First of all, my apologies go out to the Alien franchise.
Back when I did a franchise ranking of that series, I lambasted the series as being a particularly bad one. I noted that it had two good movies and then a bunch of trash in their wake that I was reduced to trying to figure out an order for.
Brother, I had no idea what a bad franchise was yet.
This brings us to today’s offering. I just recently and reluctantly watched the newest entry into the Scream franchise, Scream 7. And given that we have at least two years before Scream 8 is anywhere in sight, I thought now might be a good time to take a look back at this classic slasher series and see how I’d rank them all to this point.
They aren’t good! But we’ll get to that.
As a 15-16 year old in 1996 who just friggin’ LOVED slasher movies, Scream was obviously a revelation to me when it came out. A well-made, thoughtfully constructed, AND respectful take-down of the slasher brand of films I loved? I was all the way in.
And since then, all they did was release 6 more movies in the line. So what on Earth went wrong with most of them? Well… let’s take a look.
(Oh, and obviously there will be SPOILERS BELOW for the ranked movies!)
7. Scream 4
My Letterboxd Rating: 1 / 5
Scream 4 seems to be the most divisive in the entire franchise. I asked across my social medias before writing this article for followers and friends to give me their Scream rankings, and this was the movie that was most liable to pop up anywhere on any given list list. One person had it tied for first! Several others had it near the bottom. Others still had it top three. For me, it’s the one that pissed me off the most.
Scream 4 starts with easily the worst and most obnoxious opening of the series, and it never got me back after that. The opening scene–such a staple of the franchise–is mocked and reduced to an asinine gag. This opening-within-an-opening-within-an-opening reeks of being completely out of ideas. I can’t stress enough that watching that bit legitimately made me mad at Scream 4 right out of the gate.
From there, you end up with the first time I was able to predict all the killers coming from a mile away. So the thrill of the reveal was more of a “Yeah, get on with it” kind of feeling from me. Only in one other movie in this lineage was the resolution as painfully obvious as it was here, but at least the rest of that other movie wasn’t as bad.
Still, all the credit in the world go out to Emma Roberts and Hayden Panettiere for doing their absolute best to make this one worth watching. They are doing the Lord’s work in this one. But it’s just not enough. A bad opening. A bad ending. And not enough in between to really save it.
6. Scream 7
My Letterboxd Rating: 1.5 / 5
Scream 7 just… well… “screams” that it’s time to let this franchise go quietly into the night. But unfortunately, it made $210 million against a $45 million budget, so more are imminent. The people behind the franchise, including writer and now-director Kevin Williamson, are clearly out of ideas, though.
Scream 7 was hastily cobbled back together from a burnt husk after star Melissa Barrera was unjustly fired for speaking her thoughts on the Israel/Palestine conflict, and then Jenna Ortega and would-be director Christopher Landon backed out in the wake of that. The studio hurried everything along, hit the “break glass in case of emergency” Neve Campbell button, and pushed out a plate full of slop.
This entry has the worst third act and the worst killer reveal in the history of the line. Being predictable is bad, sure, but having complete nonsense is even worse. I guess the first two acts of this one aren’t abhorrent or anything, but they sure aren’t special, either. This one feels like the kind of brain-dead, thoughtless slasher that the original Scream poked fun at back in 1996.
5. Scream 3
My Letterboxd Rating: 2 / 5
Originally, Scream was a trilogy! It wasn’t initially planned on being as such, but given its success, two more movies were pumped out, and we had a three picture extravaganza that combined to tell the story of Sidney Prescott and her relationship with her mother. It made sense, and it would be about ten years before a fourth entry would come out. We already know what I think of Scream 4. So what makes Scream 3 so low here?
It’s just so damned forgettable. I’ve seen Scream 3 at least twice, and I’d be hard-pressed to tell you a damned thing that happens in it. I know the finale takes place in a mansion with hidden rooms and some such? And that’s about it.
I guess I could say it’s better to be forgettable than bad, but even then… what I do remember is pretty much trash. The voice modulator the killers have all used suddenly can identically recreate the voices of others. The killer is Sidney’s long-lost brother as we continue to slut-shame her mom. Cotton Weary dies! Alas, poor Cotton.
Does the movie get some props from me? Absolutely: it cast both Patrick Warburton and Parker Posey. I am just always overjoyed to see Warburton, even in a minor role, and Posey is just owning the moment every scene she is in. She is undeniably the star of this one. And it needed one.
