Thinking about the implications that Albert did not want to kill S.T.A.R.S.
The only member he killed with his own two hands was Enrico, and judging by his situation when Jill and Chris confront him, he seems to be injured and very well could have been infected from the creatures roaming the NEST facility. Which could be presumed to be a mercy kill covered up with the perception of being to hide his secrets. But that still wouldn't make sense when he planned to reveal them anyway.
Wesker received orders from Umbrella to dispose of S.T.A.R.S. They were his pride and joy. He called them his pet project, yet his residential quarters in the Spencer Mansion is COVERED in numerous articles and newspaper clippings of their accomplishments and exploits. It would be one thing if this were something in his private office, but why keep them in his Umbrella residence? Especially in such a public seating area where other scientists visiting his research area would see them. He was proud of his teams and their accomplishments. He was showing off their notoriety.
He had their affection. Their loyalty. Their love and respect. All of S.T.A.R.S. trusted him. He was proud of them. They were HIS. His accomplishment that was solely his and his alone. Not Umbrella's. Nobody else could take credit for it. Not Spencer. Not Umbrella. This was all his hard work and training put into a team that functioned efficiently and effectively. Sure Alpha was his favorite by far because it was his specifically, but Bravo was quite impressive in their own right as well.
The orders for him to get rid of S.T.A.R.S. and collect the combat data against the Bioweapons in the Spencer Mansion came a week before the U.B.C.S. recruits would begin their own training. Training that would have relied on the specialized skill set and curated techniques of an elite fighting force such as S.T.A.R.S. and the accumulated combat data from fighting various different Bioweapons. Many of which the U.B.C.S. is being trained to deal with.
If Albert Wesker had succeeded in getting rid of S.T.A.R.S. and followed his orders like the loyal drone Spencer expected of him, the U.B.C.S would have thrived under his tutelage and strategic intellect, and would have been far better prepared for an event such as Raccoon City.
Yet Albert failed.
He failed because he couldn't bring himself to harm his own team. Albert is an impressive marksman as showcased in the very beginning of RE1 when he snipes a Cerberus out of the air with a handgun in the dark dense forest to save Chris.
But every single time he attempts to "take out" one of his own team (excluding Enrico which was an impressive shot much like the Cerberus), he 'misses' any vital spots or can't bring himself to pull the trigger at all.
He aims at Rebecca and hits her bulletproof vest dead center instead knowing the shock and impact would be enough to knock her out for the short time he'd need to confront Chris privately. He doesn't pull the trigger on Chris. He can't bring himself to harm Jill or Barry, both of which would have been very easy for him to do.
Albert pretends to be condescending. He tries to downplay their skills and abilities but Albert knows the true value of his team. He has stacks upon stacks of articles detailing their real value that he has kept like personal trophies. Every single one of his team was a valuable asset and he curated their strengths to make Alpha team (and Bravo team) a formidable force in its own right.
Had both teams been aware of what they were walking into ahead of time they may have survived with far better odds, but at the end of the day only 6 members were lost. That's a 50% casualty rate. In a situation with no preparation or knowledge shared ahead of time. They went above and beyond, just as they always did.
He could have returned to finish the job after faking his death. He could have hunted down Barry and his family, taken care of Rebecca, ended Brad, and assassinated Jill. He could have finished the job many times over, and he kept a very close eye on all of them, Chris especially, but Albert never wanted to. He watched from a distance. He kept surveillance on them all. He observed and he continued to be proud. Chris did what Umbrella never could succeed in doing with the U.B.C.S, and that was building the BSAA.
His team strived, thrived and overcame every obstacle, and found success where Umbrella only ever found failure. Albert could never bring himself to kill them, because they became the one creation he nurtured solely as his own, that far exceeded anything Spencer could have come up with, and they made it their personal goal to destroy the same people who ruined Albert's entire life. Whether they knew it or not.
His team unknowingly, and indirectly, avenged him.
The more Resident Evil content the algorithm feeds me, the more disconnected modern RE feels from the original 90's trilogy/Code Veronica era. I think the series lost it's vibe and I actually don't like the remake era much, and when you examine the stories of 2 and 3 the remakes just...really actually kind of blow in comparison. The original era was so cheeseball and charming but also felt very human and comparatively grounded and simple, which is wierd because the remakes are trying to force a sense of realism.
Anyway, I am super nostalgic for the old shit and at this point my RE fandom brain is going to live mostly in that era. 80's-90's classic horror inspired with a moody atmosphere is the true vibe.
Actually, you know what? The new Weskers are more fan service designed than ever but in a really meh kind of way. Classic Umbrella Chronicles/CVX Weskers were giving Bowie-esque but not sexualized fan service, just vague inspiration. RE5 ramped it up to leather fetish cheesecake possibly only slightly by accident.
But at this point Capcom is likely very aware by now that he has always had fangirl attention and after Lady Dimitresque they know they have a bigger viral reputation for cheesecake villains.
