Robbie Amell
Robbie Amell is an actor, born 1988.
Amell started young and Canadian, doing teen television before he could vote: Life with Derek, a supporting turn in Cheaper by the Dozen 2 in 2005, and then two Scooby-Doo prequel movies as Fred Jones. That could easily have been the whole career. Instead he became one of the more reliable leading men in mid-budget genre work, which is a real job and an underrated one.
What he is good at is holding a ridiculous premise steady. The Tomorrow People, The Flash and Upload all ask him to say things about physics or the afterlife with a straight face while remaining likeable, and he does it without visible strain. Upload is the best use of him: Nathan Brown is charming, a bit vain, not especially bright, and Amell plays all three at once instead of choosing the flattering option. The Babysitter does something similar with horror comedy, where he plays a member of a murder cult with the manner of a summer camp counsellor.
He also produces. Code 8 started as a short in 2016, became a 2019 feature alongside his cousin Stephen Amell and got a sequel in 2024, which is a rare example of an actor building his own franchise from scratch rather than waiting to be cast in one. The rest is a working filmography: The DUFF, When We First Met, ARQ, Simulant, and Chris Redfield in Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City. Not much of it is essential, and he is consistently better than the material.
Movies (24)
- Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City (2021)
- American Pie Presents: Beta House (2007)
- The Babysitter (2017)
- The Babysitter: Killer Queen (2020)
- Code 8 (2019)
- Cheaper by the Dozen 2 (2005)
- The DUFF (2015)
- Code 8 Part II (2024)
- Max (2015)
- Scooby-Doo! Curse of the Lake Monster (2010)
- Scooby-Doo! The Mystery Begins (2009)
- ARQ (2016)
- Simulant (2023)
- Nine Lives (2016)
- When We First Met (2018)
- Float (2024)
- Eat Wheaties! (2020)
- Desperados (2020)
- Picture This (2008)
- EXmas (2023)
- The Hunters (2013)
- Code 8 (2016)
- WWE Elimination Chamber 2025: Toronto (2025)
- Struck by Lightning (2013)
TV (10)
Where to start with Robbie Amell
Try Upload first. It gives him the most complete character he has had, a man who has to be shallow enough for the satire and sympathetic enough to root for, and the show is smart about class and money in ways the premise does not promise.
After that, Code 8 is worth it for the version of him he chose himself: quieter, grubbier, played opposite his cousin Stephen Amell, with Code 8 Part II following the same crew. The Babysitter is the most purely fun thing on the list. The DUFF is the teen comedy where he first showed he could be a straight romantic lead. The Flash is where most people met him. Skip Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City unless you want the video game connection, and take ARQ if you like a single-location time loop done cheaply and cleverly.