Scream 7

How fitting that Scream 7’s cold opening ends with Stu Macher’s house—now a tacky museum for the Ghostface killings and the Stab movies based on them—burning to the ground. That’s exactly what the latest installment does with this franchise. Kevin Williamson, writer of the 1996 original and two successors, returns for the most uninspired sequel to date. After a rocky production and some bad press leading up to its release, the lackluster result brings Neve Campbell, the series’ Final Girl, back in a primary role. Campbell’s Sidney Prescott hasn’t led a Scream movie since the fourth installment in 2011, and even then, she seems sidelined next to other characters. Not even her fan-service presence invigorates this tonally flat entry, devoid of the crackling blend of humor and fear that established the Scream phenomenon in the 1990s. But with the latest sequel, it’s apparent that this franchise has stopped its meta commentary on the horror genre and now exists solely to keep the IP alive, forgoing inspired self-awareness for sheer laziness, motivated only by commercial ambitions.

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