy doll, is dressed like a bride, malevolently nodding to Ethan's wife, and also nodding to the ghostly Miss Havisham in Charles Dickens's "Great Expectations".

Dr Moreau is a weird, fish-like mutant whose posture and movement remind me a lot of the old beggar in Francisco Goya's painting of "Old Beggar with a Maja". There is no intriguing interaction between him and Ethan, apart from random attacking attempts as our hero is trying to do what is necessary in order to weaken and defeat him. Dr Moreau is the most neutral of all Mother Miranda's children; he seems indifferent towards Ethan, his main concern being to appear as a good son in Miranda's eyes. His area is a secluded part of the village where everything is working with hydro-power via a rather elaborate but old-fashioned system involving windmills, that seems to have been lost in time. 

Last but not least, Karl Heisenberg is, along with Donna, one of the most interesting lead enemies of the game. Unlike Dr Moreau, he openly hates Mother Miranda and is determined to stand against and eliminate her. Obsessed with engineering and machinery, he runs a factory where he produces super-powerful mechanical soldiers, hoping to form an army big and strong enough to defeat Miranda. His aim is to use Rosemary in order to get to his goal, and he keeps trying to persuade Ethan to join him in his ambitious plan. Heisenberg keeps talking to Ethan as our hero wanders around the factory, sometimes degrading him and other times confessing his own impatience to get rid of Miranda. Although he is one of the coolest characters in the saga, his part of the story is unfortunately ruined by the ridiculous mutation that he goes through in the end, where he transforms into a tank-like machine, a tangle of magnets, buttons, iron bars and God knows what else. 

Notably, all of the four lead bosses seem to be obsessed with something: Heisenberg is obsessed with his machines, Donna with her dolls, Dr Moreau with his water, Lady Dimitrescu with her prestigious bloodline. Quite possibly Miranda used their obsessions in order to manipulate them and make them part of her experiments. That said, Mother Miranda, in spite of being the evil mind behind everything, is not so memorable, and the final confrontation with her feels more like a chore and much less like an imposing boss fight. On the contrary, the brief scene where Ethan is lying inside Duke's cart with the merchant driving him to the altar, and then gets out and we see the black horse that was actually leading the cart, bringing to mind a Victorian hearse, is one of the strongest and most blood-chilling of the game.

With Village, the Resident Evil series took an interesting turn, but I feel that somehow the potential of both the story and the characters were not fully explored. The ending left me with a bitter taste, and not only because of the unexpected twist that was Ethan's death. There were characters in the game, like Donna or Heisenberg, that should have had a bigger role. I feel that Donna's past and the backstory of her lineage, for instance, should have been presented in more detail, and in more sections of the game; and same goes for Heisenberg. Unlike Lady Dimitrescu or Dr Moreau who seem to be secluded in their personal spaces, both Donna and Heisenberg have a looming presence in many parts of the village. As I mentioned a few paragraphs above, Donna in particular seems to reflect Ethan and his quest in a morbid, creepy way. 

 

In my humble opinion, this is a feature that should have been highlighted a lot more. Moreover, Donna somehow embeds certain familiar enemies from the previous games, namely Ramon Salazar from Resident Evil 4 and Alfred and Alexia Ashford from Code Veronica, and also nods to the Victoriano family from The Evil Within (like Salazar and the Ashfords, also conceived by Shinji Mikami), characters that share a series of common elements: all of them bring an aura of Victorian decadence about them, both with the way they are dressed and their attitude; they are deranged, their life is a tragedy, and they seem to have emerged from a vintage fairy tale, never being able to adapt to the modern world, reminiscing the glory of past days, at the same time reminding us that the stories they are involved in also belong to a world of magic and fancy.