|Scream 7: The Franchise Almost Didn't Survive Its Own Chaos

Okay so imagine this.

Okay.

It's 1996. And you're seventeen.

Sure. I’ll go with it.

And you’re at a sleepover. There’s Doritos everywhere, probably somebody in a sleeping bag on the floor, and then the phone rings.

And it's not your mom.

No. It’s not your mom. It’s not anybody you know. It’s just some random guy asking if you like scary movies. And he says it so casually too. Like he’s asking about the weather.

And then Drew Barrymore is dead. Hanging from a tree.

All of that happens in four minutes! Four minutes in, and she’s already swinging from a tree!

Man. Wes Craven did not come to play.

No, he was not messing around. And that was basically the deal Scream made with the audience. Everybody you love? Everybody you trust? Yeah… nobody’s safe.

So. No one is safe?

Nobody. Not the movie star. Not the nice girl. Not the cop. Nobody. And Sidney Prescott was the center of all of it. For like six movies. This woman cannot catch a break.

So, her entire life is just Ghostface?

Yeah. And every single time she thinks it's over.

Another mask.

You guessed it, and then Scream 5 happened with a new generation, new leads, Melissa Barrera and Jenna Ortega, and honestly, it worked, and then Scream 6 came along, which.

I know you’ve got some thoughts on Scream 6.

I have many thoughts. We're not here for those today. Because today is Scream 7. And this one.

This one has a whole other set of thoughts attached.

Oh yeah. Because this one is different. Because before we even talk about what's on screen we have to talk about how this thing got made. Because it almost didn't.

Like, it almost didn’t happen in the messiest way possible. Right?

Ohhh, it completely fell apart. And the best part it happened in public.

Okay so walk me through it.

Alright. So it’s August 2023. And Christopher Landon is directing. And Carpenter sisters storyline is continuing. Skeet Ulrich, you know Billy Loomis — later confirmed that the plan was for Sam to actually become Ghostface. Like, Billy slowly corrupting her until she crossed over.

Which is genuinely a wild idea.

Wild, but in a good way, because the final girl turning into the exact killer she was always scared she might become? That’s actually a pretty solid character journey.

That’s actually a really good character journey…but wait…Something happens doesn’t it?

Yup. It’s all gone. Because first the SAG-AFTRA strike hits and everything freezes. And then in November of 2023 Melissa Barrera gets fired.

Wait wasn’t that over a social media post about Gaza?

Yeah. And the studio invoked a zero tolerance for antisemitism. She said she was advocating for human rights. And however you feel about the politics the effect on the film was a bomb going off.

And the next day, Jenna Ortega’s out. Right?

Oh immediately. She said later she left because the movie was falling apart.

Which…she wasn’t to far off with that assumption. So now you have both leads gone within twenty-four hours. That’s not looking good.

Talk about a rough start. And then Christopher Landon resigned. And he said people were sending him death threats. To both Him and his family. So, the FBI got involved.

And this is all happening over a Scream Movie?

Yeah. Go figure. What are we doing out here?

The internet broke something.

That’s an understatement. It’s completely broken. So now it’s early 2024. We have no leads. No director. And No Script. Just a franchise-shaped hole.

And then Spyglass writes a check.

For a half a million dollars. For an emergency rewrite.

So they were kind of desperate at this point.

Kind of. Then Kevin Williamson gets the call. Followed by Neve Campbell. And suddenly the movie exists again, but it’s completely different.

So, the guy who created Sidney Prescott thirty years ago gets to come back and.

Rescue her.

And rescue his own franchise.

Which is either beautiful or a panic move dressed up as a homecoming.

I’m gonna say both.

Honestly, yeah I can see both. And then they shot the whole thing in like nine weeks. In Atlanta, under the working title Scar Tissue.

Wait….What? Nine weeks?

Yeah, that is insanely fast for a franchise movie, and honestly, the fact that it holds together at all after everything going on behind the scenes? I don’t want to just brush that off like it’s nothing.

Now, you’d think it was the fastest. Right?

