Warning: This article contains many spoilers with regards
to Resident Evil 2 (but not other games in the series). If you haven’t played
it, and don’t want to know the events of the game, I’d recommend you avoid this
article.
Hey everyone, I want to do something slightly different
today, and that is pay homage to visually, one of my favourite villains in
video game history. Now my favourite character in all of Resident Evil is
actually Albert Wesker, the mastermind behind a rough estimate of 80% of the
events in the entire series. But William Birkin, not the man, but the monster,
visually, is an image that has always stuck with me as a fan not only of
Resident Evil, but also of video games in general. But before I talk of Birkin,
I want to just talk a bit about Resident Evil 2, the game he was in.
Resident Evil 2 (from now on I’m going to refer to it as
Resi 2) was initially released in 1998 on the Playstation, but has since been
ported to a few different consoles. This isn’t a major review on the game, the
title above tells you what I’m going to discuss in great detail, but if I were
to review the game, I’d probably give it either ****1/2 stars or ****3/4 stars.
The game has dated a lot since the fantastic experimental days with graphics in
the mid to late nineties. At the time, everything was new and all consoles and
game designers were trying to outdo each other, graphics wise in the market. At
the time this was a lovely looking game, but now it’s quite badly pixilated and
even the FMVs look quite naff. The game is well due a remake (although I might
write that article another day). The sequel to the original, Resi 2 had
improved graphics, dramatically improved voice acting (but it’s still quite poor), better controls and a decent
advancement in storyline. The best thing about the storyline was that you could
either be Claire Redfield (sister of Chris Redfield, main character in the
original) or Leon S. Kennedy (you can’t forget the S. in his middle name). At
the start of the game, regardless of who you choose, you both end up on
separate sides of a tank explosion and make your separate ways to the police
station, and continue from there. If you play as Claire, and complete the game,
you have the opportunity to play as Leon, and see what happened from his
perspective in the backgrounds of Claire’s game. This is referred to two
different games, Claire A, and Leon B. The reverse also applies, in that if you
choose Leon first, you end up on the side of the fire Claire was on in her “A”
game, and Claire also switches to where Leon would be. So in theory, you have
four games, Claire A, Leon B, and the reversal, Leon A, and Claire B. These
games are slightly different with the same outcome – you both survive, along
with the horribly annoying Sherry. There are suspicious that Ada also survives,
and you find that answer out in another entry into the series. But along the
way, regardless of if you do Claire A/Leon B or Leon A/Claire B, you go against
William Birkin many, many times, as well as Tyrant in the “B” scenario with
either character.
William Birkin’s story is a sad one. He has a wife named
Annette, and his daughter is the frustrating Sherry I mentioned earlier, and he
is a scientist. He has spent a large portion of his life creating the G-Virus,
one of the viruses responsible for the zombie outbreak, the main one
responsible for the zombies in Resi 2. He liases with Umbrella, the
pharmaceutical company who are responsible for the T-Virus, but there is an
agreement between the company and Birkin that no matter how much they
co-operate, Umbrella will never take his research and most importantly, the
G-Virus, away from him.
 |
| William Birkin in his human form. |
As expected, Umbrella break this promise and send an armed
squad to retrieve the virus by force from Birkin. Two squadrons find Birkin
first and hold him at gunpoint, but he was expecting them. Birkin, being the
clever scientist he is, knew Umbrella would turn on him, and his plan was to
pack up some samples of the Virus in a container, one that they would take by
force if required. He kept the G-Virus on his person. At the heat of the
moment, the two squadrons threaten to kill Birkin if he refuses to hand over
the G-Virus; Birkin has a gun to the two armed men. Retreating backwards,
William Birkin accidentally knocks over a metal instrument, which gives him a
shock. The two squadrons shoot at him, taking advantage of the situation, and
grab the container with samples in it, as Birkin planned.
