Jill Valentine

Jill Valentine is a video game character in the Resident Evil survival horror series. She is one of the main characters in the original Resident Evil and the main heroine in Resident Evil 3: Nemesis. She also appears in the second Resident Evil movie, Resident Evil: Apocalypse.

Background
A member of the S.T.A.R.S. Alpha team in Raccoon City. According to the official storyline, Jill was a former member of Delta Force. This would imply enlistment in one of the armed forces, specifically the Army. Therefore she would most likely have been an Army Ranger or a Green Beret. She also must have been a very talented soldier to get noticed so quickly. Supposedly, Jill was already acquainted with her fellow S.T.A.R.S. member Chris Redfield prior to joining the squad; we however are never told how they knew each other. However, in the Strategy Guide for the Resident Evil remake for the Gamecube it is stated that Chris, Jill, and Barry were recruited from another S.T.A.R.S. unit where they worked together. This might be the reason Barry refers to Chris as "our old partner" in the original game. Jill was a fairly new recruit when she and the rest of the Alpha Team were caught up in the Spencer Mansion incident.

Alternatively, the Stephani Danelle Perry novels claim Jill was trained to be very observant by her father, Dick Valentine, a famous thief. Her father had trained her to follow in his footsteps, explaining Jill's skills with lockpicks. However, he was arrested for one of his crimes, and after being sentenced to prison, he begged Jill to clean up her act, with prompted her to use her unique skill set to join the Raccoon S.T.A.R.S. It should be noted that the Perry novels are not considered canon by the developers, and therefore Jill's thief traits are merely confined to the domain of fanon.

Spencer Mansion incident
On July 24 1998, S.T.A.R.S. Bravo team was deployed to the forest surrounding Raccoon City located in the Arklay Mountains after evidence of grisly, cannibalistic murders. After contact with Bravo team was lost, the Alpha team was sent to find out what happened to their commrades. Soon after their arrival, the team found the destroyed remains of Bravo teams's helicopter and were quickly attacked by vicious Cerberus, canines infected with the T-Virus. After witnessing the death of member fellow Alpha team member Joseph Frost, the team was abandoned by their helicopter pilot, Brad "ChickenHeart" Vickers, and the remaining members fled to a nearby mansion, the Arklay Research Facility.

Jill, along with fellow survivors Barry Burton and Albert Wesker, assumed the mansion to be deserted. They would quickly discover the various beasts and monsters inhabiting the mansion, as well as the remains of their fallen Bravo Team compatriots. Through her cooperation with Barry, Jill was able to discover that the mansion was actually a front for a top-secret research facility owned by the Umbrella Corporation. They also came to find that Wesker was a double-agent working for Umbrella, and planned the whole operation as an experiment to test out Umbrella's T-Virus BOW's and to destroy the S.T.A.R.S. team. However, after Wesker was seemingly killed by one of his own creations, Jill and Barry escaped along with Chris Redfield and surviving Bravo Team member Rebecca Chambers, leaving behind the ruins of the secret lab known as Spencer Mansion.

Raccoon City incident
After their return to Raccoon City, S.T.A.R.S. request for a full-scale investigation of Umbrella's activities was denied by their superior, Chief Brian Irons of the RPD. With no support from the American government, Chris, Barry and Jill decided to travel to Europe and investigate Umbrella's main headquarters themselves. Chris went ahead and travelled to Europe by himself by the end of August, while Barry went to Canada to relocate his family first. Jill decided to stay in Raccoon in order to investigate the whereabouts of Umbrella's Underground Facility before joining her comrades.

However, three months after the mansion incident (on September 28), her investigation was ruined when the Raccoon City was infected with the T-Virus. During her escape, she witnessed the death of Alpha Team's pilot Brad Vickers, at the hands of "Nemesis", a BOW sent by Umbrella to assassinate the remaining S.T.A.R.S. members. Jill managed to thwart Nemesis temporarily and met with Carlos Oliveira, a surviving member of the UBCS (Umbrella Biohazard-Countermeasure Service) along with Nicholai Ginovaef and Mikhail Victor. However, Mikhail lost his life protecting Jill from Nemesis and Nicholai was presumed dead after a zombie attack. Jill and Carlos ended up in a nearby clock tower after their train collided off-course. During the following battle with Nemesis, Jill was infected with the T-Virus and lay in a semi-coma for a few hours.

