Claire Redfield

Claire Redfield (クレア・レッドフィールド) is a player character appearing in the Resident Evil series by Capcom Claire is the younger sister of Chris Redfield, the protagonist of the first Resident Evil game. She is the female protagonist of Resident Evil 2 and Resident Evil Code: Veronica, also appearing in Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles (a re-telling of the events of RE2 and Code: Veronica), the CG-animated film Resident Evil: Degeneration, and the live-action films Resident Evil: Extinction and Resident Evil: Afterlife.

Character design
Claire Redfield was originally known as 'Elza Walker', the female lead in the original version of Resident Evil 2 (in 1997, after a year of work, this version of the game was scrapped by the development team and is now widely referred to as Resident Evil 1.5). In the released version of the game, Elza Walker, a college student and motorcycle racer,  was changed into Chris Redfield's sister, Claire. Her appearance and background remained mostly unchanged, but she now had an explanation for her skills with firearms and other weapons and her reason for coming to Raccoon City was to search for Chris, as opposed to trying to recruit fans at Raccoon City university to form a racing team back in her hometown. Comparatively, Claire shares the same age and blood type as Elza, in contrast, her hair was made auburn as opposed to blonde. She was also given physical features which more closely resemble her brother, her signature jacket with "Made in Heaven" printed on the back, and a sheath for a standard-issue STARS knife from Chris. The changes that occurred were done to connect Resident Evil 2 to the original game.

The character of Claire did not exist in the early drafts of the film Resident Evil: Extinction, as Jill Valentine was supposed to re-appear from her debut in Apocalypse. Later producers Paul W.S. Anderson and Jeremy Bolt decided to have a separate game character appear alongside the previous film's lead Alice, saying, "We thought, rather than bring Jill back, put her with another game heroine." Claire is voiced by Alyson Court in the games and in the film Degeneration (her Japanese voice actress in the Japanese version is Yūko Kaida), for which she was motion-captured by Lori Rom. In the Resident Evil 2 commercial she was played by Adrienne Frantz, while in the live-action films Claire is portrayed by Ali Larter (dubbed by Hiroe Oka in the Japanese version).

In video games
Claire first appears in Resident Evil 2 (1998), which revolves around her search for her missing brother Chris, an officer in the local police special force called STARS. Claire arrives in Raccoon City to find the town being overrun by zombies and soon meets up with a rookie cop Leon S. Kennedy, but along the way she is separated from him. The rest of the game focuses on Claire's attempt to escape from the city alive. She maintains radio contact with Leon and teams up with a young girl named Sherry, while fighting against the various creatures infesting the Raccoon Police Department, including a mutated William Birkin. Claire eventually escapes from the city through the Umbrella Corporation's underground research complex along with Leon and Sherry, after the three of them manage to destroy Birkin. As revealed in the epilogue of Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, Claire left to continue her search for Chris, while Leon and Sherry were rescued by the U.S. military.

Resident Evil Code: Veronica (2000) is set three months after the events of Resident Evil 2. Claire, still searching for her brother, is the player character for the bulk of the game. After an unsuccessful infiltration of Umbrella's medical branch in Paris, Claire finds herself imprisoned on Umbrella-owned Rockfort Island. She escapes and teams up with fellow prisoner Steve Burnside following another viral outbreak caused by a rival corporation of Umbrella's. During the escape, she manages to discover the whereabouts of her brother and sends a message to Leon, telling him to get help from Chris. The pair escape from the island, only to find themselves in another of Umbrella's secret labs, this time in Antarctica, before they are taken captive by Alexia Ashford. The second half of the game follows Chris trying to save his captured sister from Umbrella. He finds his way into the Antarctic lab and rescues Claire before the final battle with Alexia. The siblings escape from the facility via the transport airplane Chris used to get there. During the game's ending they vow to put an end to the Umbrella Corporation.

Claire is also playable in Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles (2009), which retells the events of Resident Evil 2 and Code: Veronica, and in the uncanonical spin-off games Resident Evil: The Mercenaries 3D (2011) and Operation Raccoon City (2012). Claire is also one of two playable characters in Resident Evil: Zombie Busters, which started as a browser game in the Capcom Party line and in 2011 was converted for mobile phones.

