Claire Redfield

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Context

Claire’s another OG Resident Evil character.

She debuted in the first sequel. And is the younger sister of one of the first game’s main protagonists.

She had a pretty strong showing in the first few games. However, the more recent games and movies pushed her to the back. She became more of a support character.

Background

Powers and Abilities

Claire was taught hand to hand combat and weapons handling by her older brother Chris. She can handle anything from knives to rocket launchers.

Despite not being some sort of ex-Special Forces badass, Claire is nearly as tough as some of her more decorated comrades in arms.

She was also able to evade automatic fire from an attack helicopter. Claire even could outmaneuver half a dozen thugs who had the drop on her by dropping her gun, diving to grab it before it hit the ground ,and shooting out a propane tank behind them.

With the right weaponry she’s been able to take on superhuman mutated horrors and still come out on top.

She’s also a passionate motorcyclist. Ms. Redfield enjoys riding and racing cross country. She also does mechanics on bikes when her busy schedule permits it.

Claire in 1998, in the remade version of RE2.

History

Claire and Chris lost their parents in an accident. Chris being then in his late teens, he became the parental figure in Claire’s life.

He thought that his sister needed to be able to protect herself if he wasn’t around. Which is why he started training her in both hand to hand combat and firearms.

Claire excelled at both, and showed a natural aptitude from the get-go.

Chris then enlisted with the US Air Force. Claire wasn’t happy about her big brother leaving her so abruptly, but she put on a brave face and continued her studies. She was eventually accepted into an unnamed university.

Somewhere along the way she also discovered her love for motorcycles.

Claire in 1998. I think that the bike is a period-accurate Harley-Davidson FXSTC Cruiser, but don’t quote me on that.

The Raccoon City Incident (Resident Evil 2)

Chris and some of his fellow elite SWAT operators, the STARS Team, barely escaped a mansion of horrors. This place had been brought about by the Umbrella Corporation experimenting with zombie-creating viruses.

The few survivors went on missions to investigate Umbrella. Chris traveled to Europe, but apparently ran into snags. Thus, his sister was left without news.

In September, 1998 she left the university to look for Chris. She started her search in Raccoon City, the STARS Team’s hometown.

(The dates used in this entry are the official ones for the events, rather than when the stories/games were released).

Survival horror

What she didn’t know was that Umbrella also had a secret lab set up in the sewers beneath the city. It of course leaked and started infecting the residents.

The once vibrant town turned into a zombie hellscape.

Claire ran into young police officer Leon Kennedy. He too had just arrived in town.

After encountering some zombies they procured a patrol car to get to the city police station. But they didn’t check the backseat. The zombie there jumped out at them, causing them to crash just outside the police HQ.

This separated them for most of the game. They each went on their own adventures to try and escape the city before the government nuked it.

Sherry

Claire found Sherry Birkin, the kid daughter of William and Annette Birkin. The couple was among Umbrella’s top scientists, and was largely responsible for creating the T-virus that was infecting everyone.

Sherry was later kidnapped by the corrupt and psychotic Police Chief Irons. But William Birkin infected himself with the virus, turning into a giant grotesquerie that killed Irons.

Claire then determined that Sherry had been infected. But her mother Annette gave Claire instructions about where in the lab to find an antidote.

After a hard fought battle to get through all the zombies, Claire was able to inoculate Sherry.

William

Ultimately the lab’s self-destruct mechanism was triggered. The reunited Claire and Leon teamed up to escape in time.

They wound up on a train leaving the facility, but were pursued by “G” – most likely a heavily mutated William Birkin.

They had already fought him on several occasions. But every time they thought he was vanquished he would further mutate and renew his pursuit of them.

This time he had mutated into a colossal blob replete with tentacles. Which took up most of a box car.

Heavy weapons fire wounded him badly enough to disconnect the train car he was on – and send it hurtling back to the lab as it blew up.

Leaving Raccoon

Leon vowed to protect Sherry. Having been infected then inoculated made her a prize research subject for those in the Bio Organic Weapons (BOW) development arms race.

Seeing that Sherry would be safe with Leon, Claire renewed her search.

Claire in 1998 – the vintage version.

The Rockfort Island Incident (Resident Evil Code Veronica)

In December 1998, Claire infiltrated an Umbrella facility in Paris. But security responded with such means as an attack helicopter that turned an entire hallway into Swiss cheese when trying to kill her.

(Yes, Umbrella is really that cartoonishly irresponsible and evil.)

Claire found herself cornered in the basement by half a dozen armed guards. She feigned giving up by pretending to drop her gun, grabbing it out of midair, and shooting out a propane tank conveniently located behind them.

But one of the guards, Juan Raval, saw through her ruse. They ended up in a Mexican standoff. Reinforcements then came in and took Claire prisoner.

Island life

Claire was disappeared to one of Umbrella’s black sites on Rockfort Island. The program presumably was to torture her for information, execute her and bury her in a shallow grave.

But her luck once again held out. Shortly after she arrived, Albert Wesker invaded with a small force and a number of BOWs. His objective was to steal Umbrella secrets and research.

His BOWs were released all over the island to create chaos.

Juan Raval, now working on Rockfort, was bitten. Knowing that he was on borrowed time he decided to make amends and released Claire. To give her a fighting chance.

Shortly after escaping Claire was able to send an e-mail to Leon Kennedy.

Claire in RE Code Veronica.

Leon makes a call

Leon was by then working for a prototype, elite counter-BOW-based-terrorism unit. A few powerful individuals had begun recognising the threat potential of BOWs. And as one of the very few Raccoon City survivors Leon was a choice recruit.

