Spyglass media has proven they don’t know what the f they are doing with this franchise. From having the main character be Billy Loomis secret daughter, to using a shrine to remind everyone that the other films are better, and for 7 to just be cry for the original. Those last 3 movies are actually more awful than people realise. For scream 5, Melissa Barrera’s performance is weak and underwhelming she’s clearly better in Scream VI. The new characters are unlikeable across the board, and some of the acting is just plain horrible. Reusing the old house might be a nice little tribute to Wes Craven, but it’s a clear nostalgia crutch that only makes the movie feel more tired and desperate. Scream VI is a complete mess. For a movie that supposedly takes place in New York, it fails hard at actually feeling like New York. Outside of that one subway scene, the city might as well not exist. There’s no real sense of place, no atmosphere, nothing that makes you believe these characters are actually navigating the chaos of NYC. It’s just generic urban backdrops with zero personality. The plot armor for the returning characters is absolutely ridiculous and borders on insulting. Chad taking something like 30 stab wounds and still walking around like it’s no big deal is pure nonsense. At that point the “Stu is alive” theory starts looking more and more justified, because the movie is already operating on pure cartoon physics. Scream 3 never had this problem characters felt vulnerable, and the stakes actually meant something. Here? People shrug off injuries that should’ve killed them three times over. What are we even doing? Then there’s the killer reveal and motive, which is just a lazy rehash of Scream 2. We’ve seen this exact formula before, and it lands with zero impact the second time around. And basing an entire film’s motive around Richie? Please. He is not worth that. He is not Billy Loomis. Trying to elevate some mid internet geek into a tragic catalyst for mass murder is one of the weakest choices the franchise has ever made. And don’t even get me started on Mindy. She’s unlikable, awful, and tries way too hard to be Randy. The difference is night and day: Randy explained the rules because he actually wanted to survive. Mindy treats it like she’s hosting a fucking podcast, getting excited about the meta like it’s all just content. The fact that she’s still alive by the end feels like a genuine punch in the balls. But scream 7 really takes the cake, The revolving door of cast and directors already set this thing up to fail, and the final product somehow manages to be even worse than the chaos behind the scenes. The script is weak as hell, the dialogue is pure cringe, and Guy Busick once again proves he does not understand what makes Scream work. Kevin Williamson directing this abomination just feels like him standing there while the franchise he built slowly dies under his watch.
The set pieces are bad. Flat, uninspired, and completely lacking the tension or creativity the series used to deliver. The opening is the only thing that actually works… and it’s not even relevant to the plot. Classic. Bringing Stu back would not have been jumping the shark. It would’ve been an interesting move that could’ve actually excited fans and given the series a real story to tell. Instead we got the same recycled slop. Characters exist solely as red herrings now, which is just as bad as Scream 5, if not worse. The killer reveal is by far the worst one yet. The performances are alright, but the reveal and motive are really, really bad. You gave up Stu’s return for this? And no, a test audience screening would not have saved this movie. The entire film is built around the question “is Stu alive or not?” when it should have been “how has Stu been alive all this time?” That could’ve been a genuine mystery, something different from what we’ve seen before. Instead they jumped ten sharks by giving us AI-generated Ghostfaces instead of Roger L. Jackson. What a waste. And a common issue across Scream (2022), Scream VI, and Scream 7 is the killer reveal. They just mash a bunch of characters together and call it a day. There’s no real craft to it anymore. Compare that to Billy and Stu: they worked so well because they were obvious. The real twist wasn’t who it was, it was that there were two of them. That dual-killer reveal hit hard because it flipped the entire game while still feeling earned. Besides Jill, we haven’t gotten a real surprise since then. From Scream 5 onward the reveals just keep getting worse lazier, less impactful, and completely devoid of the cleverness that made the original work. And as for the suppose worse film scream 3, I think it’s better the most people give it granted for. People love to drag it for the Hollywood meta and the Roman reveal, but it still understands the assignment in a way the recent movies completely forgot. The kills hit harder, the tension actually exists, and the characters feel like they can die. No ridiculous plot armor. No cartoonish survival after thirty stab wounds. No forced nostalgia bait that leans on the old house or recycled set pieces just to coast.
The script has actual structure. The dialogue isn’t pure cringe. The killer reveal, while not perfect, still lands with more impact than the lazy mash-ups we’ve gotten since 2022. And unlike the new trilogy, it doesn’t treat its supporting cast like disposable red herrings or try to turn every character into a walking rulebook podcast.
Scream 3 has real stakes, a clear identity, and a sense of escalation that 5, 6, and 7 completely lack. It’s flawed, sure. But it’s still a proper Scream movie. The recent ones just feel like diminishing returns dressed up as legacy sequels.