Well, nine weeks is fast. Since most movies take six months to a year to make.

That is true. But what if I told you that Paranormal Activity filmed in just seven days.

Wow. I had no clue it only took seven days to film that movie.

And here’s another tidbit of information. Halloween filmed in just twenty days, and Get Out did it in twenty-three days.

So what your saying is. This movie could of been a very bad version for the franchise?

It could of but it didn’t.

Okay. So. Let’s talk about the movie. Like what’s actually on the screen.

Well, let’s start of by just saying Sidney is not Sidney Evans.

So, a new name. And a new husband who was played by Joel McHale who played a cop named Mark.

And let’s not forget she has kids.

Oh right  . And a new house in Pine Grove, Indiana. Where she is trying to live a normal life…And her eldest daughter is named Tatum.

Exactly. She was named after Tatum Riley.

That was her best friend from the original. Didn’t she get killed in…what was it again?

Uh..the cat door… what you don’t remember?

I remember. And of all things she named her daughter after her. Now, that’s grief that never fully healed, right there.

Yeah. It’s packed into one word.

And it wouldn’t be a scream movie without Ghostface showing up. Because we all know Sidney cannot have just one nice Tuesday.

No she can’t. Not a single one.

And what makes this one different from the rest is the whole movie hangs on…Is that the killer is using deepfakes. You know, like A.I. Real-time video calls showing the faces of dead people. Like Stu Macher. Dewey. And Roman Bridger.

So it’s someone with a laptop puppeteering ghosts.

Which is either terrifying and timely or a giant narrative cheat. Depending on your patience.

But, we’ll come back to that.

Oh, we’ll definitely come back to that. But first let’s ride through this thing, because there are moments that genuinely work and I want to give them a proper shout out…For example that opening.

Oh right. That opening was strong.

And the Macher house has been turned into a slasher museum. Like a tourist attraction.

Which is exactly what would happen.

Oh definitely. One hundred percent that would of happen. And the motion-activated Ghostface Mannequins were everywhere. Now that’s already creepy before anything happens…and then.

The phone rings.

That exact phone ring from the 1996 film. With the same sound effect. And if you grew up with that movie you feel it before your brain registers it.

Oh yeah. It hits you in the chest.

Like a ton of bricks. And then the fire sequence. I just love it when they actually build a set just to.

burn it down.

And the best part. They used Practical flames. You know, real propane lines rigged through the whole interior. And the sound team…and this is the part I keep going back to. Is they start the sequence completely inside the victim’s point of view.

Now that’s cool.

And it’s quiet. Just her breathing. And then the fire erupts and moves through the surround field from the screen into the rear channels and if you’re watching in Dolby Atmos the whole room catches.

And I love that the sound work in this movie is doing a lot.

Oh it’s doing so much. And Marco Beltrami came back. You know he was the one who scored the first four.

Oh Right.

And he brought Sidney’s Lament back…the wordless vocal piece…and he apparently made four different arrangements of it.

Okay.

And the version in the main title sequence just immediately puts you in the right headspace.

They also let Roger Jackson's Ghostface voice just sound old.

Yeah older. And angrier.

And with more gravelly. And that’s weirdly correct. Because this guy has been calling people for thirty years…he sounds tired and really mad.

He sounds like someone who took up a hobby and deeply regrets it. And they made this choice…I mean, the sound team. To where Ghostface barely exists as a physical presence in action sequences. No heavy breathing. No grunts.

Right. Just footsteps.

Footsteps and the squeak of the rubber mask.

That’s the whole thing right there.

It is. Because they use it as punctuation! In the tavern kitchen after someone hits Ghostface with a meat tenderizer...there's this tiny squeak as he straightens his mask. Just like a cartoon.

And it works.

Oh it absolutely works. Because you laugh and then immediately feel bad for laughing. That's peak Scream.

Don’t you mean peak franchise energy.

Of course. But, Okay we have to talk about the Hannah kill.

We have to talk about that.

