Scream 7 (2026)

Holy shit, there's 7 of them now? These movies have come a long way. After a number of fits and starts, including losing most of the new, younger cast they hired for the reboot several years back, the franchise falls back on nostalgia for its next legacy sequel, putting Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) back front and center, as well as familiar faces from the past. Does any of it make sense? We're long past that now. Series creator Kevin Williamson is in the director's seat this time, paying homage to Wes Craven in a back to basics format that's straight to the point, while basically providing fan service in spades. It's so self-aware, it almost feels like a parody of itself at this point. However, it's head and shoulders above the previous entry, so it's all right in my book.

2½ beer taps out of 5

Scream VI (2023)

That went off the rails quickly. Clearly, pushing these out every year does not work to its advantage. This is a cheap, lazy sequel which lacks almost all the charm of the previous entry. That's nothing to say of the movie itself, which was completely forgettable, and worse yet, predictable on many counts. The motives for these killings continue to keep getting thinner and thinner, and we as the audience have to excuse a lot of ridiculous hand-waving in order for any of it to work.

If not for the talent pool of this cast, it would get a much lower score. Just don't go into it with any set of expectations.

1½ catfishes out of 5

Scream (2022)

AKA: Scream V

As a jaded horror fan, I actually enjoyed this one quite a bit. I'm not sure if I'm letting my defenses down lately, but I don't think it was worse than any of the other sequels. The leads (especially the sisters played by Melissa Barrera and Jenna Ortega) were very well cast and I believed their relationship. I didn't anticipate the twists either, so it was a success in that regard.

It's not as slick and stylish as it was under the direction of Wes Craven, but it still manages to capture the ethos of the time it was made in. This volume introduces the idea of the "requel"—i.e. the reboot/sequel to a legacy series—which this film also represents (meta as always). 

3 toxic online comments out of 5

STILL SCREAMING: THE ULTIMATE SCARY MOVIE RETROSPECTIVE [2011]

Celebrated horror journalist Ryan Turek's documentary, Still Screaming, pays tribute to the first three films in Wes Craven's popular Scream franchise.
It opens with a pointless and sloppily "first kill" scene that makes Scream 3's opening kill look inventive and then, gets into the juicy stuff that's filled with trivia and behind-the-scenes looks with interviews from cast & crew members and other popular folks in the genre.  As a dedicated fan to the series there was plenty I was already aware of but it gave just enough new tasty tidbits to keep me interested till the end.  Unlike most film documentaries of this type, it wisely doesn't just praise it's subjects but also is quite honest about a lot of the franchise's mistakes it made.  It's not going to win over any fans with this execution but will certainly make the nostalgic fan eager for a revisit to Woodsboro.

3 Scary Movies out of 5

SCREAM 3 [1999]

When the scriptwriter of your trilogy doesn't have the time to do the final instalment, you wait till he does have the time. Don't get some schmuck to pen it instead...and that's exactly what happened here.
Scream 3 has some promising elements but in the end it's just plain bad. It loses that perfect balance of horror and satire and comes off as an episode of Scooby-Doo or Abbot & Costello (mansion filled with secret passageways and trapdoors included). Even the new characters are boring and snotty. You just can't wait for them to bite the biscuit.
Such a shame. It left such a bitter taste in my mouth for 12 years.

2 Jay & Silent Bob's? out of 5

SCREAM 2 [1997]

Who'd want to make a sequel? Sequels suck.
Unless you know how to avoid all the obligatory rules and take it step above all that. Scream 2 manages to pull out some brutal punches and makes sure it doesn't fall under the curse of sequel suckage.
With all the survivors from the original returning plus a slew of brand new faces to slice n' dice, (Liev Schreiber and Timothy Olyphant being the new highlights), Scream 2 is just as much fun as the first one.
It does run about 5 minutes too long and has a few slow moments, but the gorier and more vicious murders make up for it. A worthy follow-up.

3½ Robert Rodriguez & Danny Elfman cameos out of 5

SCREAM [1996]

The 60's had Psycho, the 70's had Halloween, the 80's had A Nightmare on Elm Street and the '90's had Scream.
It single-handlely revived the teen slasher flick genre to a whole new generation of blood thirsty teens. While dissecting and poking fun at the rules and faults of all the horror films we've grown up with, it also pays tribute and breaks & follows all those elements as well.
Scriptwriter Kevin Williamson mastered the art of writing teen dialogue and actually makes it sound like real teens and not what Hollywood had portrayed them as before. A highly entertaining & talented cast elevates Scream above the usual slasher flick fare and establishes it's spot as one of the best horror films made.

4 excellent Norman Bates quotes out of 5

SCRE4M [2011]

After getting over the initial disappointment of not living up to the first Scream, like the cast & crew interviews kept on promising it would, I found the fourth installment of the popular Wes Craven slasher flick franchise to be an entertaining ride upon a second viewing.
While not meeting it's full potential, it is light years better than the third one and just trailing in behind the first two films. It never makes full use of the killer using the updated technology to his advantage, like he would have in the original films or really acknowledging the huge change in horror cinema since the last one came out over 10 years ago. There are a few moments of using blogs, webcams, phone apps and poking fun at remakes, reboots and torture porn but not as much as it could have been and that was a little disappointing. The new cast was a hoot to watch, although some were painfully underused or killed off too early. With the hugest body count so far in the series, slasher flick fans and gorehounds won't be disappointed.
It's still fun and I hope the next two patch up the mistakes this one made.

3 Robert Rodriguez "cameos" out of 5