William Birkin was mortally wounded by the gunshots to his
upper torso and was lying in a pool of his own blood. In his hand however, is
the G-Virus, his life’s work, the work that is precious not only to him and his
family, but to Umbrella as well. He had a choice – die, and let someone else
take the virus off him? Or use the G-Virus on himself, possibly curing him, but
more likely, turning him into the biggest monstrosity the city of Racoon had
ever seen. He took the latter option, and he slowly started to mutate. He had
cheated death, but paid the price. He quickly took revenge on the two squadrons
that took the samples. They saw him coming, and started unloading machine gun
bullets into him. It was no use. He ran at them, slashing them up with his
newly developed arm, which was developing into a mutated claw with a large eye.
The squadron holding the container of samples dropped it as he got killed.
Birkin, still with some human consciousness, goes crazy and starts breaking the
samples into his own skin, making him mutate further and further. Rats then
start to devour the remains; these rats start the infection of zombies in
Racoon City.
The Transformations of William Birkin
So now that you know how Birkin became the monster that he
is in Resi 2, let’s go through the different transformations. These
transformations are in canon order, so that’s why it’s important to know that
while, for instance, Leon A takes place ‘live’ at the same time as Claire B
(and vice versa with Claire A/Leon B) only one of the two characters take him on
at a time, and that in the timeline of the game, if you only play an “A”
campaign, you don’t see the transformations that only appear in “B”.
Mutation #1
Scenario: Claire B or Leon B
Location: Claire B – the secret underground passage
belonging to Brian Irons; Leon B – the pool leading to the sewer entrance
Difficulty: 4 out 5
 |
| First Mutation. |
The earliest time you see Birkin properly in the timeline of
the game is in the “B” scenario. He has a lot of his human appearance here, the main
mutation being on his right arm. The confusion for me is that as I explained
earlier, he took out the two squadrons with what is implied as a claw. A swipe
action is seen, and blood spurts in a cross direction. However, in this
mutation, Birkin’s claw has not quite developed yet. There is an argument to be
made that he could have taken the two squadrons on after this fight (you go to
the sewers after this fight, so it’s possible, just unlikely), who knows.
Anyway, his right arm has mutated and is a pinky-red colour, and has a large eye in
the shoulder area. Because William Birkin hasn’t quite developed yet, he
prefers to use a steel pipe to beat you down with. I’ve given it a difficulty
rating of 4, because while you should be able to load him down with a decent
weapon before he gets an attempt to hit you, IF he hits you, it’s quite
difficult to get away from him. One hit from the steel pipe brings you to your
knees, utterly winded, in which he basically gets a free second hit on you. If
you’re on decent health, this at least brings your health down to half. If you’re
stuck in a corner at this point, if you beat him, he gets angry and starts
flailing his steel pipe around, something that is also quite difficult to
dodge. After the fight he simply walks off and jumps to the lower areas of the
sewers.
Mutation #2
Scenario: Claire A or Leon A
Location: Underground Gondola
Difficulty: 3 out of 5
 |
| Second Mutation. Note his human face seeping to his pectoral. |
Because you have to play through the “A” scenario to get to
the “B” scenario, this is officially your first fight with Birkin. He starts
off the fight by throwing his steel pipe at you (it’s a cutscene so it never
hits). This, naturally, is reference to his first fight with the opposite
person in the previous mutation. At this point however, he has grown in
stature, probably about an inch in height and his shoulders are quite bulky.
His face has started to seep downwards towards his pectoral. He starts to
develop a new head, a weird grey coloured one. His right arm, earlier mutated,
has now developed that claw that we spoke of earlier. The battle with Birkin in
this instance is actually slightly easier than the previous one. He walks a lot
quicker, yet his attacks are quite easy to dodge. If he hits you with his claw,
he usually hits you a second time, and attempts a third, but you can relatively
easily dodge the third attack. These attacks waste a lot less than the ones in
the first mutation, and you recover much quicker. About two-thirds into the
fight, he seems to squirm inwards, and starts to develop a very small second
set of hands, under his torso. These have no affect on the fight however, and
at this point onwards he is very easy as he is weakening, he slows down
dramatically. When you finish him off he falls to the ground.
