Review: Scream VI (2023)

Sisters Jenna Ortega and Melissa Barrera face a new Ghostface killer in New York, whilst Hayden Panettiere shows up as Kirby Reed, now an FBI agent. Reporter Gail Weathers (Courteney Cox) is back too, as are several other characters from previous “Scream” films, particularly the previous one (including twins played by Jasmin Savoy Brown and Mason Gooding). Dermot Mulroney plays a detective who is also the father of Liano Liberato who plays Barrera’s new roommate. Henry Czerny has a small role as a therapist, and Samara Weaving appears early as a University professor.

 

I liked the first “Scream” film just fine, and at the time I enjoyed “Scream 2” and “Scream 3” slightly less ‘just fine’. Over the years though, I’ve found I just don’t care about the latter two at all anymore. Or the franchise as a whole to be honest. The original is all you need, though I will say this 2023 film from directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin & Tyler Gillett is a step and a quarter up from the dire “Scream 4” and five, the latter of which is from the same directing pair. This sixth go-round is blandly mediocre instead of actively terrible, basically.

 

The horror set pieces and violence are really well done in this one. The opening set piece is without question the best opener since the first film. It’s quite a different opener in some ways for what is otherwise a very formulaic franchise. You also get multiple twists in just that opening set piece, which is cool and I felt like this could be headed somewhere really intteresting. However, around 50 minutes in and I legitimately didn’t care who the killer/killers were. For the record, I actually guessed part of the equation but not the whole. It didn’t really matter because very little of anything was mainting much of my interest.

 

Mason Gooding is slightly more compelling this time around I guess, but Melissa Barrera is still amateurish and her screen presence innately unlikeable. Meanwhile, an annoying Jasmin Savoy Brown has taken the Randy role full-on and seems exceedingly pleased with herself. Too forced. Worst of all is Liana Liberato who in addition to playing a cliché, plays the most annoying character in a franchise that already had a character played by Tarantino’s idol, Matthew Lillard. Jenna Ortega is objectively cute and all, but she plays a boring cliché here too. Returnee Hayden Panettiere’s introduction is unintentionally hilarious. Dreadful attempt at just getting a recurring character back into the “Scream” fold for the sake of what, late 2010s nostalgia? Can people even get nostalgic for the previous decade already? Speaking of recurring characters, Courteney Cox’s appearance here as Gale Weathers is just a reminder that they killed off the wrong legacy character last time. Sorry, but it’s true. Just for some further unintentional giggles, watch the scene Cox shares with Panettiere, they’ve both had so much work done to their faces that neither of them can properly do their job, because they can’t move their facial muscles anymore.

 

For me the only interesting people here die in the opening set piece, it’s all downhill after that. If you liked the other sequels, your standards are obviously low enough to enjoy this one. As for me, I didn’t hate this one but the franchise is tired and so am I, boss. The screenplay is by Guy Busick (the terrible fifth “Scream” film, the surprisingly excellent “Final Destination: Bloodlines”) and producer James Vanderbilt (“Zodiac”, “Truth”, and the aforementioned fifth “Scream” film).

 

Rating: C-