Mr. Kennedy had also obtained that Sherry Birkin receive protection as part of this recruitment. But he had been careful not to mention Claire, so she’d be free to continue looking for her brother.

Leon was somehow able to contact Chris Redfield, and relay Claire’s SOS.

Meanwhile, on the island

Claire teamed up with Steve Burnside. He was a hot headed 17 year old, whose father had betrayed Umbrella to sell their secrets.

Together they clashed with the insane Alfred Ashford, the 7^th Earl of Ashford. The Earl’s family had been the founding members of the Umbrella Corporation.

Several attempts to escape the island failed. But they eventually boarded an automated plane, which flew special cargo to a secret Umbrella research facility in Antarctica.

Predictably upon their arrival this base had too been overtaken by escaped BOWs.

The new plan was to procure a truck to drive to an Australian research facility. But on their way out they were again confronted by Ashford. This clash ended when he was shot and fell off a cliff – presumably killing him.

You’ll need a bigger BOW

They weren’t so lucky. Alfred located his sister, who had been one of the earliest people to be infected by the T-Veronica virus. Alexia Ashford had been placed into a cryogenic sleep where her body would eventually learn to acclimate to the virus.

Claire and Steve also had to fight off a new type of biological horror, the Nosferatu. As they’d learn, it was a heavily mutated Alexander Ashford – Alfred and Alexia’s father.

And once they could board the truck, the pair was set upon by some sort of plant-like tentacle monster. It knocked over the truck, then dragged them back to the base as prisoners.

His sister’s keeper

Meanwhile, Chris reached Antarctica and located the unconscious Claire. However, they soon had to go their separate ways:

Steve had been turned into a gigantic reptilian monster. He initially attacked Claire, but refused to kill her. This angered Wesker, who shot the mutant dead. He and his men then overpowered Claire and took her hostage.

In the meanwhile, Chris activated the base’s self-destruct mechanism. He then came in to rescue his sister and have his showdown with his nemesis.

Chris did not have the upper hand, as Wesker had been enhanced to possess superspeed. But they were separated by a wall of fire, and both had to flee the facilities’ self-destruction.

In the chaos Claire slipped away and located a plane. Chris came in and flew them out seconds before the base went up in a giant ball of flame.

Intermission

Claire later learned that Sherry, now with a sort of witness protection program, had been adopted by Derek Simmons.

Ms. Redfield felt that Simmons was a schemer who had larger plans for Sherry. She wrote to warn her, but Sherry never received this letter.

Resident He-vil

By this point, Claire’s role in the series becomes pretty diminished.

Early Resident Evil games had two playable characters, one man and one woman. In the first game it was Chris Redfield and his partner Jill Valentine.

And the next three games (RE 3: Nemesis, RE: Code Veronica, and the flash back prequel, RE 0) all had strong female protagonists as the one and only lead character.

But after that point, all female RE characters are support characters, or at best sidekicks. That includes Claire and Jill.

Original version of 1998 Claire, with her Browning.

The Harvardville Incident (Resident Evil Degeneration)

Claire joined TerraSave, an NGO that helped prevent bioterrorism. They also gave comfort and aid to victims of BOW attacks.

Umbrella had collapsed. But plenty of unscrupulous organizations vied to take its place.

By 2005, TerraSave’s target was the WP Corporation. These had been linked to a biological outbreak in India. WP’s HQ was in Harvardville, as was wealthy Senator Ron Davis – one of their major investors.

Claire and another protestor were arrested in Harvardville. But they shook loose once a coordinated bioterrorism attack hit the airport.

At the same time, a plane that was under siege from zombies crashed into the airport. This made much of the building inaccessible.

Battle for the airport

Claire’s old partner Leon was already at the scene along with back up from the 75^th Ranger Regiments.

While the zombie attack was raging through the airport the group took shelter in the VIP lounge. They tried to contact the outside world.

Claire strongly suspected that Dr. Curtis Miller was behind the attack. She had seen him right before the outbreak.

Miller had previously worked for both the WP Corporation and TerraSave, but had been ousted as a black market dealer by both groups.

Eventually Claire was able to make her way outside.

Ms. Redfield in the RE Degeneration movie.

Dr. Downing

From there she met up with Dr. Fredrick Downing, who could prove that the incident in India was a cover up. WP Corporation had actually been shipping vaccines against the T-virus, but these had been sabotaged and altered en route.

Downing drove Redfield to his lab, to show her a G-Virus sample he had obtained on the black market to search for a cure. But as she overheard a discussion between Dr. Downing and Senator Davis, Claire came to suspect it was Downing who’s been behind the attacks in both India and Harvardville.

Downing then went downstairs to check a disturbance. He frantically phoned Claire to warn her that the lab was under attack by a BOW monster. Because it just wouldn’t be an RE installment without zombie monsters attacking every five minutes.

Dr. Miller

The monster was Dr. Miller, who had willingly taken a modified sample of the G-virus.

Claire made it out, with the assistance of Leon and his squad of Rangers. But the pair were the only survivors. As often happens in the genre, unnamed characters wind up in body bags.

Ms. Redfield soon discovered that the footage of the attack had been leaked to a third party. From there she determined that Downing had orchestrated the incident.

Exposed

As it turned out:

In most RE plotlines the villain would’ve gone off the deep end and injected themselves with the virus in a last ditch attempt to evade capture. But this time it was different.

Downing surrendered and was quietly arrested and it was basically roll credits.

Continued!

The second half of this heavenly-made profile is there.

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