Mutation #3
Scenario: Claire B or Leon B
Location: Underground Gondola
Difficulty: 4 out of 5
 |
| Third Mutation. This is my favourite mutation. |
Yes, the same place, the opposite character. When you play
the “B” scenario, you have to call the tram back up (as the other character
rode it down to the bottom, you have to get it back up to get to the chemical
plant). When your opposite character has to take on Birkin for the second time (it’ll
be the same character taking on Mutation #1) his mutation stage is an
advancement on #2. Remember the two arms that were premature and served no
purpose in the fight above? Well, they’ve now developed. They’re now claws that
form a new set of arms and are where the previous arms used to be. And left arm of old has now
developed its own claw, equal to his right one. These claws? Well that’s the
thing, they’re now absolutely huge, a good 150% broader than Birkin’s
shoulders. So yes, if you didn’t figure it out by now, William Birkin now has
four claws.
For me personally, this is my favourite looking mutation of
the ones in the game. He just looks so badass, with his two huge claws above
his shoulders, and the two smaller ones on his sides. And yes, the difficulty
has gone up too. He has now developed the ability to jump up on top of the tram
and jump as close to you as possible. He walks a slightly slower speed to
Mutation #2, but quick enough to be a threat. But the main snag here is when he
gets within around three feet of you, he raises his two massive claws even
higher, and the two below are also raised. This makes him look even bigger, and
most certainly harder to avoid. If you’re cornered at this point, chances are
you’re not going to be able to dodge his attack. That attack is a four-claw
slice combo, which can easily take you to near half health. The good news is
that he usually lowers his claws after this combo, giving you the chance to run
around him and recuperate. After the fight, he jumps off the tram onto the side
of the grid, his blood trickling downwards.
You actually see this mutation of Birkin at the chemical
plant in the Claire A scenario (I’m unsure of another one), you see his wife
Annette finds him and tries to talk sense. At this point any humanity in Birkin has completely
gone, and kills her with one claw. He jumps into a vent afterwards.
Mutation #4
Scenario: Claire A or Leon A
Location: Train Platform Elevator
Difficulty: 4 ½ out of 5
 |
| Fourth Mutation. He's now a six legged beast. |
This is the final boss in the “A” scenario with either
character. William Birkin breaks through the ceiling and drops a great height
to the elevator platform. You can make an argument that the fight starts of at
Mutation #3.5 as he is a slightly different looking monster at this point,
although it’s hard to pinpoint where he has changed. He has another eye, now on
his left shoulder. His stomach has started to open up, although the beginning
of that may have started in mutation #3. Either way, you start this fight
early, and after unloading a certain amount of bullets into him, he then
transforms officially to Mutation #4.
The fourth mutation sees Birkin fall to his knees, where his
stomach rips open. It literally, develops into a new base, a very large mouth
full of many, many teeth. We’re talking probably hundreds of tiny teeth. His
arms now turn into a set of six legs. His head (the one that
developed in Mutation #2), has now doubled in size. and William Birkin no
longer resembles anything close to a human any more. His skin has turned to that
blacky-grey colour I mentioned earlier and he is a four/six legged beast. He
can jump onto the beams on the platform with ease, and runs faster than he ever
has in the past. This is definitely the most difficult mutation to fight. The
worst thing that can happen is Birkin jumping from a beam into you ‘mouth’
first, and then grabbing you with his massive mouth, chomping at you and then
throw you a good eight feet away. This two move combo can easily slash your
life in half if not more. He mainly runs around after you, and you have to just
shoot at him and hope for the best. When he eventually goes down, he literally
shrivels into a heap, seemingly sulking; his head and arms all contract inwards
into his many teeth and a pool of blood.
