Scream quickly became a fan favourite horror franchise when it was first brought to the screen in 1996 by the iconic director, Wes Craven. It’s self parody nature was genius at the time and still holds up perfectly today. With franchises being rebooted and returning, it made sense to be the perfect time to return to the Scream universe.

This time, 25 years after the original attack on Sidney Prescott and her friends. A new Ghostface pops up in Woodboro, seemingly attacking people to do with the original murders, forcing faces new and old to return to Woodsboro to track down the killer.

The first Scream is one of my favourite horror films of all time. The cast is incredible, the self awareness of the film is so much fun, Ghostface is a lot of fun to have as a character in the film when he’s just a teenager that is so clumsy and falls over all the time and doesn’t know what he’s doing. The sequels that follow struggled to live up to the hype of the first one, the originality of the first was hard to replicate without feeling like they were just copying itself. All sequels struggled but fans continued to turn up, even when the franchise moved to MTV and became a decent TV series with 3 seasons.

Now Scream returns to the big screen bringing back Neve Campbell, Courtney Cox and David Arquette, along with Melissa Barrera, Jenna Ortega, Jack Quaid, Dylan Minette and other young 20 actors playing late teens. They all do a solid job. It’s always good to see the original three reunited, they do a solid job, playing the same sort of role they have in since they took less of a front seat in these films. But the standout ones for me were Melissa, Jenna and Jack. Melissa impressed me mid last year with her vocal performance in In The Heights, her first big role before her appearance in this and she feels like a natural Scream Queen in the making. It’s certainly Melissa’s film more than anyone else’s, her and Jack Quaid (Yes, the son of Dennis Quaid and Meg Ryan) probably had the most fun on set and enjoyed being their the most, surrounded by the trio that are legends of the genre.

Part of the parody that works for me in this one, is it relevance to today’s cinema. Without spoiling it, I particularly enjoyed the poking fun at a certain franchise and their toxic fans. That to me was some of the best moments in the film, where the writing worked really well. Something that wasn’t consistent throughout the film. Yes, the film talk is the strongest part, probably, as the filmmakers are likely to be big film nerds too. Some of the horror worked, some of it didn’t. It rides a difficult like of trying to pay homage to what’s come before, making the film predictable at times and the audience doesn’t fully get everything they want, but with enough to keep audiences satisfied and seeing some of their favourite characters return to the screen.

Overall, Scream is a solid entry into the franchise, maybe the best since the original, but that’s a tall bar that no Scream can ever get to. The magic that film has can’t be replicated, and will go down as a classic of cinema.

What did you think of Scream (2022)?

The first review of 2022. Apologies for the lack of posts, but with some quiet weeks coming up, as we head towards Oscar season, I might use those to catch up on some bigger releases I missed over the Christmas period and some of the smaller ones being talked about, so follow on Instagram @floodersfilms and like on Facebook to keep up to date with the latest reviews.