So Hannah, you know Mckenna Grace’s character. Well she is in a school play rehearsal. And in a harness that was suspended above the stage. And Ghostface cuts the line.

Yeah I wasn’t expecting that.

Right. And I flinched. And I don’t flinch that easy.

Oh sure you don’t.

Whatever. As I was saying. I thought I didn’t, and this is the cool part. They built a full prosthetic torso, rigged with fluid lines, and when it drops to the stage.

That was the part where I just lost my shit. Because it felt so real to me.

Yeah. It was real enough that your brain briefly thinks it’s not fake. And here’s the thing…Williamson and Neve Campbell talked early on about pulling back on the gore.

Really. I wonder why?

Well from what I read they were thinking about going back to the Craven approach. You know, the suspense over the blood.

And then that exists.

Of course. But I do want to point out. That either the conversation didn’t stick or they just decided this one moment needs to be the exception.

I think it's the exception that makes the rule work. Because the rest of the movie is more restrained. So when it hits, it hits harder.

Exactly, it’s the contrast that makes it work. Then you get to the tavern, that bar kitchen scene, and everything feels quicker, messier, and way more physical. And what’s really cool is the sound team pulls the score out completely, so you’re just sitting in all that chaos.

And all you hear is just a fridge hum.

And footsteps. That's it. Chloe's fear is just carried by a fridge hum and slow steps in the dark.

And that's terrifying in the right way.

Yeah that’s what we call old-school terrifying. No music telling you how to feel. Just the room.

And I think that’s the best way to scare someone. But okay. Let’s get into the cast situation. Because some of this is.

Complicated.

That’s an understatement for sure.

So we know Neve Campbell is good. Because the movie is built around her and I have to say she earns it.

Oh definitely.

Because Williamson’s whole point of view is…Sidney is a mom now. And if Ghostface comes for your kids, well that’s a different fear all in itself. And Neve Campbell said she didn’t have to think twice because she’s a mother herself.

Because it's not acting at that point. It's just living in that moment for real.

And just opening a door that’s already there. Then you got Isabel May as Tatum. You know, Sidney’s daughter and this casting is smart too.

Really? How so?

Because she’s the same age Sidney was in the original. And the best part she doesn’t know her mother’s history.

Ohhh that makes so much sense.

And then you’ve got Williamson asking Isabel what kind of music Tatum would actually listen to, and then he works that into her bedroom décor like little story clues hiding in plain sight.

That's a tiny detail that makes a character feel like a real person.

Yeah, it makes her feel like a real person instead of just someone there to move the plot along.

And let’s not forget about Joel McHale as the husband. Which is itself a whole thing.

Right… so originally, Patrick Dempsey was actually in talks to come back as Mark Kincaid from Scream 3, but it just didn’t work out because of scheduling conflicts and the California wildfires.

So they just.

Changed his last name, because in the newer sequels they never really say “Kincaid” out loud. So they quietly switched it to Mark Evans, brought in McHale, and just kept the story moving.

And nobody had a clue.

Yup. Nobody caught it! That's such a specific little production move that I love. And then… okay. Dewey.

Ah.

David Arquette shows up in this one too.

Via deepfake.

Let’s talk about David Arquette appearing in this film.

Wasn’t that due to a deepfake?

Yeah, a A.I. deepfake. Because we all know Dewey is dead and the whole mechanism of this movie is that the villain is using deepfakes to mess with Sidney’s head…So, Dewey is back but only as a weapon.

And I don't fully know how I feel about that.

Neither do I. Because thematically it fits. The villain weaponizing grief. Using dead faces as psychological torture. That's coherent. But Dewey had a real arc. He died saving people in Scream 5. And now he's a tool in someone else's scheme.

It feels a little cheap to me.

Yeah. I can see that. Because I’m on the fence. And then you have Matthew Lillard, you know Stu. Which is the same thing. A.I. deepfake also.

Now, talk about messing with someone’s head.

I know, right? But it’s actually kind of funny in a dark way, because fans have been arguing over the whole “did Stu survive?” thing for more than thirty years.

And the movie teases it!

