REVIEW: 'Scream 7' is a bloody good time
In 1996, Scream revitalized the slasher genre after the 1980s pretty much ran it into the ground following the trail blazed by Halloween (1978), Friday the 13th (1980), and the like. Years of sequels, copycats, and straight-up rip-offs had diluted the idea of a masked killer hunting camera-friendly teenagers, and, on first glance, Scream would just be more of the same. What horror auteur Wes Craven (Nightmare on Elm Street) and screenwriter Kevin Williamson (Dawson’s Creek, The Vampire Diaries) ended up delivering was a brilliantly postmodern take, deconstructing the genre through meta humor, Gen X cynicism, and iconic kills, all borne of the notion that the people in this universe would have grown up on exactly the kinds of films Scream was honoring.
All of a sudden, slashers were cool again, resulting in titles like I Know What You Did Last Summer (1997) and Urban Legend (1998). While the severely underrated Scream 4 (2011) would reinvent the series through the (then-new) idea of online celebrity, the franchise would see its true return in 2022 with the fifth entry—simply titled Scream—from Ready or Not masterminds Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, with a riff on Hollywood’s obsession with legacy sequels. Just as the original film launched the movie careers of Neve Campbell (Party of Five) and Courtney Cox (Friends), who were primarily known for their TV work, Scream 2022 introduced the world to Jenna Ortega (Wednesday) and Melissa Barrera (Abigail).
While Campbell sat out Scream 6 (2023) over a pay dispute, Scream 7 marks her return as Sidney Prescott, and it feels—in all the best ways—as if she never left. We catch up with Sidney in the small town of Pine Grove, where she’s happily married to police chief Mark (Joel McHale, Community) and the mother to three kids, including teenage daughter Tatum (Isabel May, of Netflix's Alexa & Katie). When Ghost Face murders start up again, Sidney finds herself forced to confront the past she thought she’d left behind, before it can destroy the life and family she’s built for herself.
Older and wiser, Sidney has grown from the last time we saw her, having settled into her role as an overprotective mother. However, her good intentions have caused a rift between Sid and her daughter Tatum, which drives much of the drama. Campbell was sorely missed in VI, and her presence here anchors the plot, as the Ghost Face murders have always hinged on elements from Sidney’s past. While the revelations here can’t help but feel a bit undercooked (largely on account of pretty much everybody from the original film being, well, dead), Campbell brings a level of sincerity and verisimilitude that balances out the more outlandish murders.
May is fine as Tatum, even if her interactions with her friends turn out largely the way they always do in films of this type. McKenna Grace (Regretting You) puts in a memorable turn as best friend Hannah, while her fellow Ghostbusters Afterlife alum Celeste O'Connor rounds out Tatum’s circle of friends. As Tatum discovers firsthand just what it means to be Sidney's daughter, she and her friends will learn the dangers of opening old wounds and—in true horror movie fashion—how some secrets just won’t stay dead.
Of the adult actors, Cox reprises her role of dogged reporter Gail Weathers, who is still grieving the murder of her husband, Dewey (David Arquette), in the previous film. Unfortunately, save for a fun bit with an SUV, and Cox being an executive producer on the film, Gail doesn’t really have anything particularly different or interesting to do here. Pitch Perfect’s Anna Camp joins the cast as a concerned Pine Grove parent, while Joel McHale is woefully miscast as Sidney’s well-meaning husband. While McHale is generally a fun addition to most projects, he’s in no way believable (or credible) in the part of a senior law enforcer, much less someone that multi-time survivor Sidney would trust with her safety.
As with any long-running series, the fun lies in the ways filmmakers can shake up the established formula, and Scream 7 has these in the form of Ghost Face kills that easily rank among the franchise’s best. While these movies will probably run out of novel ways for people to get stabbed, slashed, and/or otherwise impaled at some point, it thankfully hasn’t happened yet, and fans will get a kick out of watching characters get picked off.
While the final twist lacks a lot of the shock factor we’ve come to expect, Williamson makes up for the absence of revelatory catharsis with a solid grasp of what makes these movies entertaining; this may only be his second time directing a major film, but he’s lived in the Scream world for so long, he finds creative ways to play with audience expectations that make the experience worthwhile.
Scream 7 may not break the mold as far as genre commentary or meta humor have evolved since 1996, but it’s an undeniably fun way for old fans to reunite with Sidney, Gail, and Ghost Face, while welcoming a new generation to see for themselves just what the fuss is about.
Scream 7 opens in Philippine cinemas on Feb. 27. Watch the official trailer below.