Two days later (on the night of October 1st), Jill later recovered after being administered with a serum by Carlos, and later discovered another one of Umbrella's secret research facilities hidden behind a park. In this lab, she confronted Nicholai for the last time and fought with Nemesis once again. Jill successfully destroyed Nemesis with a top-secret weapon that was transported to the facility a few days and managed to escape from the city with Carlos via helicopter. As they flew away, Jill witnessed the destruction of Raccoon City after the US government ordered the city to be nuked. Since they first met, Carlos displayed an interest in Jill but she rejected his advances. However, as time progressed, Jill became more and more attracted to the handsome young man. Carlos' selflessness and care for her eventually won Jill's admiration and affection. By the end of the game, it is highly possible that she returned his feelings as they were seen on a ship together. Jill, Barry and Carlos would go on to become involved in various Anti-Umbrella groups and activities.

Jill's current doings are unknown at this time, though many fans anxiously await an appearance by Jill in the post-Umbrella Resident Evil world.

Appearances
Jill was one of the two main playable characters in the original Resident Evil. In Jill's version of the game, the player is given a higher item capacity, along with additional equipment such as a lockpick and a Grenade Launcher, making the game easier for those inexperienced with the Resident Evil series. Jill was later given the starring role in Resident Evil 3: Nemesis. She is one of the more popular Resident Evil characters within Capcom's internal staff, making cameo appearances in Pocket Fighter, SNK vs. Capcom: Card Fighters Clash and Marvel vs. Capcom 2. Jill also makes a rather humorous appearance in the off beat Under the Skin along with a comedic representation of the Resident Evil 3 setting. She was portrayed by Sienna Guillory in the live-action movie Resident Evil: Apocalypse, which was loosely based on the events of Nemesis.

In the live-action sequences of the first game, she was played by an unknown actress known only as Inezh. Her voice was provided by Catherine Disher in Resident Evil 3: Nemesis and by Heidi Anderson in the 2002 remake of the original Resident Evil.

Wardrobe
Jill has the most alternate outfits of all Resident Evil characters. Her standard and most well-known outfit is a pair of blue assault pants with a light blue tight shirt and body armour, completed with a blue beret on her head. In addition to her S.T.A.R.S. uniform in the first game, Jill wore a casual outfit consisting of jeans and a black middriff. In Resident Evil: Director's Cut, she wore a sleeveless blouse with jeans and boots as a default outfit in the game's Arranged Mode. The Saturn version of the first game also featured Jill in an alternate version of her S.T.A.R.S. uniform.

In Resident Evil 3, she wears a blue tube top and mini-skirt as her default outfit. This is also a well-known outfit and is the outfit worn by Sienna Guillory in the second film. She has a total of five alternate outfits (eight in later versions), including her original S.T.A.R.S. uniform, a Regina (heroine of Dino Crisis 1 & 2) outfit, a police mini-skirt, a biker outfit, and a disco outfit. The Resident Evil remake featured her standard Resident Evil 3 outfit and a new military outfit modeled after Sarah Connor's outfit from Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

In Deadly Silence (the Nintendo DS port of the original), Jill gets to wear her original casual outfit, as well as a revealing policewoman uniform in the game's "Rebirth" mode.

During the original games' conception, Jill is notorious for going through more changes in her appearance than any other character.

Trivia

 * Jill is generally considered by fans as the most competent female protagonist of the series. She is more calm and collected than the more emotional Claire, and is a more mature and able combatant than Rebecca. She also singlehandedly defeated the Nemesis, Umbrella's deadliest bioweapon to date, no small feat.
 * In Resident Evil 2, one can search Jill's desk in the S.T.A.R.S. office of the Raccoon City Police Department. On her desk is a picture which, when examined, is described as her being with a young man, possibly her boyfriend. This is one of the biggest mysteries in the series to date, as no mention has been made of her having any kind of romantic relationship so far. However, based on the events of Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, it is highly likely she established a relationship with Carlos Oliveira.

Movies


In the movie Resident Evil: Apocalypse, Jill is portrayed by Sienna Guillory. Early in the film a newspaper article in her apartment hints at her dismissal from the S.T.A.R.S. unit and her involvement with Nemesis both add to similarities between the movie and the game Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, although due to the vastly different conclusion, as well as the role of Alice, the game and movie are officially considered alternate universes.

Novels
In S.D. Perry's novelizations of the games, it is stated that Jill is the daughter of a professional thief (Dick Valentine) and was his accomplice prior to her career in law enforcement, explaining her unrivaled infiltration skills and skills at lockpicking. However, this backstory is not supported by any of the games and is considered non-canonical.

Actresses

 * Heidi Anderson is the current voice of Jill Valentine as seen in the GameCube version of Resident Evil
 * In the movie Resident Evil: Apocalypse, she is portrayed by Sienna Guillory.
 * Her voice actresses in the past include Catherine Disher in Resident Evil 3: Nemesis and Marvel vs. Capcom 2: New Age of Heroes.
 * She was portrayed by an unknown actress known as Inezh in the original Resident Evil.

Jill Valentine