Resident Evil season 1, episode 5 recap: Home Movies

We’ve passed the halfway point of Resident Evil season 1, so it’s about time for an episode that’s heavy on exposition with a lot of information being revealed all at once. Since the characters in the 2022 storyline are the ones keeping secrets from each other, most of the episode takes place in that timeline.

That leaves only about a minute of footage taking place in the future timeline. Let’s begin!

Resident Evil Season 1 Episode 5 recap – 2022

We start with Albert looking for his children but being sidetracked by a summoning from Evelyn. Evelyn had Angel arrested/possibly kidnapped at the end of the last episode.

Although we can see from his injuries that he’s already been worked over, he hasn’t given up any information. Evelyn needs Albert to turn up the interrogation.

It turns out that Albert is a highly qualified torturer. Once Angel admits that he knows about his daughters, Albert is all about the idea of torturing him for information.

Speaking of Albert’s daughters, they’ve both made it safely home after last episode’s party. Billie also seems to be fully recovered from the virus that she was dying from a few minutes ago.

Now that the 72 hour mark has passed, she is no longer withdrawn or sickly, and instead her old usual self and wants ice cream. Jade on the other hand, is bothered by the information that Angel gave to them during their brief meeting.

She’s mostly fixating on the part where he said that her father was supposed to be dead, and neither she nor her sister technically exist. In an effort to get Jade to stop worrying, Billie agrees to look for their birth certificates.

After all, if they have birth certificates, they have to exist, right? The hunt for birth certificates turns up a computer that uses a different password than Albert’s usual one.

So, Jade calls super tech friend Simon to help her hack her dad’s laptop. With the hacking successful, the sisters discover an unsent email addressed to Billie instructing her on what to do should Albert be dead.

Following the instructions, the two girls follow a series of clues that lead to a bag filled with fake passports, stacks of cash in various currencies, and a gun. Otherwise known as a standard bag for when a powerful cooperation is out to get you.

Billie is understandably upset at how their comfortable life is falling apart with each new reveal. Especially since she recently got her life back from almost becoming a zombie.

The sisters fight about if they should keep going or not. Jade wants to push farther and find out what else their dad is hiding.

The fight gets more and more personal the longer it goes, with Billie accusing Jade of violent tendencies, and Jade claiming that Billie just wants to hide from the world. Simon is still on the video call awkwardly listening while all of this personal baggage is being aired.

After Jade storms off, he’s the one that talks to Billie and convinces her that her sister does love her. Jade’s motivation and actions are always driven by her desire to do what’s best for Billie.

Moved by this, Billie agrees to keep looking for more information.

Resident Evil Season 1 Episode 5 recap – Albert’s secret lab…

Jade and Billie ask Simon where someone might hide something in the house, and he suggests the basement. Billie says that they don’t have a basement, which we all know means that there’s a secret basement.

The sisters find the doorway and unlock it with help from the dog. (The chip to grant entry into the secret basement has been implanted into the family dog.)

In the secret basement is the mysterious lab we’ve seen Albert conducting experiments in this whole season. The sisters look through the lab, finding a minifridge filled with their own blood, and a box of DVDs labeled Raccoon City 1998.

When watching one of the DVDs they see footage of a full blown T-Virus mutation including a woman with a two foot eyeball growing out of her back. Jade tries to take the DVDs and the computer as proof of Umbrella’s unethical practices, but she improperly disconnects the network and the lab begins a self-destruct sequence.

Billie and Jade are saved by Albert showing up at the last minute to put the fire out. But since he was on the video with the eyeball lady, and since he has a secret lab hidden in the basement of their home with their blood in a minifridge, they no longer trust him.

Billie hits him with a tray and the two sisters tie him to a chair. Albert stresses that he cares for the girls, and that he is trying to protect them from Umbrella.

That’s why he kept so many things secret including the hidden bag of money and a gun. He explains to Billie that the dog that bit her was infected by the T-virus, she was able to fight the infection off.

He adds that he made them strong by manipulating their embryos before they were born. Billie admits that Angel the reporter knows that she was bitten, which Albert responds by saying he needs to protect them.

If they find out that Billie was infected, she will become a part of the experiment for Umbrella. The sisters free their father, who heads back to the lab at the office.

Not the secret one in the basement. That’s a lot of stuff that happened in the 2022 timeline not leaving much space for the 2036 timeline in this episode.

All we get is a quick sequence of Jade, who just made it back to the surface, getting captured by Umbrella soldiers. The lead soldier takes her helmet off to reveal that it’s Billie.

This is a shocking cliffhanger for the adult versions of these characters to address next episode.

Resident Evil Season 1 Episode 5 recap – Picking up speed.

While the 2022 storylines have usually been a drag on the more zombie focused future storylines, this episode that was all 2022 actually ended up working pretty well. Maybe it’s because the characters finally got to learn a lot of information that the audience has known for a while now.

It can be a cathartic feeling to finally see the plot that was moving the slowest in the show actually starting to pick up some momentum. Unfortunately, what works in this episode mostly serves to highlight what hasn’t been working in the first half of the show.

It feels like a lot of the action here should have been unfolding in episode two or three instead of episode five. The mystery surrounding the original Racoon City has become the most interesting part of the 2022 storyline.

It’s nice to see that the show seems to have finally realized that. Resident Evil is starting to put more focus on those storytelling threads and dropping the ones that didn’t seem to go anywhere interesting.

It does feel very much like a “better late than never” episode in terms of the ground it covers so hopefully this is a step towards a more compelling latter half of the season.

Why is Billie working with Umbrella? Should Jade and Billie trust their father?

Let us know you thought of Resident Evil season 1 episode 5 in the comments below!

You can watch Resident Evil season 1, only on Netflix!