Of course they do. And they even shot an alternate ending where he’s actually alive. You know that scarred John Doe in the psychiatric ward.

Yeah. What about it?

Well he gets discharged. And that’s where you find out it’s him. But when they tested that. The audiences hated it.

And didn’t they say it was a stretch.

Yeah, they said it broke the rules of that world, so they basically killed him all over again, and this time they made sure he stayed dead.

Now. Do you think that was the right call?

Probably. But.

You wanted the chaos didn’t you?

Yeah. A part of me wanted to see where that goes. A living Stu and setting up Scream 8. Now that’s bold.

Yeah. I think that would of been awesome.

I think so to. But audiences said no and I get it. Scream isn’t that franchise. Because the dead people stay dead. Except when the movie is literally about the dead not staying dead, apparently.

Yeah, I can see where they’re coming from on that. But what did you think about the reveal itself?

Oh you want my honest opinion?

Of course. So what do you think about the duel killers?

Well, I’ve got a lot of thoughts. So the two killers were Marco Davis, this obsessive tech fanboy who’s been recreating the original killings by using A.I. to bring back dead Ghostfaces, and then you’ve got Jessica Bowden, played by Anna Camp. You know, Sidney’s neighbor. She seems friendly, she seems normal, but underneath all that, she’s carrying this personal revenge motive.

Uh, yeah. They feel like they’re in two totally different movies.

They really are in two different movies, and it feels like somebody just stitched them together. On one side, you’ve got this guy running a full-on high-tech deepfake surveillance setup that would take serious money, time, and planning, and then on the other side, you’ve got someone who’s mad over something that feels way more like neighborhood drama.

And they're supposed to be partners. Right?

Sort of. But the funniest part is they try to cram both motives into one big final monologue, and it just doesn’t really land.

And The Guardian basically said Williamson had too much going on, like he was juggling a bunch of plates and started losing track of which ones were even still in the air.

That’s exactly it. It feels like they were writing two different ideas at the same time. One is this modern tech thriller with deepfakes and surveillance, and the other is that classic Scream-style personal grudge.

That makes sense.

And the thing is, they kind of needed both of those ideas for the story to work. But together, they feel like two totally different movies that just slammed into each other.

And critics slammed the deepfake element specifically. They called it a lazy way to bring back legacy characters.

And I understand that. Because the whole mystery game of Scream is who’s behind the mask.

Exactly.

And the reason it works is because there are rules.

Just like any other horror movie.

Right. The movie wants you to play along and figure it out, but once deepfakes become the whole setup, suddenly anyone can be anyone, and the red herrings just keep piling up.

And at that point it's not fair play.

No, it’s really not. But here’s where I’ll give the movie some credit. The idea itself isn’t bad, because we do live in a world now where you can’t always trust a video of someone’s face. That fear is real. And Scream has always been about tapping into whatever people are anxious about in that moment.

So what you’re saying is the instinct is correct?

[Ambrose:] Yes. And the exception in the third act is what wobbled. And then you factor in that whole thing was built in nine weeks after a catastrophic collapse and you have to understand some of the seams were going to show.

And yet.

And yet. It still brought in two hundred and thirteen million dollars worldwide.

Which was a franchise record.

It was the highest-grossing entry ever. Second highest-grossing slasher film of all time. And the market said yes loudly.

But the critics didn’t.

No they didn’t. And it got thirty-one percent on Rotten Tomatoes. Along with a B-minus on CinemaScore. And the reviewers were not kind at all. But, audiences showed up anyway.

And the fanbase was split too. You had boycotts over the Barrera situation, protesters showing up at the premiere, and then Melissa Barrera herself publicly calling the movie nostalgia bait.

Which makes the whole thing really messy, because now you’ve got real political issues mixed in with a horror franchise, a studio trying to defend itself, and a fired actress who still has a big platform. So at a certain point, you can’t completely separate the movie from all the noise around it.

You never can.

Right. And the thing that keeps hitting me is — this movie is about the past haunting the present. It’s about trauma being weaponized. It’s about dead people's faces being used to control the living.

