A Second Opinion On The Divisive Sequel

PLOT: Years after her last encounter with Ghostface, Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) is living a quiet life with her new family. But, when the Ghostface slayings start again, she soon realizes she can’t leave her past behind her – no matter how hard she tries.

REVIEW: I’ve been a Scream devotee since my mom took me to the original back in ’96 when I was in eighth grade. Since then, I’ve been front and center for every opening night. While I was initially cool on the “requel” era and the Carpenter sisters, Scream VI eventually won me over. Honestly, I felt like their story ended nicely with that film, so walking into Scream 7, I wasn’t mourning the loss of the “Core Four.” I was ready for a proper return of our Scream Queen.

What made this screening hit differently, however, wasn’t just Neve Campbell — it was my son. I got him into the series right before VI, and I took him to see this one in a packed theater. Seeing him experience his first Scream movie on the big screen in eighth grade, exactly like I did 30 years ago, felt like the ultimate full-circle moment. It reminded me why we love these movies: they aren’t just slashers… they’re events.

Of course, going into this event, there is a Ghostface-sized elephant in the room. Let’s get the sour grapes out of the way. Between the behind-the-scenes goings-on and the firing of Melissa Barrera (which was, let’s be honest, completely uncalled for), this is easily the most divisive entry in the franchise. Our own Tyler Nichols disliked it. The low Rotten Tomatoes score reflects a lot of that frustration, but if you let a percentage point sway you from seeing a movie, you’re doing it wrong. I still catch heat to this day for loving Halloween Ends, but at the end of the day, the only opinion that matters is your own.

For me, that opinion is that Scream 7 is exactly the movie I wanted back in 2022. Having franchise creator Kevin Williamson step into the director’s chair brings the series firmly back to its roots. Is it a “step backward” from the massive New York scale of VI? Maybe to some. But to me, it felt like a homecoming. It captures the look and feel of the Wes Craven era, aided tremendously by the return of Marco Beltrami’s iconic score, which wraps around the film like a warm, blood-soaked blanket of nostalgia. It’s a very simple formula, after all.

That nostalgia is anchored by a surprisingly grounded emotional core. Where the movie truly flourishes is in the messy relationship between Sidney and her teenage daughter, Tatum (Isabel May). Sidney is a traumatized, overprotective parent who practically uses the Stab movies and her own survivor memoir as a parenting guide. The dynamic feels surprisingly real, and both Campbell and May deliver powerhouse performances.

Williamson also brilliantly bakes the real-world studio drama right into the script’s DNA. The meta-commentary this time around skewers the very real studio obsession with manufacturing “new demographics” and tossing aside legacy final girls for the sake of a reboot. It takes the controversial clouds hovering over the franchise and weaponizes them into sharp, unpretentious satire. The callbacks are woven deep into the plot, entirely avoiding the cringeworthy, point-at-the-screen pandering that plagues so many modern legacy sequels.

As for the actual mystery, is the reveal here great? No. Not even a little bit, which seems to be the general consensus. But is it the worst? Not even close. That “honor” still belongs to Scream VI, a movie I truly love despite the Bailey family’s logic-defying antics. Most Scream reveals are based on silly motives with even sillier monologues, but what matters most to me is the build and the ride. This one nails the tension. The nearly two-hour runtime flies by, culminating in a third-act monologue that goes so wildly over the top it crosses from silly into genuinely fun, delivering a level of unhinged energy I haven’t seen in the series in a long time.

Bringing that energy to life is a cast that absolutely delivers. Neve Campbell proves once again that she isn’t just a legacy cameo, but the absolute soul of the franchise. The theater went wild when Courteney Cox made her entrance, somehow playing an even more emboldened Gale Weathers, joined by the surviving Meeks-Martin twins, Chad (Mason Gooding) and Mindy (Jasmin Savoy Brown).

While the new “Tatum’s friends” group might not be deeply developed, Williamson understands that we don’t need to know the exhaustive life stories of the knife fodder. They function as perfect red herrings, keeping the whodunit element alive, and serve as fun names to cross off the suspect list. And their exits are spectacular. Ghostface has rarely felt meaner or more sadistic. There are a couple of knife stabbings in this movie that are so visceral and inventive they made me physically gasp.

Ultimately, Scream 7 won’t work for everyone. The critics are already sharpening their knives, and some fans can’t see past the production hurdles. But if you can separate the art from the industry mess, you’ll find a lean, mean slasher that definitively answers the existential question of what this series is. At its heart, Scream is Neve Campbell’s franchise.