Page 189 - Cyberculture and New Media

180 Cyborg Goddesses: The Mainframe Revisited
______________________________________________________________
the Nemesis Project, the bio-genetically manipulated Alice does not
deteriorate in her eugenics. In the world of science, beauty survives the beast.
Therefore, during the Resident Evil films’ sequels, the vessel or the
latest biogenetic creations carrier happen to be all female figures. That is, the
T-virus’ production happens to be for the bodily enhancement of a weak little
37
girl called Angela. Subsequently, the mainframe computer the Red
38
Queen’s holographic representation speaking in British accent happens to
be a girl’s image. The Red Queen safe-keeps and controls the Hive. Rain is
another dedicated and selfless female rescue officer. In this line of female
figures, Alice the protagonist is the accidental instigator of evil in Raccoon
City, but also Angela’s rescuer. Thus, different shades of the female image
occur as part of a technological invention. This image combines in one
various qualifications: such as good, evil, innocence, clumsiness, beauty,
ugliness, dedication, destruction, love, sex, altruism, determinism, will,
kindness, strength, and endurance. These qualifications of the female vessel
appear in the context of race, class, gender as well as generations. In the
movie Alice and Rain, one blond, and the other a dark skinned woman,
symbolize racial diversity. The Queen obviously stands for the class issue,
while the little girl obviously introduces a generational perspective within the
female context as part of the carrier of new technology into the future.
In the Resident Evil films, the female image appears as part of the
technological, viral evolutionary and genetic experiments. However, the
female image also appears along the idea of massive extinction such as the
Holocaust. In this respect, the Resident Evil movies call forth for the
reconsideration of the meaning of life, death and being one more time.
Specific clues regarding the Holocaust in the Resident Evil films are as
follows: Alice’s dramatic clothing; her high black leather boots and red dress
half covering her body, and Spence’s black leather jacket in the first film.
They are a reminder of a military outlook. A major hint regarding the
Holocaust is the infection of the Hive workers by the virus spreading through
the air conditioning system. Later the computerized system puts the
employees into temporary sleep by pouring gas all over them. Similarly, the
poison puts Alice to sleep as well while she was taking a shower in the
mansion. All seem to connect as a reminder of the historic Holocaust
representations in the media. The train scene is reminiscent of the media
images regarding the trains, which carried Nazi victims to concentration
camps during the Second World War. In the movie, the underground train
connecting the Hive to the upper ground level; and the terror scenes
generated by the mutant humanoid biological weapon creature’s attacks
haunting for flesh, add further into the idea. Thus from a critical perspective
the Hive, and the quiet suburban neighborhood with both ends connected by
the train, happen to be symbolic for those double concentration camps of
corporate employees in work and in leisure. The movie in the opening