And that's not subtle given everything that happened off screen.

No, it’s not. And Kevin Williamson made a film about being unable to escape your own history. And that film was made inside a production that could not escape its own history. Whether that's intentional.

Or just the universe.

Probably the universe.

Yeah. But okay, with all of that said, I have to ask…who is this movie actually for?

Now. That’s the real question. Because it’s clearly designed for the people who’ve been there since 1996.

It truly is.

It’s going back to what made that first movie work. Back to Sidney, back to suspense over gore, and back to emotional horror instead of just flashy style. And honestly, in certain stretches, that really does work.

And then it also can't fully commit to that.

That’s because the movie is juggling a lot. You’ve got the Hannah kill, the whole A.I. subplot, two legacy deepfakes, and on top of that, it’s trying to set Tatum up as the next-generation anchor while still keeping Sidney right in the middle of everything.

That's a lot of asking from one movie.

I think it’s asking for too much. And that’s really where my frustration comes from, that gap between what the movie clearly wanted to be and what it actually pulled off. Because you can see the care in it. I mean, the sound work alone is doing stuff most horror movies don’t even try.

Well, the intentions are there.

Yeah. The intentions are. And Kevin Williamson clearly wanted to make something emotionally real. And I genuinely wish he'd gotten to make it the way he planned instead of the way he had to.

So what you’re saying is, this movie was basically made while everything around it was on fire?

Yeah, you can say that.

And the metaphor was already in the script.

It really was. And let’s be honest, Scream 8 is coming. The box office numbers already made sure of that. And Isabel May feels like the right person to carry whatever comes next. She’s got it.

And Sidney deserves a cabin somewhere with no cell service.

Yeah. No cell service, no Woodsboro, no drama, nothing. She’s earned a quiet little break far away from all of this.

She wouldn’t last two weeks.

Yeah. Two weeks tops, and somebody is already showing up in a mask. Honestly, I fully believe that.

That is so true.

Okay, real quick…what are our actual survival odds here?

Really. You have to ask me that.

Yeah, we kind of have to.

I want to go on the record and say I hate this segment.

You hate it because you know you're not making it.

Oh, I’m making it!

Jessica. Be honest with yourself.

I am being honest. I’m very fast.

Yeah. You’re fast, sure. But fast doesn’t help you in that bar kitchen at two in the morning with the lights off and Ghostface is already inside.

Oh, I would hear the mask squeak.

Wait…you’re putting your survival on a mask squeak?

Why not. It’s a real sound. Right?

Yeah, but here’s the thing. The deepfake stuff completely changes the survival odds, because now it’s not just Ghostface you have to worry about. It’s your phone too. Your phone can lie to you. Your video call can lie to you. And suddenly, the face of someone you trust becomes the weapon.

Okay that part is genuinely terrifying.

Right? Because in the original Scream you could at least trust your eyes. If you see someone you know, it's actually them. In this one.

Yeah. It might not be.

It might just be some guy with a laptop. So your whole sense of who you can trust is already wrecked before Ghostface even steps inside the house.

So let me ask you this. How do you survive this?

Easy. You don't answer video calls. Full stop.

That's it? That's the whole plan?

Yeah. Don’t answer video calls. Don't open the door. Don't investigate the noise.

Don’t give me that. Because you would absolutely investigate the noise.

No I wouldn’t.

Ambrose, come on. You would hear one weird noise in the basement and immediately go down there talking to yourself like, “Huh, that’s weird. That doesn’t sound right. I’m just gonna check it real quick.”

Okay that is.

That's you. That's word for word you.

I hate how well you know me. But hey, at least I’d see it coming, and my death would have a full play-by-play.

And your death would have commentary.

Whereas you would survive three acts by just not engaging with anything suspicious and then trip over something in the finale.

What are you talking about. I wouldn’t trip.

Really. Everybody trips in the finale.

Well, not me.

Ahh Jess it's a rule of the genre. It's in the handbook.

Wait…there’s no handbook.