You think this is it, as you complete the “A” scenario.
And in the “B” scenario, the majority
of the bosses that fill the game other than the two mentioned above, is Tyrant.
As you play the “B” scenario, and get the exact same ending as the “A” scenario
(that is, the two games now combine each others ending and you now have the
full story about what happened to both characters) everything looks good. Until
the FMV isn’t finished after all, and train all of a sudden starts to shake.
Mutation #5: The Final Birkin Transformation
Scenario: Claire B or Leon B
Location: Train
Difficulty: 2 out of 5
 |
| Final Mutation. They just went too far. |
I hate to talk about this. I love William Birkin and his
transformations are excellent. Up until this one. I think Capcom and the makers
of Resident Evil 2 went too far with this. But here we go.
After the storyline twist FMV, the person playing the “B”
scenario must investigate what on earth is going on with the train. When they
go into the second carriage, they suddenly see a tentacle break a metal plate
from above. The character runs in the opposite direction towards the first carriage,
as what is seen is an amazing thing to describe. Amazingly stupid anyway. This
is the final boss in the “B” scenario.
What you see is a four tentacled William Birkin, with an
extremely large mass fall to the train carriage. I like to call him Gelatinous
Birkin. It literally, uses it’s four tentacles, which are around 15 feet long
each, to grab the sides of the train corners to pull it’s ridiculous body
forwards towards the character. All you see is the many teeth from earlier, the
mouth, and a body full of dead corpses and flesh around it. As I said, it
literally takes the entire train carriage, pulling himself towards you. Just
unload your weapon, unsympathetically into him, and he’ll fall quickly. He’s so
big and slow that he’s hard to actually struggle with, he falls with ease. When
he falls, he turns into a disgusting huge mass of purple goo, his gelatinous
body starts to seep in your direction, in which your character reacts to
retreat closer towards the door.
In the official scenario “B” ending FMV, Gelatinous Birkin
still didn’t die when you beat him down in the final fight. Leon, Claire and
Sherry manage to apply the emergency break on the train and run out of the
tunnel. The train self-destructs taking Gelatinous Birkin with it, and this is
finally where Birkin meets his end, much to the relief of the three survivors.
It’s a sad ending in many ways. It’s sad because the four
mutations before the final are excellent and are what I remember fondly of
Birkin. I don’t think I like any other set of physical transformations in any
other series than I do of the first four in this game (apart from Magikarp to
Gyarados of course). It’s sad in other ways as I said, as it’s sad that William
Birkin was so relentless in his pursuit of the survivors that he had to take
such a dramatic form. It’s also sad for William Birkin the man, the human, he
was so obsessed with his research, his project, his virus, that he would rather
turn himself into this extremely persistent monster that only wants to feed itself
humans and other virus samples than die a proud man, having completed what he
thought was his life’s task. I mean the virus is highly dangerous, illegal and
he shouldn’t have been conducting this type of scientific experiment, but the
passion in which he took the project, where he would put it in front of even
his family, is admirable yet ultimately a sad thing. He is a sad human being
for having his priorities this way.
To conclude it’s a sad ending for William Birkin as a human
and as a monster. Yet myself, and some of you too I hope, will forever remember
the rise and fall of William Birkin, as one of the greatest monsters in video
game history, one that doesn’t seem to get the recognition I believe it
deserves. The transformation sequences, the artwork, the ideas and imagination,
in 1998, there was nothing like it, at least I struggle to think of anything
remotely close. I was and still am to a certain extent, astounded to how great
he looked. A remake would do his transformations even more justice, graphically.
Pun intended, William Birkin, is a beast of a monster and I thank everyone who
contributed to his greatness.
Do you agree? Disagree? Are there any other monster
transformations that you like, or prefer to Birkin? Comment below and tell me
your story if you want. I hope you enjoyed this slightly different article.
Thanks for reading.
For the latest updates on my work, follow me on Facebook and Twitter here!
