5 TV Shows To Watch If You Like Resident Evil – TVLine

2026’s “Resident Evil” sees director Zach Cregger bring his signature blend of spine-tingling horror and dark comedy to the iconic video game franchise, with the movie following Bryan Hodukavich (Austin Abrams), a medical courier who takes a high-risk job in Raccoon City. It’s the most recent live-action addition to the franchise since Netflix canceled its “Resident Evil” TV series in 2022.

The new movie has already fared better than the show, earning a 96% rating on Rotten Tomatoes and raking in around $200 million worldwide. The gory road trip is crammed with jump scares, zombies, and other tentacled creatures, all of which serve to make Bryan’s life a living hell. For fans of the movie, though, it might be a little difficult to find other projects that walk the same zombie/monster line. Still, there are a handful of TV shows to watch if you like “Resident Evil,” and each one delivers a similar flood of guts and gore.

“Ash vs Evil Dead” is much goofier than the rest of the entries in this list, but that’s why it’s the perfect follow up to “Resident Evil.” While “Resident Evil” is brutally scary, there are a handful of comedic moments which make Bryan incredibly endearing, whether it’s the running gag of him unable to open padlocks, or the scene in which he runs in circles as he’s chased by an undead woman.

There’s a similarly funny core to “Ash vs Evil Dead,” as Bruce Campbell’s titular deadite-slaying hero gives off over-the-top bravado while actually being chaotically hapless. This vibe began when Sam Raimi made “Evil Dead II” in 1987; since then, that film’s slapstick gore and guts approach has become a key part of the franchise. The 2015 TV series sees Ash protecting the Necronomicon so that the deadites don’t return, but, obviously, that doesn’t exactly go to plan.

Like the films, the series is incredibly violent, gory, and funny, with a heavy reliance on practical effects and creature designs. All of that makes it a perfect companion to Cregger’s “Resident Evil.”

If “Ash vs Evil Dead” has a similar humor to “Resident Evil,” then “Kingdom” brings the terror. This period drama takes place in the Joseon era, when a politician uses a flower that harbors parasitic worm eggs to start a zombie plague as a way of controlling the country. Yes that’s right, “Kingdom” is part political period drama, part pulse-pounding zombie horror. It also reinvigorates the usual genre stereotypes, offering new elements to the outbreak that makes it truly unique compared to other zombies.

For example, the zombies hate heat, and they go dormant during the day as a way of shielding themselves from it. While the worms in their bodies drive their bloodlust, the heat sensitivity pushes the zombies to hide in colder spaces. It’s a surprising twist that helps build the show’s mythology.

Meanwhile, the village massacre in Episode 3 shows just how ambitious “Kingdom” can be, as the zombies’ emergence causes widespread chaos and carnage. It’s a harrowing sequence, as the uninfected desperately try to stay alive — but that’s difficult when there are hordes of snapping jaws at every turn, and bites turn their victims within seconds. To put it bluntly, “Kingdom” is one of the best zombie TV shows of all time.

“Swamp Thing” is one of the best DC Comics TV shows ever made, and it deserved much more than the single season it got on the ill-fated DC Universe app back in 2019. The series was inspired by Alan Moore’s seminal run with the character in the 1980s and leant hard into the supernatural horror aspect of the character. The story follows Abby Arcane (Crystal Reed), a CDC doctor who investigates the truth behind the murder of Alec Holland (Andy Bean) in Louisiana. Soon, Abby realizes that Alec transformed into something else after death.

From there, the show plunges audiences into monstrous territory as Swamp Thing battles mutated plants, undead spirits, and, worst of all, greedy businessmen. It was all incredibly ambitious but almost too good to be true, and the series was canceled before Season 1 finished airing due to high production costs and tax rebate issues.

Still, as a relatively self-contained story about mutating viruses with practical monsters and plenty of jump scares, it fits in nicely with some of the problems Bryan faces in “Resident Evil.” Plus, both projects also revolve around the dastardly plans of corporations and greed, so they’re even thematically similar in that sense. 

This 2008 series is actually a horror parody of the “Big Brother” reality show, as a group of housemates in the game show remain unaware that a zombie apocalypse has erupted while they’re trapped inside the house. From there, it becomes a fight for survival as the Big Brother house stands as the last safe haven from the undead. What makes “Dead Set” so impressive is that Channel 4 went all in on the concept, choosing not to make it a comedic parody, but a truly terrifying one.

The show swaps out slow, shuffling zombies for the sprinting, screaming hordes of flesh-eaters that became more popular around the mid-’00s. Elsewhere, one bizarrely effective trick is how the show used the then-host of “Big Brother,” Davina McCall, to sell the concept — with the presenter playing a zombified version of herself who stalks the offices and hallways surrounding the set.

It’s a brilliant way of examining a breakdown of society — much like “Big Brother” itself — and it’s genuinely chilling, too. The show’s most harrowing moment sees Kelly (Jaime Winstone) trapped in the “diary room,” unable to escape while surrounded by the undead and forced to accept her fate. It might not feature larger-than-life monsters like those we see in “Resident Evil,” but “Dead Set” is just as scary.

Of course, we can’t talk about “Resident Evil” without mentioning another popular zombie horror video game adaptation: “The Last of Us.” The series stars Pedro Pascal as Joel, a survivor living in post-apocalyptic America after the country was ravaged by the Cordyceps fungus, which turns its hosts into plant-like creatures. Some are more like traditional zombies, others are much worse — similar to how the T-Virus mutates some of its victims in the world of “Resident Evil.”

But that’s where the similarities end, because “The Last of Us” is a much more emotional affair, focusing on Joel’s journey to escort Ellie (Bella Ramsey) across the U.S. in the hopes of using her DNA to find a cure for the infection. It ultimately becomes a story about found family, grief, and acceptance, with the emotional aspect of the plot becoming the focus, rather than its post-apocalyptic shenanigans.

But there’s still plenty of horror, with white-knuckle chase sequences and grim special effects bringing the fungus creatures to life on the small screen. “The Last of Us” has since become renowned as one of the best shows streaming on HBO Max – and for good reason.