Albert Wesker has long been the main villain behind the horror of the Resident Evil franchise.
He's been around since the original game, serving as one of the mysterious (and dangerous) heads of the Umbrella Corporation. He would later go on to become a superpowered being intent on world domination.
That was, at least, until heroes Chris and Sheva shot him in the head with RPGs. That was back in 2009's Resident Evil 5, and since then, the aftershocks of his death have been felt in subsequent Resident Evil titles. However, Wesker might not be as dead as fans think he is, if new evidence from spin-off Resident Evil: Umbrella Corps (via Rely on Horror) is to be believed.
The online multiplayer title is getting scathed by critics and gamers alike, but at least there are a number of mysterious clues sprinkled throughout the game's single-player mode. The plot of the title involves special agents (including the player) being sent to various biohazard locations around the world from previous games in order to gather various DNA and virus samples.
Certain journal entries from the campaign level taking place in the same village area as Resident Evil 4 make note of a "higher up" from the organization paying a visit to the officer overseeing the player's mission. The officer describes the man visiting as being very interested in the village, almost "like he was there when everything went down." The officer goes on to say that the man visiting doesn't seem to have come from anywhere, and that he seems familiar with everything.
It's a curious entry, namely because only a few key characters involved in the events of Resident Evil 4 survived. One of them was hero Leon S. Kennedy, along with the U.S. president's daughter, Ashley Graham. Another was agent Ada Wong, who was working for Wesker to recover samples of the Las Plagas parasite. Though Wesker wasn't on site directly, he closely monitored Wong's progress and would have been familiar with the area.
All of that together seems to imply that Wesker is, somehow, alive and well, and a brief piece of dialogue seems to confirm it. Occasionally, after a multiplayer match, a voice can be heard over the radio, one that sounds like Wesker's. A man will ask over the radio, "Well, sir, what did you think?" upon which, a voice that is definitely Wesker's chimes in to say, "That was ... satisfactory."
It matches up with the fact that fans have known Wesker voice actor D.C. Douglas would be reprising his role in the game, although at the time, Douglas says it was his understanding that Wesker's role in Umbrella Corps was non-canon. However, as Capcom later pointed out, that's not the case at all.
"The game is not a hypothetical, 'what-if' side scenario," Capcom said earlier this year. "Umbrella Corps is set in the present day of Resident Evil, which means it's after the events of Resident Evil 6. It's almost in an ironic way that we're using the title Umbrella Corps. If you know your Resident Evil lore, Umbrella no longer exists at this time in the universe; it's been destroyed. There's definitely a kind of a background of the Resident Evil universe that forms the basis of the game's premise."
So, is Wesker actually back? Is he a clone? That's all unclear for now. Also unclear is whether or not Wesker might make an appearance in Resident Evil 7. Despite the upcoming new entry in the franchise taking a far different approach from previous games, Capcom ensures fans that it will have connections to existing Resident Evil lore and will take place after the events of the sixth game in the series. What exactly those connections are, and whether or not Wesker is involved, remains to be seen.
