Claire Redfield

Look, you have two choices here: kill or be killed, your call!

Claire Redfield is the younger sister of former S.T.A.R.S. member Chris Redfield. Claire is an avid motorcyclist, and a member of Terra Save. She was present in Raccoon City during the T-Virus outbreak. She is the second primary female protagonist intruduced in the Resident Evil series.

Early Life
Claire is the younger sister of Chris Redfield. Their parents are never seen or mentioned in the games but the novels state that they died in a car crash. At the age of 17, Chris joined the US Air Force. At the age of 18, Claire went to a university to study. After hearing the news about the mansion incident in the Arklay Mountains, Claire heads to Raccoon City to seek out her brother.

Raccoon City Outbreak
I never thought any of this stuff my brother taught me would work!

Claire arrived in Raccoon City in search of her brother, but found something much worse. After she is saved from nearly being eaten alive by a virus zombie by Leon S. Kennedy, Claire and Leon hatch a plan to get out of Raccoon City as soon as they can. After being separated by a zombified trucker, Claire and Leon headed towards the police station, from opposite directions, where they hoped to rendezvous. Claire manages to get into the Raccoon City Police Department, where she met an injured police officer, Marvin Branagh, who told her that they lost contact with her brother Chris, and his comrades, Jill, Barry, Brad and Rebecca 10 days ago.

Claire explores the deserted police station and finds Chris's Diary in the S.T.A.R.S. office, telling her that Chris is no longer in Raccoon City, as he went to the Umbrella HQ in Paris and asking Claire to forgive him for not informing her as to where he's going. Claire eventually runs into the corrupt Chief Irons and twelve-year-old Sherry Birkin, the daughter of two important Umbrella researchers, William Birkin and Annette Birkin. Claire encountered Annette on at least one occasion, during which she accused Claire of being a spy for Umbrella.

As Sherry and Claire looked for a way out of the city, they were stalked by the mutated Birkin. Whilst inside the sewers, Sherry and Claire were separated, during which time Sherry was found by Birkin and infected with the G-virus. Upon reuniting, Claire attempted to find a cure for Sherry within Umbrella's underground labs. While in the laboratory, Claire ran into Annette one more time, before William arrives and fatally wounds his former wife.

Before dying, Annette gave Claire the instructions for creating the G-virus antidote. Claire contacts Leon to take Sherry to an escape train before the lab self-destruct sequence activated. She creates the antidote and, when finished, attempts to flee. However, she was thwarted once again by Birkin, forcing her to fight the monster and incapacitate it. Claire then rushed to the train, joined Leon, and successfully administered the vaccine to Sherry. Unfortunately, Birkin, now a gigantic, amorphous blob, attacked the train, thus triggering another self-destruct sequence. Claire, Leon, and Sherry escaped moments before the train exploded, destroying Birkin once and for all. Not long after their escape, Leon urged her to leave them and go search for her brother.

Rockfort Island Outbreak


I don't know what went on between you two, but you have it all wrong. My brother is not the kind of person you think he is.

Three months after her escape from Raccoon City, Claire infiltrated Umbrella's Paris facility in search of her lost brother, Chris. At some point in her investigation, her presence was detected and a security team was dispatched along with a military chopper to eliminate her. After evading the security force, and having narrowly evaded helicopter gunfire, she was ambushed by the team's remainder, and captured by Rodrigo Juan Raval. She was then taken to Rockfort Island to be imprisoned. Due to her strong will to survive and to find her brother she was able to again find her way through the island once it had been attacked by an unknown enemy. Another viral outbreak happened on the island. During her attempt to escape, Claire ran into Steve Burnside, another prisoner on the island, and the two eventually joined forces. Soon, after finding out that Umbrella was spying on her brother she contacted Leon to tell him and to come get them (as Steve checked her out). During this time, Claire also encountered Alfred Ashford, who insisted that Claire had led enemy forces to the base, and who then released multiple B.O.W's to stop her. Claire also had a run-in with her brother's old rival, Albert Wesker, who decided to leave her as "bait" to get Chris to arrive at the island. As all of this happened, Claire soon found out about Alexia Ashford, and had a supposed run-in with "her", only to be saved by Steve, who then shot "Alexia", revealing that it was none other than Alfred, calling him a "cross-dressing freak". As the two found a cargo plane to escape the island, Alfred then sent out the T-078 Tyrant to deal with the two survivors, and also had the plane's auto-pilot redirected, sending the two survivors directly to Antarctica. Upon arriving at the base, Claire and Steve found that the entire facility had been infected by the t-Virus. They managed to locate an Australian research base nearby. After having one last showdown with Alfred, she and Steve used a snowmobile to escape the Australian base, but were forced to deal with Nosferatu before leaving. Things seemed fine as the two headed for the base, until a dying Alfred managed to awaken the hybernating Alexia from stasis, who then held them captive.

