Pokonowski's Sheva Alomar As A Symbol Of Resident Evil

A zombie is a creature of imagination and a tool for storytelling. This is very apparent to nearly all who know about them. When creating a fictional creature or situation in any sort of story it is very important that there are no holes in the plot that can distract the viewer from the story. This is why movies often cite science as the basis for invention of cool spy gadgets, space age weapons, warp speed travel, jetpacks, and many more fascinating creations portrayed in films. This is a much easier explanation that citing something supernatural as the basis for this technology and it will create fewer plot holes and result with the viewer asking less questions about this supernatural element. Pokonowski decides not to recognize this logical

The author uses this to his advantage when he attempts to portray the zombie as a symbol of racism. Pokornowski explains that “The first promotional trailer for Resident Evil 5, released in 2007, sparked controversy when it showed the white American protagonist shooting a horde of black zombies” (Pokornowski 4). The author then goes onto explain that “Prior to the games release, Capcom attempted to address the issue of racial othering by introducing an African partner figure to work with the white protagonist, but this character, named Sheva Alomar, is significantly fairer skinned than the zombies and villagers of the game” (Pokornowski 4-5). The author continues on to essentially explain that he believes the game to be racist, because of the shooting of black zombies and the presence of a light skinned partner who is there because she is deemed assimable while the other zombies are not. The first flaw the author makes is that he is ignorant of the plot and background of previous resident evil games. In previous games such as Resident Evil 4, there was an outbreak of the zombie virus that involved a lot of Spaniards becoming infected, and thus resulted in the killing of many Spaniard zombies. In resident evil 6, there were many Europeans and Asians infected, so many Europeans and Asians were killed. Is the author suggesting that it is not racist to kill these races, but it is racist if the African race is harmed at all? Furthermore, the game takes place in Africa, so it would make sense for there to be Africans there that would end up becoming zombies. And the games protagonist seeks not to harm them, but to save them from the bio terrorist who is turning them into zombies. This bio terrorist also happens to be a white male. It is interesting that the author chooses