Scream (2022) Review

Scream (2022) review.

Scream (2022) is a love letter. A loving tribute to longtime series director Wes Craven. A movie made for the viewers who hold the original close to their hearts. It also honors its returning characters by shifting the focus away from them for the first time.

Classic movie reviews will not contain spoilers.

Scream (2022)

Directed by Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillet

Written by James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick

Starring Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox, David Arquette, Jenna Ortega and Melissa Barrera

Scream 2022 Review

Full disclosure…the original Scream might be my favorite movie of all time. It arrived at the exact moment in my life that it had to. Having grown up in an era where campy slasher movies were the horror genre…Scream was a statement made for people like me. People who spent their weekends watching Freddy and Jason do their thing for the hundredth time on VHS. The slasher genre was in massive decline in 1996. A perfectly timed love letter to the budding adults who grew up with them was exactly what we needed. Flash forward to over a quarter of a century later…Scream (2022) wrote another love letter. This time written back to the original.

There are so many ways to approach discussing a Scream movie that doing so can be a dizzying prospect. It’s a franchise that this site, and eventual podcast, will be looking back on repeatedly from different angles. A whole article could be written just about the Billy Loomis aspect of Scream (2022). Rest assured that one day it will be. For the purposes of this review, however, we’ll stick to what 2022 has to say about 1996. … Sneak peak on that other idea though…notice what Sam is crawling towards before the Billy part of her steers her towards the knife. It’s an umbrella. The weapon of the victim defending herself in the original set aside here for the weapon of the killer.

Scream (2022) takes full advantage of being a part of the Scream franchise. It’s able to spell out exactly what it’s doing without subtlety in an endearing way. Fittingly it is the niece of the original film’s horror movie expert Randy who fills in everything we need to know. She’s right about everything, of course. She correctly lays out the killers’ plot and motivation. She even correctly guesses their endgame when she points the finger at Billy’s daughter as the most likely killer in this fan made requel. The killers’ plan is revealed to be framing Sam as the mastermind behind the latest Woodsboro killings, after all.

Unfortunately, Mindy, the aforementioned niece, may unwittingly be responsible for the deaths of Sheriff Judy and her son Wes. She mentions in front of the yet unknown killers that Wes and his mother are likely safe since they wouldn’t care about the inferior sequels in the franchise. The killers then sit there and watch as Mindy accurately lays out every single thing they’re doing and why. Their very next move is to do the opposite of what Mindy says they’ll do. Sorry Judy and Wes.

Is that an intentional move that Scream (2022) is making? Who knows. Part of the fun of discussing this series is that it does so many clever things. Any cool thought you stumble into may have been by design…and it may be reading too much into something you care about. Was Scream 3 partly about the broken sexual politics of Hollywood? Yes. Was it directed at a sleezy producer who ruined women’s lives because it was produced by Harvey Weinstein? Who knows. But it is fun to think it was someone’s middle finger at him. Also…how crazy is it that Weinstein produced a movie about the way Hollywood uses and abuses women? … That’s for another review.

If we follow that Scream was about slasher movies, 2 was about sequels, 3 was about trilogies and 4 was about remakes…Scream (2022), as stated in the film, is about requels. But what it’s really about Scream 1996. That’s the point. The rules that Dewey lays out to Sam early in the film are not “requel rules” though Mindy gives us those later. They aren’t standard slasher rules, they aren’t even rules for the Scream franchise. They are the actual rules you would take away from just the 1996 original.

1. Never trust the love interest. Pretty self-explanatory. Both Sam’s boyfriend here and Sidney’s in the original turn out to be one of the killers.

2. The killer has something to do with the past. Billy and Stu killed Sidney’s mother a year before their Ghostface killings…Billy’s motive is directly tied to Sidney’s mother. Here Sam is being targeted and ultimately is to be framed specifically because she is Billy’s daughter.

3. The first victim has a circle of friends that the killer is a part of. Stu dated Casey Becker before the original film’s opening scene. Amber is Tara’s best friend in this one. Fun side note…the two killers in both movies are the boyfriend of the lead character and the person living in the Macher house.

Dewey is accurately pointing us to Richie and Amber because that’s exactly who the original Scream would tell us are the killers. His logic is based solely on recreating the original movie. Which works because that’s what Scream (2022) is also doing.

The smartest thing that the movie does is somehow the very thing that the Halloween sequels and requels keep getting wrong. For the first time in the franchise, they’ve given us a movie that isn’t about Sidney Prescott. When Halloween does this with Laurie Strode over and over and over again…it feels like a slap in the face. Scream (2022) does it…and it feels like the best use of the character in decades. Part of this is because the movie goes out of its way to explain Sidney’s role as a legacy character. Part of it is because being the main target again would require you to buy that a fifth killer or set of killers had once again come after her. Michael Myers is just one person and Laurie seeks him out as often as vice versa. Ghostface has been 9 different people. At some point it’s just silly.

Sidney wouldn’t be a part of this story if she didn’t actively choose to insert herself into it after Dewey dies. Dewey and Gale wouldn’t be a part of it if they didn’t choose to be either. That’s the coolest thing about Scream (2022). There’s a Ghostface murder spree happening with or without the old gang. The story doesn’t need them to work. They just can’t help themselves for various reasons. This version of Sidney, wisely moved on and over it, is one of the series best. It’s a shame we won’t see her in the sixth movie.

Scream (2022) was made to tell people who love the original that it’s important enough to do a tribute to itself. It manages to walk a difficult line that could have tipped to self-aggrandizing and hokey at any time. It’s so lovingly crafted and heartfelt that it never tips over. It brings back the characters we love and sets its climax in the location of our fondest memories. Commenting on itself without ever becoming parody. Most importantly…it feels like Scream. Not just like a Scream movie.

Scare Value

Scream (2022) is a weird one to grade. The original Scream was directed right at people my age when it came out in 1996. Over a quarter of a century later this fifth installment with the same name was, once again, directed squarely at the same people. People who didn’t just love the original…but also regard it as one of the most important and lasting films of their lifetimes. It’s difficult to rate it in comparison to the rest of the series because it’s cheating the test. If the Scream franchise isn’t your favorite thing…this is still a fun movie that delivers what you expect from it. If the franchise is your favorite thing…Scream (2022) wants you to know that it loves you too.

4/5