Scream 7

Mel Valentin started his review by saying,

After several, media-fed controversies, the abrupt departures of Scream and Scream VI co-stars Jenna Ortega and Melissa Barrera, and three directors, the studio behind the Scream franchise settled on original series writer Kevin Williamson to co-write the screenplay and direct the latest entry, Scream 7.

It was — and is — a decision that felt slightly desperate and very risk-averse to protect the franchise’s viability. Bringing back original star Neve Campbell as Sidney Prescott, murder magnet and Ghostface’s number one target, only buttressed the calculated decision by the Powers-That-Be to return the series to what it once did better than any of its competitors or imitators: Deliver meta-horror humor, taut, mystery-thriller plotting, and gorily inventive, ultra-gnarly kills.

Scream 7 certainly succeeds in delivering one element of the meta-slasher formula: inventively gory kills. The Ghostface killer isn’t a single individual, alive, dead, or supernatural, but a rotating carousel of murderous psychos, thrill-killers, and obsessive slasher fans. Each one hopes to join their long-gone predecessors in the iconic mask and flowing robes, and wield the ultra-sharp, carved knife.

If anything, the series has somehow failed to take the “many killers” story to its logical end. Valentin commented, “Rather than have just two (or more) killers per entry, Scream could go all out and turn Ghostface into a death cult, sending waves of masked killers at the protagonists and end the series in a literal, figurative, and metaphysical conflagration before rebooting it.”

Valentin continued, “Not surprisingly, Scream 7 give audiences a “burn-it-all-down” conflagration in the opening moments. Taking a broad, unsubtle knife stroke at obsessive meta-slasher fans, the seventh entry immediately introduces the audience to a Scream -themed AirBnB rental in Woodsboro, California.” As a completely obsessed couple (Jimmy Tatro and Michelle Randolph) enter into the house from the first film, Ghostface shows up, as guessed, knife in hand, murdering both of them after a few minutes of their introduction.

That’s how the series has always started, right? Valentin noted, “Most of the characters in the Scream franchise fall into two distinct categories: 1) fodder for Ghostface to stab, slice, and dice into piles of meat and viscera, and 2) suspects.” Only Sidney Prescott-Evans, Tatum (Isabel May), Sidney’s daughter, Mark (Joel McHale), Sidney’s husband and Pine Grove, Indiana’s police chief, series veteran Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox), and sister-brother duo Mindy (Jasmin Savoy-Brown) and Chad Meeks-Martin (Mason Gooding), Gale’s interns – all who are not on the “suspect” list.

Everyone else who appears in the film either are victims or suspect. Those characters include Sidney’s overly considerate neighbors, Jessica (Anna Camp) and her slasher fan son, Lucas (Asa Germann), friends and/or irrelevant people, Hannah Thurman (McKenna Grace), Chloe Parker (Celeste O’Connor), Ben Brown (Sam Rechner), and Marco (Ethan Embry), an employee at a mental asylum. Any one of them could be the killer until Ghostface abruptly murders them from the film.

This is the same as it always has been for the franchise, and that’s the main problem with “Scream 7,” released theatrically in February. Valentin noted, “It’s run out of juice; it’s woefully short on ideas, meta-slasher-related or otherwise; and it’s creatively bankrupt.” Nothing, not even the return of Neve Campbell, missed by the fans in the last film, or series originator Kevin Williamson, strangely proving himself a better director than screenwriter this time around, could save a series that should have ended or given the proper restart.

Sure, some of the murders deserved to be mentioned. One involves Sidney and Tatum hiding behind a hollow wall as Ghostface tracks them down throughout their home. Another one involves Tatum’s friends, played by Grace and Cyle Winters, being murdered, with Grace being brutally stabbed while suspended in a harness. Valentin said, “Outside of those two set pieces, though, the remainder feel utterly perfunctory, negligible twists on familiar slasher tropes, forgettable moments after the latest Ghostface victim bleeds out from copious knife wounds.”

Valentin continued, “Story-wise, Scream 7 makes a stab (sorry, not sorry) at contemporary relevance through an AI/deepfake-related plot point, but even that feels less like an essential narrative element and more a sign of franchise-related necrophilia. It resurrects long-dead characters (and their respective actors) for a nostalgic hit of dopamine.” With so much nostalgia, sadly, the effects begin to wear off. With “Scream 7,” that’s long before the credits in the too long, too kind recap.

As everyone might have guessed, I am not a fan of this latest installment of the “Scream” franchise. Every single one of the sequels have been terrible, with this one possibly being the worst. Why do they keep making these terrible sequels? Because the franchise is making so much money that they feel to keep making the sequels? Why don’t you just end the franchise already? Each one is getting negatively received, so why bother? Because the fans are loving it? For how long though? I think they are planning to make another sequel, but when will they end the franchise? How much longer are they going to keep making sequels until they run this franchise to the ground? I didn’t see this in the theaters, but waited for it to be released on Paramount+ so I could watch it while exercising. Just avoid this one because you will not love it. If you do, then I won’t question you.

Next week, I will be ending “Halloween Month 2026” with another latest sequel that was released this year that is terrible. Sorry for the last posting. I went out to see the new “Street Fighter” movie, then had to go pick up my mom who was seeing my aunt in the hospital. Review on the new “Street Fighter” to come tomorrow, as I am tired right now.