‘Resident Evil’: Zach Cregger Reveals How His Backup Plan Changed the Brutal Ending

Resident Evil just opened to more than $100 million worldwide, and Zach Cregger is revealing how a shot he wasn’t sure he’d use helped reshape its divisive ending.

If you haven’t seen the movie yet, get out of here. This is something you should experience for yourself.

Major spoilers for Resident Evil follow.

After everything Bryan, played by Austin Abrams (Weapons), survives, the movie delivers one last kick in the teeth: he becomes a monster himself. We’ve spent the entire film rooting for this poor bastard to make it through the night, only to discover we’ve been watching the birth of something we’d be trying to kill in a Resident Evil game.

But while Bryan’s transformation was always part of the script, Cregger realized that the final stretch needed to preserve the possibility of saving him.

Speaking with Collider, the filmmaker explained that his original version destroyed that hope too early.

“Originally in the script, that scientist pulls the needle out, and as soon as Austin grabs the woman’s face, he drops it and it shatters, and then the rest of the movie is just Austin killing the scientist,” Cregger said.

With the syringe destroyed, the audience already knew there was no saving Bryan. Fortunately, Cregger had filmed another option.

“But I shot that shot of the scientist putting the needle in his pocket just because I had a feeling,” he explained. “I was like, I feel like I’m gonna need that, and so then we were able to build a new sequence at the end.”

He also filmed the scientist attempting to inject Bryan as a contingency while shooting in Prague. Together, those pieces allowed him to keep the possibility of a cure alive deeper into the finale.