In addition, she is also an unlockable bonus character in the unrelated Capcom title Trick'N Snowboarder (1999). Whilst Claire is not appearing in this game, one of C. Viper's costumes in Ultimate Marvel vs. Capcom 3 (2011) borrows heavily from her iconic look.

In other media


Claire plays a major role in the CG-animated film Resident Evil: Degeneration (2008) alongside Leon S. Kennedy. The film is set seven years after the events of Resident Evil 2. In the film, Claire is now a member of TerraSave, a non-governmental organization which handles search and rescue at chemical and biological attacks. She is rescued from a bio-terrorist incident at the Harvardville Airport by Leon, and together with him and a police officer Angela Miller they survive an a zombie outbreak at the WilPharma Corporation's research complex, in the end exposing and arresting the WilPharma's researcher Frederic Downing.



In Resident Evil: Extinction (2007), Claire is the leader of a convoy of survivors who, at the end of the film, go to Alaska in search of a safe haven. The live-action film's Claire has no connection to the video game character and her look has been completely redesigned. In Resident Evil: Afterlife (2010), Claire, is ambushed by the Umbrella Corporation and manipulated by a device that controls her and impairs her memory, before she is rescued by Alice and reunited with her brother Chris. Together the three manage to defeat and kill Albert Wesker with the help of convoy survivor K-Mart, who had been a close friend of Alice and Claire's, and find themselves preparing to fend off an attack by Umbrella led by a device-controlled Jill Valentine. According to the interview with Ali Larter, this time she was dressed in the outfit that Claire wears in "the videogame". Claire will not return the upcoming Resident Evil: Retribution, where her absence will be explained by their characters being captured by Umbrella.

In addition, Claire is featured in the 1998-1999 manhua Shēnghuà Wēijī 2 ("Biological Crisis 2"). A romantic comedy retelling of the story of Resident Evil 2, centered on Claire, Leon and Ada, was released in the Taiwanese two-issue comic Èlíng Gǔbǎo II in 1999. She also appears in S.D. Perry's 1999 novels Resident Evil: City of the Dead (a novelization of Resident Evil 2), Resident Evil: Underworld (an original story) and Resident Evil Code Veronica (a novelization of the game of the same title and the last book in the series), as well as in the comic book series Resident Evil by Capcom (1998) and Resident Evil: Code Veronica by WildStorm (2002).

In promotion and merchandise
Claire appeared in George A. Romero's Japanese TV commercial for Resident Evil 2, as well as in a viral marketing video to promote Resident Evil 5 (despite not appearing in the actual game).

Several action figures of Claire were released by various manufacturers, including one by Toy Biz in 1998, and two by Moby Dick Toys, two by Palisades Toys,  and one by Volks in 2011. A Claire block-style figure was also released by Dragon in the Kubrick's Resident Evil line and Vanilla Chop produced a resin kit.

Reception
The character of Claire Redfield was very well received by critics for her good looks and survival prowess. Eurogamer nominated her for the Gaming Globes 2000 awards in the category Female Lead Character. In 2007, Tom's Games listed her among the 50 greatest female characters in video game history, stating "a rugged beauty, Claire's got a daredevil attitude and is a quick learner when it comes to firearms." In 2008, she was featured in GameDaily's list of top "hottest game babes", ranked 42nd, as well as in UGO Networks' list of top 50 "videogame hotties", while PC Games Hardware included her among the 112 most important female characters in games. Featuring her in their 2009 list of top nine greatest video game heroines of all time, San Francisco Chronicle chose Claire as an example of a positive female game character that "Brandi Chastain would be proud of." That same year, IGN included her among the characters they would like to see returning for Resident Evil 6, calling Claire to be "leagues above that walking bag of useless called Sheva", and as one of the characters who they would recruit for an ultimate counter-zombie strike force (along with her brother Chris and some other Resident Evil characters), while GameDaily included her among the "chicks who will kick your ass" (listed along with Ada Wong, Jill and Sheva). Her guest appearance in Trick'N Snowboarder was also ranked as fifth in GamesRadar's 2010 list of best character cameos. In the "battle of the beauties" feature, Complex pitted her against Jill Valentine in the category "zombie killer".

In 2011, Complex ranked Ali Larter's portrayal of Claire in the films as 15th on the list of "hottest women in video game movies", with likeness factor of 56%.