Ghostface comes to small-town Indiana! But this was filmed in Atlanta, once again pretending to be Indiana, just like it did in Stranger Things. HMPH.
Previously on Midlife Crisis Crossover: The Scream movies stopped sucking for a while! After Scream 3‘s major letdown I avoided the series for years until critics’ morale improved. Once I caught up, I loved the fourth one’s All About Eve ending (costarring future Best Actress Mikey Madison!) and thought the fifth one was the best one since the original. The last one made a few mistakes but ranks fairly near the not-bad second one on my list.
The creative slump returns with a vengeance in the inevitable product that is Scream 7. Studio execs love durable IPs and most studios seem to be making nothing but horror flicks nowadays. After the original plans for this one collapsed and most participants ran away or were fired, the “Billy Loomis’ Haunted Daughter” trilogy was ditched unfinished and the buck was passed back to series creator Kevin Williamson to save the day and the profits. In conjunction with the writers of the last two, Guy Busick and James Vanderbilt (or maybe just cannibalizing whatever scrap papers they left behind), Williamson ran it to the finish line and decided it was time to direct a feature film for his second time ever. His first try 26 years ago, Teaching Mrs. Tingle, is faintly remembered as the answer to the trivia question “What horror film had to change its name because of Columbine?” and not for much else.
(Before we dive in: mild spoilers ahead. I’m pretty sure anyone worried about spoilers already saw it opening weekend and the second weekend’s box office receipts will plummet a good 80% or so. But here’s a courtesy pause anyway, just in case.)
Midlife Crisis Crossover! 