When Chris finally arrived at the Antarctic facility he managed to rescue Claire, but was separated from her once again by Alexia. To make matters worse, Claire soon found Steve, who had been infected with the t-Veronica virus, thus causing him to mutate. Claire was forced to escape from the monster, only to be nearly killed by a giant tentacle. Steve suddenly came to his senses, and freed Claire, only to be mortally wounded in the process. As he reverted back to his human form, he confessed his love to Claire, and died by her side.

Though emotionally distraught from what happened to Steve, Claire managed to give Chris instructions for initializing a self-destruct sequence, before eventually reuniting with him. After Chris killed the mutated form of Alexia once and for all, he attempted to escape with Claire, only to be interrupted by Wesker. Once their confrontation was over, Chris and Claire evacuated in a harrier, determined to bring Umbrella down, once and for all.

Harvardville Outbreak
Bastard! That little girl will probably have nightmares for the rest of her life because of you!



7 years later in 2005, Claire joined a non-government organization called Terra Save (she overworks herself and even went as far as calling her Terra Save report her 'boyfriend'), which campaigned against Bio-terrorism. She arrived in Harvardville Airport to meet a friend who was part of Terra Save as well, but was caught up in a Bio-terrorism event herself after an outbreak of the t-virus occurred within the airport.

Stuck in the airport, Claire tried to find a way to escape with the others in her party, which included Rani Chawla, Ron Davis, and an airport employee. After calling 911 and waiting for help, a sudden scream followed by gunfire gave Claire the knowledge of other survivors. Maneuvering into the hallways to find them, wielding only an umbrella (ironically colored exactly like Umbrella Corporation's logo), she eventually came into contact with Leon S. Kennedy and his party. After escaping the airport, Claire headed to WilPharma with Frederick Downing. Once there, she learned that the G-virus was being researched there. As she called Leon, a time bomb was set off, causing a shard of glass to embed itself within her leg, severely affecting her mobility. While escaping WilPharma, Claire tried to help Leon and Angela Miller escape from Curtis Miller, who had mutated due to an self-injection of the G-virus. Once Curtis was disposed of, the three survivors cornered Frederick, who had been involved with the attacks in India and Harvardville, and arrested him. With the threat of any further outbreaks temporarily subdued, Claire and Leon opt to meet again under more normal circumstances as Leon rushes off to his next mission in a helicopter whilst Claire goes back to a car in the distance with Rani and her aunt.

Wardrobe
Claire's original outfit in Resident Evil 2 consisted of a black short sleeved, short legged cycling skinsuit worn under a pink vest with a "Made in Heaven" design (which she gives to Sherry during the course of the game), pink-coloured shorts, brown boots, and black riding gloves. Her alternate outfit in the game consists of a leather jacket and trousers with a "Let Me Live" design on the back and a red bandanna. In the N64 version, this outfit is colored purple and features the Angel Studios logo (the company that designed the N64 port) on the back. Her dark, layered, auburn hair is pulled back into a high ponytail with two free locks parted in the middle, framing the sides of her face.





In Resident Evil - CODE: Veronica, she wears a different red vest (this time with a "Let Me Live" design) over a short black T-shirt with jeans as her standard outfit. She wears an alternate outfit in the minigame Battle Game which consists of red and black hot pants and tank top with Umbrella's logo on the sides, and white boots. Claire is also shown wearing a third costume consisting of a red skin-tight unitard in the game's unlockable art gallery, but she never appeared in-game in this outfit.