Once you see it you can't unsee it: they leaned into tropey female gaze intentionally, that's part of why he suddenly seems so intensely heterosexual. Reboot!Wesker is giving Possessive Billionaire and Zeno is giving Mafia Boss Who Kidnapped Me.
Just popping in to say that I could not be bothered to understand or pay attention to Resident Evil 9 so I had NO FUCKING CLUE they tried to give fucking SPENCER a redemption arc oh my fucking god Capcom please I'm begging you to stop adding to the lore. Just stop making Resident Evil I want to get off this ride now please
Honestly, the Emperor was right to deceive me at first. He's right that I wouldn't have trusted him. Case in point: I did not trust Omeluum in my first run when I was actually trying to roleplay and make somewhat genuine decisions (not "it's a game, let's just see what happens" decisions). I didn't even do its quest.
Ideally, someone would be honest with you so that you can decide, with all the info, whether to trust them or not. But desperate times and all that. He needed our trust. The fate of a lot of people depended on it. Even if he only cares about saving himself, it's still saving a lot of other lives too, including ours.
Also, plenty of people hide or change things about themselves for their own safety or comfort. Queerness, disability, religion. Things like makeup, hair dye, clothes, and surgery can change how we look. Many people don't even use their real name or share pictures of themselves online.
Also, half of our companions lie or manipulate or withhold info from us too. Astarion tries to manipulate you by seducing you. Astarion, Shadowheart, Gale, and Wyll all withhold important info about themselves.
Also, what does it even matter? Elf, half-orc, mindflayer, what difference does that make? He was still doing what he said he was---protecting us.
Also, he's pretty honest about everything else. He tells you right away that he stole the power he's using to protect you. Tells you he's doing this because he wants to be free of the Absolute. Tells you he ran the Knights of the Shield. Tells you how he got captured by Gortash, mind controlled again, and sent on the nautiloid to find the prism. And when he tells you the tadpole powers will help in your fight, that is also simply the truth.
I have never felt any sort of betrayal from the Emperor.
I'm so tired of seeing people say the Emperor threatens Tav for turning him down or even for insulting him, completely ignoring all the context of the situation. He threatens Tav because he's scared.
His life and freedom rest in Tav's hands---the hands of someone who has made it clear they still don't trust him and aren't willing to work together amicably even after all these months, someone who might even want him dead. And he knows it.
He only uses threats as a last resort after spending months being amicable, politely putting up with any insults Tav and the party throw his way. And then Tav either calls him a freak or says he's not fooling them with his human impression. BG3 is a game, it can't account for everything, maybe Tav was nice until that moment, but it's likely that any Tav who responds like that has already been treating him like that.
The Emperor can't just give up on Tav, there's no time to put together and gain the trust of a new team (and players would hate him even more if he did that). He also can't keep protecting Tav and co. without getting any help in return because eventually the brain will get too strong if no one stops it. If that happens, the world will be taken over by the brain, and he'll either be trapped alone in the prism forever, or he'll be a mind-controlled slave until he dies. Those are terrible, terrifying options. So that leaves him with the option of still having to work with someone who hates him.
So him threatening Tav sounds like an overreaction without context, but the context is that nothing else has worked, he's desperate and scared and feels threatened himself, and he's fighting for his life and his freedom against the person who has the power to take that from him and has indicated, probably repeatedly, that they might want to. And this is the only idea he has left. Mind control is extreme, but it's really the only threat he has available, so of course that's what he's going to use.
I would also argue that because of this context, you can't even say this is "mask off" or how he truly feels. This is him trying to intimidate you. There is far more evidence in the game to suggest he wants to be genuine allies. He even tries to give you more power and help you find more allies.
He's not fragile-egoed, he's scared. To say he threatens Tav just because he was turned down or insulted, you have to ignore all the context and all the hostility that it took to get him to this point.
I don't want to derail @phoukanamedpookie 's post Here so I am responding in my own post because it brought to mind something lately about conversations I am seeing a lot in American political discourse right now.
I think when people push back against the idea of violent resistance, folks on the left often default to assuming the conversation is about respectability politics or debates about the paradox of tolerance. But what I keep seeing is a fundamental absence, at least in online discourse, of people recognising that the conversation is about the tactics of resistance. It's not a moral debate.
I keep asking myself where the adults in the room are, the people who understand that sometimes your greatest weapon against tyranny is knowing how not to fly off the handle, knowing when the oppressor wants you to retaliate, wants you to be violent, knowing when your oppressor would benefit from you acting rashly or losing your ethical footing in the name of resistance.
We don't talk enough about the likelihood that we are regularly being manipulated and targeted by bad actors feeding us seemingly left wing thought that is actually misinformation, fearmongering, rage bait, and most importantly, manipulative rhetoric undermining our critical thinking skills as well as the values we hold about political freedom. I regularly see young leftists online champion things like censorship, "positive" government and corporate control, and even violence as tools to fight against oppressive power, and it gives me pause. I wonder where younger people got these ideas, why they think an authoritarian left would solve the problem of a fascist right?
