Oswell E. Spencer, Earl Spencer

I was to become a god! Creating a new world, with an advanced race of human beings...

Ozwell E. Spencer was the primary antagonist for much of the Resident Evil series, most notably recognized as the President of the Umbrella Corporation. A man of great wealth and power, he was of relation to the British royal family. He had a vision to remake the world and lead it into a new era, as the world's current state was less than ideal to Spencer. He intended to use the research of Bio-Organic Weapons to carry out his vision and mold a utopia for mankind.

History


While Spencer is most notable for his role as the president of the Umbrella Corporation, he was also one of the three scientists that discovered the Progenitor virus. Accompanied by his esteemed colleague and good friend Edward Ashford and prominent researcher James Marcus, Spencer was able to make the ground breaking find on December 4th, 1968. After much experimentation with the virus, Spencer was given a vision for the future of the world, which over the years manifested into "Project W", a top secret Umbrella project that would become the reason for every action Spencer took. While driven by their insights to create a powerful viral biological weapon, Spencer and his colleagues established the Umbrella Corporation. The company appeared to create pharmaceutical products, which was truly meant to disguise their sinister motives. Around the same time, Spencer hired the well-known architect George Trevor to design a special mansion in the Arklay Mountains.

The estate would serve as a camouflage for a secret research laboratory complex in its basement. After realizing that George may disclose of the secrets of the mansion in the future, Spencer had his wife Jessica and their daughter Lisa kidnapped and used as Progenitor virus test-subjects. George was imprisoned within the walls of the mansion he built. Able to remember most of the traps and passages he created, he managed to escape. However, he could not leave the grounds due to the guards and so hid in the caves below the estate. All known information about him stopped after he ceased writing in his diary in December, some time after falling down a hole, where a grave had been prepared for him by Spencer. Also occurring in that year, Spencer established the Umbrella Management Training Facility for further research of the Progenitor virus, and appointed co-founder James Marcus as the first general manager.

After Marcus successfully created the Tyrant virus by introducing the Progenitor virus to a Leech, Spencer began to grow paranoid of Marcus' new found reputation. Ultimately, Spencer ordered Marcus' former apprentices, Albert Wesker and William Birkin, to assassinate him. In the aftermath, Spencer appointed Birkin to take over the tyrant virus project. Following the mysterious death of Ashford, Spencer was left as the sole remaining founding member of the Umbrella Corporation, and easily able to monopolize the company for himself.

Spencer's Fate
When one buries a treasure, one should not leave behind a map...

When the Zombie outbreak affected Raccoon City, Spencer ordered that all of Umbrella's data be backed up to the U.M.F.-013 computer core, an act which was carried out and overseen by his loyal employee, Sergei Vladimir. Sergei and an unidentified Umbrella officer carried the computer core out of the city via helicopter. Raccoon City was leveled by a U.S. Government missile within moments of Sergei's escape. Spencer later received word that the city had been completely wiped out and made an entry about it in his journal. He also placed Sergei in charge of Umbrella's remaining structure, and went into hiding. Following the aftermath of the incidents in the Arklay Mountains and Raccoon City, Spencer brought forth top lawyers and false witnesses to the Supreme Court to shift blame for the events of Raccoon City to the Government, which kept Umbrella afloat for another five years.

In actuality, U.S. governers were involved with Umbrella's dealings. Ultimately, Albert Wesker sealed Umbrella's fate by submitting all of Umbrella's secret information (B.O.W.s, Viral Samples, Tactical Training, etc.) to the Government. The information had been downloaded onto a special disk from the U.M.F.-013, one of Umbrella's biggest archives. Wesker even went so far as to personally testify against Spencer, detailing what role he had in the events of Raccoon City; he was referred to as a personal friend of the CEO, but ultimately betrayed his former employer. Immediately afterwards, Umbrella's business license was revoked and a global manhunt was begun with the goal of finding Spencer, who mysteriously vanished following Umbrella's destruction. Wesker took all of Umbrella's infrastructure he had recovered and planned to remake the company as his own empire, with which to lead the world into a new era. He would meet Spencer again and reveal his plans before the end of it all.

Death
Now my candle burns dimly! Ironic, isn't it? For one who has the right to be a god! To face his own mortality...

In the following years Spencer went into hiding, making sure he had little contact with the outside world. His hiding place had been his European estate, a castle along the coast of an Atlantic ocean. Chris Redfield and Jill Valentine were given information from a reliable source on Spencer's location, hoping to arrest Spencer and get information on Wesker's whereabouts. Minutes before they arrived, Wesker himself paid a visit to Spencer, who was expecting him, much to Wesker's shock. Wesker realized that Spencer had been in control of everything that had been occurring over the years, even his own actions, and the two discussed Wesker's origins. Wesker was the result of genetic experimentation with the Progenitor virus along with thousands of others, known as the "Wesker children". Spencer revealed that his goal was to create a new breed of humans -Albert included- and thus become a god over a new world. However, Albert was the only one that survived out of other individuals who were "manufactured" such as him, and the research itself was destroyed along with Raccoon City. As Spencer stood from his wheelchair to confront Wesker face to face, Wesker violently thrusted his hand through Spencer's chest, whispering to him that the right to become a god was now his, and had never been Spencer's. Wesker viciously removed his hand from his chest, allowing him to topple over. As Jill and Chris entered the room, they unexpectadly found Spencer's corpse, with Wesker's bloodstained figure standing over him. After a battle in the Spencer Estate, Wesker and Jill disappeared, and were presumed dead. Spencer's corpse was left lying on the floor of his castle.

Appearance


Spencer's only confirmed appearence was in Resident Evil 5. He was shown to be an elderly man, well into his late eighties. He had light blue eyes and completely white, curly hair. He wore a purple evening robe with purple slippers, though he may have just been settling into more comfortable attire for the night. He was shown in a portrait wearing more formal attire, albeit with an older-age sense in his fashion. He was slightly confined to a wheelchair, which he was connected to through wires, though he was able to stand up and face Wesker during the last moments of his life, at the same time disconnecting himself from his life support. The chair kept track of his heart rate. Spencer would break into racked coughing at random times while speaking, and also seemed to have breathing problems. Since he has never been seen before his incredibly old state, when Spencer's health problems began is currently unknown.

Trivia

 * The unnamed official in Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles is heavily believed to be Spencer, due to the minimal facial details shown revealing him to be very old, and him being connected to life-support. This, however, remains unconfirmed.
 * In Resident Evil: Dead Aim, the massive Umbrella cruiser, Spencer Rain, was named after the Umbrella CEO.
 * Spencer was greatly comparable to Emperor Palpatine/Darth Sidious, primary antagonist of the Star Wars film series. Both served as one of the two main villains of their series (the second being Darth Vader in Star Wars who like Sideous and Spencer was much like Albert Wesker ), were of elderly age, betrayed many of their allies with no remorse, often manipulated events from behind-the-scenes, and had a past history that was left largely ambiguous. Adam Clark's voice performance of Spencer was also remarkably similar to Ian McDiarmid's of Sidious. In a guest panel for Devil May Cry, another Capcom published game, Reuben Langdon and Daniel Southworth stated that Clark was a huge fan of Star Wars.