4. Scream 6
My Letterboxd Rating: 2 / 5
Remember, if you are a fan of 80’s horror, how we spent decades heckling Jason Takes Manhattan for sticking Jason on a boat TO Manhattan for 80% of its runtime? Why bother, right? It’s barely about New York at all!
Well Scream 6 upped the ante by setting the entire film in New York and STILL doing absolutely nothing with the premise. Let’s see… Tara and Sam run into a bodega at one point. And Mindy is on a subway, I guess. But aside from those moments, you might as well have left these characters in Woodsboro. There was nothing here that needed to be NY-bound. It was just a shitty advertising gimmick. “Ooooohhhh, we’re in the big city now!”.
Oh, and Mindy’s monologue about what is going on this time is the most tedious “these are the rules!” segment in any of these flicks yet.
Scream 6 at least gave us our first ever THREE KILLER reveal, two of which were Scream 7 levels of “Wait, what?”, while the third and primary one was actually a decent unmasking of a suspect character.
Possibly the biggest problem with part 6 is that it has an absolute banger of an opening segment that makes it feel like we will be in for something new… just to undo it before the scene is even over. How neat would it be if we knew the killer the whole time and the movie had to rely on new methods with which to lead us around?
3. Scream 2
My Letterboxd Rating: 2.5 / 5
Scream 2 is fine. It’s fine. It doesn’t do anything as egregiously bad as the earlier entries on this list. And it actually does a few good things! It kills the Randy character who survived the first movie (and more in the next entry about how these sequels only win my heart when legacy characters die). And it has the frankly excellent chase scene with Gale, Dewey, and Ghostface in the recording studio.
Aside from that, you have some pretty unspectacular killer reveals, where our villains are two characters who are barely in the film. A decent opening kill sequence, as far as these things go. And some dumb character decisions/actions and unmemorable deaths in-between. This is really kind of an up-and-down Scream, all told. But I grade it out as Average at a 2.5.
2. Scream (2022)
My Letterboxd Rating: 3 / 5
Coming in second on the list, and actually earning a “Good” score at 3 out of 5 (though this is closer to a 2.75 that I was kind to) is the second movie in the series to be called “Scream”, Scream (2022). And look: I won’t hold the naming convention against it because I get it. Calling a movie Scream 5 puts off potential viewers who may feel like if they haven’t seen all four predecessors that they can’t watch this. So you go for a catch-all title that, while more inviting, is also more confusing. Whatever! I at least see why they went with this.
Remember from a minute ago how I liked the death of Randy in Scream 2? So imagine how I felt when Scream (2022) had the audacity to kill off Dewey! It was the first time in three movies that a relevant character was murdered! And I want my cinema to have stakes and feel like anything can happen to anyone at any time. I really liked Dewey! He was my favorite long-term character. Which is why it was even better than Scream (2022) killed him off. Take that, me!
Additionally, this entry has, for my money, the second best opening in the series, as we get one that actually matters to the plot and isn’t just a shock set-up. Tara’s attack is focal to the movie, and her surviving it is, again, this outing’s attempt at doing something different.
Were the killers really predictable in this one? Yes. And that remains a huge problem after part 4 was also so easy to call. But were the new relevant characters (The “Core Four” – Sam, Tara, Chad, and Mindy) engaging and easy to root for? Also yes! All in all, I think this is easily the second best entry in the series, even with its warts.
1. Scream (1996)
My Letterboxd Rating: 4 / 5 (I actually would have sworn I gave this a 4.5, but… nope. Let’s call it a 4.25)
Unless you are being intentionally obnoxious and contrarian, I can’t imagine anyone saying the original Scream isn’t the best. You’ve got 6 middling-to-poor sequels that all follow up a bona fide horror classic that changed the genre for years in its wake. Wes Craven and Kevin Williamson really caught a bottle full of lightning with this effort.
That opening with Drew Barrymore getting surprisingly offed! The great killer reveal at the end! And all the memorable chases and characters in between. And Tatum may have essentially been a one-off, but she WAS a big core character death. Everything here is well done.
Nothing more so than the third act, which sees Sid playing cat-and-mouse with Billy and Stu, with all three young thespians overacting their little hearts out like what they are doing is the most important acting ever committed to celluloid.
The characters all feel fresh, and the movie is highly memorable and iconic. It might be a bad franchise, but there is definitely one great movie.
And that’s it! It’s strange to me that this series couldn’t keep up the momentum of its first movie, but hey… that happens sometimes.
But let me know YOUR Scream rankings in the comments! And what are your thoughts on the meta film juggernaut?
Until next time… take care!
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