Oh, there is absolutely a handbook, because the final-act trip is basically required.

Okay fine. But what about the listener. What are their odds.

Hmm…okay, the listeners. So if you’re listening to this podcast and you’re a horror fan, then you already know the rules. That’s your advantage.

But knowing the rules and actually following them in the moment are two different things.

Oh, totally different things. Because in theory, everybody knows the rules. Don’t go in the basement. Don’t split up. And don’t answer the phone.

And yet.

Someone always breaks the rules. Every. Single. Time. So, to answer your question, would our listeners survive? I’m gonna leave that one up to them. If you think you’d survive Scream 7, head over to our Facebook page, The THING About Films, and tell us why you’d make it out alive.

Oh this is going to be brutal.

Okay. I think you know what time it is.

Oh no. Already?

Yeah. Already.

Well, they better have cleaned it up better this time, because I am sick of leaving that place soaking wet.

But isn’t that kind of part of the whole experience?

What, the experience of the rot. Come on Ambrose?

Just move will you.

Well, I’m waiting on you…Lead the way Crypt Boy!

Okay. I need to say something.

If it's about the smell, I already know.

It's not about the smell.

Oh good. Because I've made my peace with it.

I was going to say the lighting down here is getting worse every week. Like, I genuinely cannot see your face right now.

That's fine. It's more mysterious this way.

Hey, at least it fits the theme, right? You can’t even trust what you’re looking at anymore.

Okay that was actually good.

Thank you. Alright, let’s talk about this movie, because I’ve got a lot to say, and honestly, I don’t know if I’m fully with it this time.

I agree. But I want to start with Neve Campbell, because honestly, I don’t think she gets enough credit for how much she’s carried this franchise over the years.

I know, right? And what really gets me is how Williamson frames Sidney this time. Because it’s not just, “Oh, Sidney’s in danger again.” No, now Sidney is a mom. And the second her kid gets pulled into it, that fear hits completely different.

And she said she didn't even have to think about it. Because she's a mother herself. So it's not performance at that point  it's just true.

Right. She's just opening a door that's already inside her. And you can feel it.

You do. And the other thing I keep coming back to is the sound work, because whoever was in charge of that sound department deserves some kind of award or at least a plaque on the wall.

Oh, the sound is doing so much work in this movie, and honestly, most people probably won’t even notice it on the first watch.

And we have to talk about that bar kitchen scene. It’s basically just the fridge humming and footsteps, but oh my God, that alone builds so much tension.

That’s all it is. No score, no music trying to guide your emotions. Just this uncomfortable room, that creepy silence, and Ghostface moving around somewhere in the dark.

That's old-school scary. Like genuinely old-school.

And Marco Beltrami coming back and bringing Sidney's Lament with him — that main title version just immediately puts you in the right headspace. It's quiet and sad and a little tired and that's exactly right for where this story is.

Okay, yes. And I want to give the Hannah kill its moment too. Because I was not ready for that.

Nobody was ready for that.

McKenna Grace is up in that harness and I'm just sitting there like — okay, this is fine, it's a horror movie, nothing too crazy and then it drops.

Yeah, that had to be the biggest shock in the movie. I don’t think anybody expected McKenna Grace’s character to get taken out like that.

Because it looks real enough that you actually have to question it. And since the rest of the movie holds back for the most part, that one moment hits way harder.

It’s all about the contrast. You keep everything quiet, hold back, and then when you finally hit, you hit hard.

Exactly. Okay. But we have to talk about the deepfakes. Because that's where it gets wobbly for me.

Yeah, I get that. Because for me, bringing A.I. into a horror movie already felt a little too soon.

I get what you’re saying. But at the same time, we really do live in a world now where you can’t fully trust a video of someone’s face anymore. And that fear? That’s very real.

Right. And Scream has always been good at tapping into whatever people are scared of in the moment. And right now, deepfakes are absolutely one of those fears. So the idea makes sense.

But the way they use it kind of messes with the rules of the game. Because the fun of Scream is trying to figure out who’s behind the mask, and usually, there are rules to that. It’s supposed to feel fair.

