Somehow, the modified term has eluded the mainstream until the moment Scream slashed back into the zeitgeist with a brand new stab.
Replacing the late, great steady hand formerly at the top, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett – the duo behind 2019’s sleeper hit horror/comedy, Ready or Not – envisioned and executed a fidelius, “Wes Cravenesqe” franchise recharge that made a believer out of Neve Campbell. Out of Kevin Williamson. And, despite the uncharacteristic amount of critical analysis attached below, out of me.
Scream (2022) – colloquially ‘Scream 5’ and you can’t convince me otherwise – is a fan-service funhouse that tackles those prone to critiquing, besieging, and even bleeding the “toxic fandom” they claim to repel. Under the care of a new regime with “legacy” guidance in spirit and in the flesh, the first two acts are painted with fresh strokes of blood-red nostalgia. The 25-years-dead Randy Meeks’ niece and nephew have continued the film rule-keeping family business in his stead, Gale (Courteney Cox) and Dewey (David Arquette) still prove the end of romance does not mean love too is dead, and “final girl” Sidney (Campbell) plays the not-so-reluctant, and ever-maternally protective of her hometown hero as always.
The make or break here was whether the new lead could hold her own; Melissa Barrera more than does. Having first gained acclaim in Lin-Manuel Miranda’s In the Heights this past summer, Barrera is a confirmed star-in-the-making as Sam Carpenter, our window back into the Wonderful World of Wes and Williamson (screenwriter, Screams 1-2, 4; Exec. Producer on ‘5’).
Haunted by the ghost of her father, Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich), and the family secret forever tying them to the old neighborhood, Sam soon discovers the only way she can save her sister from further bloodshed is to tap into her killer instincts for good, rather than resist them as per usual.
In bringing things full circle, Act III somehow travels off the rails. Granted, in an entertaining – albeit obvious, and therefore subversive – way. Of all the recent films the Scream franchise could have plagiarized past the point of the homage in the new film, who had Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood on their predictions bingo board?
Moreover, the latest pair of teenslayers leave more victims alive than any other select killers in the franchise’s gallery of (mostly) copycat villains. In one particular scene, their amateurishness is on full display. If they truly wanted to torment a mother and son pairing into early graves, why narrowly spare them the sight of watching one another bleed out as the other too succumbs to the blade? This potentially unconscious act of mercy does not match their climactic declarations, but does however speak to their shared juvenile ethos.
Carefully crafted and devoid of music, this mid-movie suspense sequence seemed to miss a clear opportunity to swing for more heartbreak than it ultimately achieved as well. And for a film that wielded phone-activated home security systems to precision, it failed to completely modernize its tech-savvy scenery by not deploying what could have been the perfect occasion for a doorbell camera angle on the aforementioned front porch-involved double murder.
The most impressive Scream sequel remains ‘2.’ Consider the quality under the duress of a complete rewrite in the aftermath of an extra leaking the script mid-production. The most ambitious: the more-adored amid the #MeToo movement, Hollywood-set ‘3’, which gunned for Wes Craven’s New Nightmare extents of self-deconstruction whilst similarly mobilizing screenplays as MacGuffins.
‘4,’ at its core, remains my favorite (sequel), flaunting the requisite timeless humor and killer twist combo – not to mention letting the killer(s) actually axe everyone they set out to, save for the (previously) invincible triumvirate, of course. The film also foretold the rising tide of teens abandoning their pride and sightline in the pursuit of overnight Internet fame.
I’m Sidney Prescott, of course I have a gun. If I were Sidney Prescott, I’d use the fortune I made off the life rights I sold for, at most, 7 of 8 ‘Stab’ movies, to only return to Woodsboro with a scream queen’s ransom of her majesty’s secret servicemen as security detail.
Lastly: in 2022, in any year, no hospital ghost towns hosting but one several-times-stabbed teenager and a single murdered security guard are in existence. (Spoilers) Captain McCluskey was not under the Ghostface mask, stop this madness.
Despite its flaws, see Scream (2022), otherwise known as ‘Scream 5’ and ‘5ream.’ Written by Guy Busick (Ready or Not) and James Vanderbilt (Zodiac, The Amazing Spider-Man, Murder Mystery), it’s certifiably Casablanca compared to Jason X.
