Spoiler! Scream VI - Spoilers

After re-watching Scream VI a couple more times, in the company of a Scream-fanatic, the film has dropped considerably in my estimations. It does many, many things wrong and feels like a waste of an opportunity and a step backwards.

- Wasting the city setting and completely missing the point of urban horror/setting a slasher movie in a city.
- The character regression of Gail Weathers, her writing yet another trashy book about the killings instead of about Dewey. Which leads to...
- The identity of the killers makes no frigging sense. Plus there's actually no good 'in-universe' reason for them to dress up as Ghostface.
- No horror-meta analysis regarding the state of the horror genre. I mean, Scream 5'S was the weakest part of the movie but it was still there. There's so much to comment on regarding the current state of horror but nope, nothing.

I'd given it a 6 before, but now I'd give it a 3. It's still moderately better than Scream 3 in terms of plotting and pacing, but even Scream 3 had something to say about Hollywood, this film feels hollow.
 
Mr Trick
Mr Trick
Some decent points. I think the horror scenes were the best in awhile, the new characters better than in 5, plus the NY setting was still pretty cool.
Yeah I don’t think the last film needed Gale. Since they didn’t do anything different with her, and she was just taking screen time from the new characters I would have been happy just to have written her out.
 
Cohen said:
Gale brings life to every scene she’s in. And I loved her chase scene!
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She's always watchable I'm not questioning that. I just think the character has gotten a bit stale, and there didn't seem much point to her in 6. Because I got more into the new characters this time I would have been happy with a reduced Gale role. Probably would keep that excahange with Tara 😀
 
Mr Trick said:
She's always watchable I'm not questioning that. I just think the character has gotten a bit stale, and there didn't seem much point to her in 6. Because I got more into the new characters this time I would have been happy with a reduced Gale role. Probably would keep that excahange with Tara 😀
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I think the new characters were pretty darn stale too. Was really disappointed they didn't die.
 
Cohen said:
Gale brings life to every scene she’s in. And I loved her chase scene!
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With how they wrote it in 7, I almost wonder if she’s sticking around for 8. It seemed written in a way where they have an “out” if Courtney wants too much money, like Neve.
 
Cohen
Cohen
6* 😘
Gale should've had a better reason for being there other than 'I wrote another tell-all book about the Ghostface murders...although apparently my book failed to have any details or pictures about the killer or his extended family...oop.'

If you really want to truly understand how dumb a lot of the writing is, listening to the Director's commentary always helps.
 
thetopher said:
Gale should've had a better reason for being there other than 'I wrote another tell-all book about the Ghostface murders...although apparently my book failed to have any details or pictures about the killer or his extended family...oop.'

If you really want to truly understand how dumb a lot of the writing is, listening to the Director's commentary always helps.
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I think her books are more like narratives than true crime texts. Also, all of the movies have plot holes... it's kind of the schtick of the franchise. Because the purpose isn't to have a beautiful mystery, but more to comment on the horror genre or society's trends. Of course, this was done with much more intentionality in 1, 2 and 4, when Williamson wrote the scripts. 5 does a better job of it, but upon rewatching 1-4, it moves at a much slower pace, and offers far less kills.
 
Cohen said:
I think her books are more like narratives than true crime texts.
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I'm not convinced by that, given that Gale's previous novels were adapted into (at least) the first Stab movie, which named all those involved, including the killers, making them instantly famous/infamous.

Cohen said:
Also, all of the movies have plot holes... it's kind of the schtick of the franchise.
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Was it? I thought the schtick of the Scream franchise's is that slasher movies don't have to be dumb movies full of plot holes and hollow characters that are merely fodder for death scenes.
In fact I would say that the first movie has no real plot holes to speak of and the rest have a few minor ones. Certainly not on the level of 'the killer's secret family seamlessly plot's revenge' angle.
I mean, there are plenty more problems, such as 'how did the killer switch the body in the aftermath surrounding the attack of Sam's apartment?'
also the 'one of the killer's pretended to be dead' is kinda cheating, since it's there to trick the audience, not the characters in the movie.

Cohen said:
Because the purpose isn't to have a beautiful mystery, but more to comment on the horror genre or society's trends.
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The first 4 films had pretty explicit commentary's on slashers in particular and the horror genre, the 5th had a weak commentary on toxic fandom. The latest had nothing.
That was another of the actual scticks of the franchise; critiquing the flaws & foibles of the current trends in horror. Scream 6 can't do that because it's indulging in them.
 
Well, well, well. I might have to actual bother to watch Scream 7. Not only is Neve Campbell returning but so is Kevin Williamson. That is really interesting. It might be a return to form after the last 2 pieces of crap.
 