And once deepfakes become the whole setup, suddenly anyone can be anyone. Every red herring just keeps going, and at some point, there’s nothing solid to stand on anymore.

And then there's the Dewey situation. Which — I don't fully know how I feel about that.

Neither do I. Because thematically it works. The villain weaponizing grief. Using dead faces as psychological torture. That's coherent.

But Dewey had a real arc. And he died saving people.

He did. And now he's a tool in someone else's scheme. And it just feels a little cheap to me if I'm being honest.

Yeah. It feels like the movie is borrowing emotional weight it didn't earn in this one.

And then you have the two killers which feels like their from two completely different movies and someone just stitched them together.

I know right.

Because on one side, you’ve got Marco Davis running this whole high-tech deepfake surveillance operation, and then on the other side, you’ve got Anna Camp as the neighbor, whose motive is basically just a personal grudge.

And they're supposed to be partners.

And the wild part is, they try to squeeze both motives into one big final monologue, and it just doesn’t really hold together.

Yeah. It feels like two ideas that both needed their own space, but instead they each got shoved into half a room.

That’s exactly it. And honestly, once you know the whole thing was written in nine weeks after everything started falling apart, you kind of have to expect some of those seams to show.

I know. And I want to be fair about that. Because this movie basically got built while the house was on fire.

And it still managed to do some things really well. So there's that.

Yeah, that’s true. Alright, it’s time to give this thing our final rating. So where are we landing on this movie?

Alright, I don’t know if you’re gonna like this, but I’ve gotta say it. The craft is definitely there in spots. The sound, the score, Neve Campbell, and we absolutely have to mention that Hannah kill. But the third act starts to lose its grip, and the whole dual-killer reveal just didn’t fully land for me. So with all that said, I’m going with three coffins out of five.

Three is fair.

Okay. You think it’s fair.

For you, sure. But for me, I’m going a little higher, because Neve Campbell alone makes this worth watching. And we cannot forget that sound department. They were working overtime on this thing, and somebody needs to give them credit for it. So yeah, it definitely has its rough spots, but with all that said, I’m giving it three and a half coffins out of five.

Wait…Jessica, that is not how our Coffin scale works.

Well, three and a half is my final answer, so you can either take it or haunt me about it later.

Fine. But I’m rounding down on principle.

And I'm rounding up on principle. So together we're at exactly three and a half and we should just call it that.

You know what…fine. Three and a half coffins. Jointly. Let's get out of here.

Yeah. I know I said I made peace with that smell…but no, I absolutely did not.

I don’t blame you. It’s starting to smell seriously rough down here.

So…why are we still standing here talking about it? Let’s move.

Smart. Just walk.

I am. And for the record, I really do think Sidney has earned a cabin in the middle of nowhere with zero cell service.

Oh, absolutely. But let’s be honest, she wouldn’t even make it two weeks before Ghostface found her again.

That’s true. She wouldn’t stand a chance. Come on, Crypt Boy. Let’s get out of here.

Okay, so, we just did Scream 7...

And Ghostface just never gives up. Like, ever. At this point, has anyone suggested retirement to this guy?

Apparently not. And honestly? I respect the commitment. But this one put me through it.

Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. I had a lot of thoughts while watching this movie, and honestly, a few of them should not be said out loud.

And that’s what I love about this franchise. Even when it drives you crazy, it still gets a reaction out of you. It still makes you feel something.

That's true. It got me. I'll admit it.

So here's what I want from you. If you've already seen Scream 7 and I know some of you have go back and watch the opening sequence again. Just the opening. Because there's something happening in there that I don't think hits you fully the first time.

Oh that's actually a really good rewatch dare. Because you're right, you're watching it differently the second time.

You absolutely are. And I think it changes how you feel about the whole movie. So go do it and let us know if we're right.

Oh.We’re right. Just putting that out there.

Obviously. Anyway, we'll be back next Friday with another one. And it'll probably destroy us.

That’s basically our legacy now…bye!

Byeeee!