I might write a more detailed post about this later, but it recently occurred to me that the use of civil disobedience and nonviolent protest during the Civil Rights movement was a brilliant strategy carried out by very brave, disciplined people, and that is what made MLK dangerous to white supremacy.
Think about what the average white person believed about Black folks. Black folks are animalistic. Black folks are uncivilized. Black folks are dirtu. Black folks are violent. Black men are dumb brutes. Black women are unruly whores.
Thus white people need to keep them in line by any means necessary.
But then...
Black folks show up dressed up in their Sunday best, singing hymns while walking down the street, or quietly seating themselves in a whites-only establishment. They're yelled at, jeered at, spat on, threatened, beaten, and worse. But they don't retaliate. They don't even defend themselves.
In that scenario, who's behaving like civilized human beings, and who's behaving like a violent, unruly mob?
That is what made nonviolent resistance dangerous. It undermined everything white Americans were taught about Black folks and about themselves. It's hard to hide behind assumptions of moral and intellectual superiority when their own actions were so glaringly cruel, unjust, ignorant, and inhumane.
Did this arouse public sympathy? Sure. Was that sympathy the purpose? I don't think so.
I’m not reinventing the wheel by saying this, but dehumanisation is bad actually, even when you do it to “bad” people.
Dehumanising even Nazis and terrorists just removes the obligation and responsibilities we all have to understand how radicalisation into violent extremism happens, how seemingly ordinary people can become convinced that mass murder is a moral course of action.
No one who becomes an extremist thinks of themselves as monstrous, they truly believe that all of their actions have a just reason and if only they could make everyone else understand, everything will be fine.
Human beings can be evil, cruel, and vicious. Pretending that only inhuman monsters can participate in and justify atrocities stops anyone who thinks of themselves as normal and moral from questioning their ideas or their actions and as we have seen, that is decidedly not a good thing.
No. Nazis and the fascists ARE the exception. They made a conscious choice in a world where what they chose to become is undoubtedly and without exception characterized as the very definition of evil. They actually made that choice, and were fine with it when presented with a straight 80 years of every piece of media who, when in doubt or in a pinch used Nazis as their villains cos, hey. Who's more evil than nazis or fascists? I will unreservedly dehumanize nazis. They broke the intolerance compact. They deserve what they goddamn get.
Here's the thing. I understand the impulse to want to say that they are getting what they deserve. However, invariably dehumanization gets shifted onto more vulnerable members of our community.
What I mean is that people take what they hate the most and turn minorities (religious minorities, racial/ethnic minorities, queer and trans folks, etc) into that thing.
If you are an American, than you have probably seen this happening a lot with trans people and immigrants. Trans people just trying to live their lives become evil deviant pedophiles, even though we should both know this isn't true. Similarly, immigrants have become criminals and illegal aliens. This is where dehumanization leads. You can see similar issues echoed across history.
You can abhor bigots and find their ways of thinking and behaving vile, I sure as hell do, but I would caution against saying they are less than human. Because I have studied the history and know where that leads and trust me it is no where positive.
OP is not calling on everyone to sympathize with nazis. OP is reminding people that dehumanization is a tool of oppression and it always always always destroys you. Not just that, the normalization of dehumanization is radioactive; it expands outward and poisons more than just it's target. It absolves you of resposiblity for how you treat those you dehumanize. It's a road that leads absolutely nowhere. There are *no* exceptions. This is not about what feels good or righteous, it's about the unrewarding dirty work of holding up the pillars of humanity.
I really need folks on the left to start considering the high likelihood that left-wing spaces are targeted by bad actors that want you to lose all of the integrity, education, and community building skills that you may otherwise have had because you are angry and terrified of the people in power. Destroying a democracy isn't just about stoking it's ugliest impulses, it's about dismantling the best impulses, and radicalizing you into abandoning the capacity for kindness. It's about training you to ignore stablizing voices or the voices of those who you hit in the crossfire.
Humanization and empathy and the willingness to sit with your feelings and try to understand people are the fundamental tools of civilization. They are the building blocks that keep society together even in the wake of a disaster or oppressive regimes. Without these tools, we are just cannibalizing ourselves.
I know it feels safer to think of those causing the most harm as monsters who exist outside of humanity. Because it means we don't have to look at this moment as a grim, humiliating reflection of the worst impulses of humanity, and the miles our society still has to go to actually dismantle exploitative, cruel systems. Justice that *lasts* does not come from purging everything with hellfire, it comes from using love and connection as a radical force for change. it comes from rebuilding education systems and social safety nets and communities.
That doesn't mean hold hands with nazis. It means recognizing these same authoritarian, cruel impulses within yourself before you start mimicking them. And quite frankly, considering the amount of blatant, vile, and dangerously antisemetic rhetoric flooding left wing spaces in the wake of the Epstein case, I don't want to hear shit about how fine and cool the left thinks dehumanization is.