The titles on the back of her jackets (in her original outfits and alternate ones as well) are homages to songs by the band, Queen (One of the games designers was once questioned about this link in an interview and expressed that they were indeed fans of the band).

In Resident Evil: Degeneration, Claire wears a tan, short-sleeved shirt with a red, long-sleeved shirt underneath it, along with khaki pants.

In the Resident Evil 2 portions of Resident Evil: The Darkside Chronicles, Claire sports an entirely new outfit from her original biker suit. She still has the black, short-legged skinsuit, but it is now covered with denim shorts and a dark red vest featuring a much wider collar, resembling her CODE: Veronica vest. She also now sports Western-style boots as well as a pair of sunglasses hanging around her neck. She also sports a Western-style side bag. Her CODE: Veronica attire seems to be slightly altered in Darkside Chronicles as well. Everything remains the same, but her jeans have holes in them and this time her hair is parted on the left side of her head and pulled down into a low ponytail.

Personality
Throughout the series, Claire showed signs of emotions either concealed or non-existent in most of the characters in the series. Thus, she is often considered as the most emotional character by fans. Claire also develops very close relationships to other characters like Leon, Steve, Sherry, and Rani to name a few. But the closest relationship she has is with her brother Chris, as shown in CODE: Veronica.

However, in Resident Evil: Extinction, her personality seems a lot different than her video game counterpart. She appears as somewhat arrogant, but acts like a leader. One similarity to her video game counterpart is that Claire also takes on a sisterly role to many of the younger survivors (in particular, K-mart, who is commonly found in her company).

Resident Evil: Extinction


Claire appears in the movie continuity, where she is portrayed by Ali Larter.

In the third film of the movie trilogy, Claire appears as the leader of a convoy of survivors traveling across the ruins of the United States in the wake of the t-virus pandemic that swept the globe. It is known that during her time leading the convoy, the number of survivors was far greater though as time steadily passed, more fell victim to the undead and chances of hope were seemingly bleak. Claire was among those who actively fought against the enhanced zombies that ambush her convoy in Las Vegas though while she fought valiantly, much of those that were under her care did not survive.

At the end of the film, she takes the survivors and flies to Alaska in an Umbrella helicopter in hopes of a life free of the t-virus after Alice and Carlos penetrate the surface of Umbrella's facility.

Resident Evil: Afterlife


Larter will reprise her role as Claire in Resident Evil: Afterlife. In the movie plot, Claire will be reunited with her brother Chris as both are locked up in a jail.

Trivia

 * In Resident Evil 1.5 (the original prototype version of Resident Evil 2), a blonde-haired motorcyclist named Elza Walker was featured as the heroine of the game instead of Claire Redfield. She was unrelated to Chris Redfield and was instead a college student attending Raccoon University and wore a red and white leather suit with the Raccoon University logo (probably a uniform). Otherwise, the character was identical to Claire and the two even shared the same personal data. According to Research on Biohazard 2: Final Edition, Elza's backstory was similar to Claire's, in which she comes to Raccoon in search for a missing person. In Resident Evil 1.5, Elza's supporting characters were Sherry Birkin (like in the released version) and an early version of Robert Kendo (the gun shop owner). The reason for transforming Elza into Claire was done to create a greater tie between the original game and the sequel without reusing an old character.


 * In the Nintendo DS game Viewtiful Joe: Double Trouble there is a picture of one of the enemy foot-soldiers dressed as Claire.


 * Claire, Ingrid Hunnigan, and Jack Krauser are the only characters in the Resident Evil series to maintain the same voice actor/actress (Alyson Court, Salli Saffioti and Jim Ward respectively) throughout all of their voiced appearances in the series. Other recurring characters, like Leon S Kennedy, Albert Wesker and Ada Wong have relatively static actors as well, but have been played by a different actor in at least one occasion.
 * It is interesting to note that the game Claire has come in contact with Lickers, while the movie Claire has not, exactly the opposite of Jill Valentine, who encountered the lickers in the films, but not the games.
 * Claire will wear a red motorcycle jacket that looks similair to her jacket in Resident Evil 2, in the film Resident Evil: Afterlife