Let’s get one factor clear: I’m obsessive about Ada Wong. Whereas she first appeared in Resident Evil 2 as a spy in Raccoon Metropolis, I first bought acquainted along with her throughout my playthrough of the unique Resident Evil 4. Evidently, I instantly liked her. Ada is a femme fatale to the core, at all times sporting a seductive crimson gown and doing killer flips whereas preventing and zipping round along with her hookshot. Once I discovered about Ada-specific additional content material Separate Methods, I sped via the ending of RE4 to get to it, and naturally I giggled and kicked my ft each time she confirmed up within the RE4 remake. She matches in completely with Resident Evil 4’s schlocky action-movie vitality and her equally ridiculous macho counterparts, Leon and Krauser.
Ada is a really enjoyable character in a enjoyable recreation. However RE4’s cinematic strategy comes with loads of action-movie tropes. Some, like Leon’s horrible film hero one-liners and head-exploding roundhouse kicks, are nonetheless actually humorous. Others — particularly those that apply to my favourite worldwide spy — aren’t. So let’s dig into that.
The title display for Separate Methods offers a bump to her femme fatale studying: In a nod to the 1990 movie La Femme Nikita, Ada is proven in the identical pose because the titular Nikita within the film’s poster. The film is a couple of younger lady who turns into an murderer and falls in love, and followers have famous that Ada’s love for a person (particularly, Leon) is a trait they share.
Ada is Asian American, although, and that impacts the studying of the femme fatale trope, since she additionally finally ends up falling very neatly into the derogatory “Dragon Lady” trope, which portrays Asian feminine characters as deceitful, mysterious, villainous, and domineering. Oftentimes, these characters are wearing sexualised Asian-inspired costumes to emphasise their foreignness. Whereas all-American boy Leon Kennedy runs round Spain to save lots of the president’s daughter, Ada stands in distinction to him in her modernized Chinese language qipao whereas working in tandem with infamous Resident Evil villain Wesker. Even her identify jogs my memory of Anna Could Wong, Hollywood’s first Chinese language American film star, who was usually compelled into taking part in a lot of these characters due to the restricted roles accessible to Asian girls.
Calling Ada a villain can be a stretch, since she truly has a mushy spot for Leon and helps him all through the sport, however in RE4 her sexualized and shady persona — alongside along with her well-known crimson gown — is the “Dragon Girl” trope to a T. I appropriately anticipated that the RE4 remake builders would change Ada’s gown to be able to distance her from this trope. The remake can also be the primary time in a Resident Evil recreation that Ada was voiced by an Asian actor, Lily Gao, who sadly confronted harassment on social media for her efficiency. Gao made a post on Instagram addressing the harassment she had skilled and voicing her assist for genuine casting, writing that “inauthentic casting perpetuates an unhealthy picture that additional dehumanizes the group they search to mirror. It’s time we cease solely capitalizing on the sexualized, eroticised, and mysterious Asian lady, and make area to honour each sort of Asian lady.”
On paper it would appear to be Ada consists of shallow horny spy stereotypes, however I imagine there’s extra nuance to her character than that. Perhaps I simply have a mushy spot for her. In spite of everything, there have been only a few Asian American characters in standard gaming when Ada stepped onto the scene in Resident Evil 4, and in 2005, our expectations for conscientious illustration of Asian feminine characters have been decrease. Seeing a cool and succesful Asian lady in a recreation like this was truly actually unimaginable!
![Black and white sketches and character models show Ada Wong looking like a crow.](https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/hWNBBqrQg1m7V5q3P2Acear98C4=/0x0:1600x900/1200x0/filters:focal(0x0:1600x900):no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/24579271/RE8.jpg)
Ada has character moments that flesh her out, too, however the hitch is that they largely contain Leon, a trademark of the “sexpionage” trope. Sexpionage is when intimacy, romance, or sexual exercise occurs throughout espionage, and it occurs each time Ada and Leon cross paths. Nonetheless, their relationship additionally reveals a extra nuanced aspect to Ada past the coldhearted femme fatale, which I like. [Warning: The following contains a spoiler for Capcom’s Resident Evil 4 remake.] For instance, Leon and Ada’s conversations throughout the RE4 remake spotlight how Ada has modified since Raccoon Metropolis, as she refuses to ship the Plaga to Wesker to be able to keep away from casualties. The issue isn’t the existence of the romance between Ada and Leon — it’s that their romance is the one automobile for character growth that Ada is given.
We don’t know lots about Ada’s historical past or motives; maybe that’s intentional, to keep up her mysterious spy picture. Due to that, we solely see the extra humanizing elements of her character in relation to her romance with Leon. Think about how Ada is part of Leon’s character growth in RE4, however he nonetheless will get to develop with out her. Ada being trapped in “romantic” plots appears to be a recurring downside, as her subsequent look in Resident Evil 6 additionally includes the primary villain having an unrequited infatuation along with her. It seems like this sort of factor is a pure pitfall for “sexpionage” storylines.
It’s positively attainable we might see extra of Ada sooner or later. I’m nonetheless holding out for a Separate Methods-type DLC for the RE4 remake. She was additionally initially presupposed to have a task in Resident Evil Village based on early idea artwork, conducting an investigation on the village whereas Ethan was looking for his daughter; Ada would then save him throughout this primary encounter with the Lords. This idea was finally reduce, nevertheless it’s promising, as a result of it’s each the precise sort of growth I would like for her exterior of romance, and an indicator that Ada might nonetheless be a participant within the franchise. However what actually makes me hopeful is one thing Gao mentioned in her assertion the place she mirrored on her efficiency, saying, “My Ada is a survivor. She is sort, simply, clever, and humorous. She is unpredictable, resilient, and completely not a stereotype.” Realizing that there was care put into her remake portrayal by an actor who understands how a lot depth Ada might have made me very joyful, and I can’t wait to see the place my favourite woman in crimson might pop up subsequent.