The one positive is that Campbell is finally getting paid what she deserves, so fair play to her on that. Guessing it will be a full reboot now. Not sure about Williamson directing. He’s a good writer but directing is different. Besides that my feelings haven’t changed. The ugly politics will cast a shadow over this 7th film. IMO as Scream sequels go 6 was a perfectly solid one. That cast should have been allowed to finish off their trilogy.
 
Welcome news but really the producers didn't have any other choice but to bring back Neve (Yes!) after rashly getting rid of Melissa Berrera for no good reason and then losing Jenna Ortega as a result.

The really good news is Kevin Williamson because the weakest part of the last town movies has been the plotting and the meta-analysis (especially 6.. Let's hope for a return to form.
 
Mr Trick
Mr Trick
That’s fair. The challenge for Williamson is can he come up
With an idea which both updates Scream but also stays true to the past films.
Mr Trick
Mr Trick
I still agree with Topher’s statement. There was nothing controversy about her comments.
thetopher
thetopher
Actor's say political stuff, it's not really a big deal, especially on such a nuanced issue. What matters is that she was a draw to the franchise and good at her job.
Mr Trick said:
The one positive is that Campbell is finally getting paid what she deserves, so fair play to her on that. Guessing it will be a full reboot now. Not sure about Williamson directing. He’s a good writer but directing is different. Besides that my feelings haven’t changed. The ugly politics will cast a shadow over this 7th film. IMO as Scream sequels go 6 was a perfectly solid one. That cast should have been allowed to finish off their trilogy.
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I'm hoping 7 kind of ties both stories together with Mindy/Chad alongside Sidney and Gale. Honestly, the Carpenters could die offscreen and I wouldn't be mad. I didn't love Samantha in either film (she was the weakest part for me in both films) and Tara was barely in 5 and very whiny in 6.

Skanky Vamp said:
Well, well, well. I might have to actual bother to watch Scream 7. Not only is Neve Campbell returning but so is Kevin Williamson. That is really interesting. It might be a return to form after the last 2 pieces of crap.
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thetopher said:
The really good news is Kevin Williamson because the weakest part of the last town movies has been the plotting and the meta-analysis (especially 6.. Let's hope for a return to form.
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Having Kevin behind the camera, hopefully we get actual deaths in this movie, instead of all the fakeouts in the last 2. Chad should have died twice over at this point. Though, I could have Gale survive 800 stabbings and I wouldn't be mad. Because I love Gale Weathers.


Honestly, I hope we get Sid, Gale, Mark, Kirby, Chad and Mindy back, and at least half are killed off. Lol.
 
Cohen said:
I hope we get Sid, Gale, Mark, Kirby, Chad and Mindy back, and at least half are killed off. Lol.
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The last three and I wouldn't complain. They just need to end it, honestly. It's not like a Friday where it can continue ad nauseum with just new characters to kill. They'll run into the Halloween problem where they have to make even more tedious connections to the original cast. "Oh wow, Sidney's distant cousin twice removed and Dewey's niece's best friend's brother are now being stalked by the secret niece and nephew of Cotton Weary."
 
Cohen said:
I'm hoping 7 kind of ties both stories together with Mindy/Chad alongside Sidney and Gale. Honestly, the Carpenters could die offscreen and I wouldn't be mad. I didn't love Samantha in either film (she was the weakest part for me in both films) and Tara was barely in 5 and very whiny in 6.



Having Kevin behind the camera, hopefully we get actual deaths in this movie, instead of all the fakeouts in the last 2. Chad should have died twice over at this point. Though, I could have Gale survive 800 stabbings and I wouldn't be mad. Because I love Gale Weathers.


Honestly, I hope we get Sid, Gale, Mark, Kirby, Chad and Mindy back, and at least half are killed off. Lol.
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Its worth noting that Williamson has only directed one movie ever. The rest of his career is writing or producing credits. Weirdly he's not been confirmed as writer for 7 yet. There's a question mark over that for sure. I'm guessing he will have a lot of input on the script.

I'm not as down on part 6 as others. It was a big step up from 5 and I would take it over the crappy 3rd film anyday. I think this whole thing has turned into an ugly mess.
 
Skanky Vamp said:
He's not. The previous two writers wrote the script.
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So their sticking with their story? I don’t know how that works out? I thought the point was they were starting fresh? Trouble is Williamson is unproven as a director. If he was retuning to write it that would be different.
 
Mr Trick said:
So their sticking with their story?
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No, they had to rewrite it, obviously.

Mr Trick said:
Trouble is Williamson is unproven as a director.
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No he's not. He's directed a feature before. That "trouble" argument is incredibly inaccurate too. Not that Williamson is a first time director, but TONS of great films have been helmed by first time directors; they just need to have a passion for the material. As a movie critic you should know the list of first time director successes more than me.
 
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