Scream VI Brings Core Four Back for Franchise Foolery

After watching this latest installment, I found myself looking over my shoulder with belabored breath while making my way to a secluded parking garage elevator.   As my heart thumped a million beats a minute, I was spooked enough to believe  Ghostface would hinder my ride to a safe space making Scream VI a massive delivery on every level.  Each thrill, chills and witty character quip bring s fans right back to the franchise they have come to know, love and support.

Based on Wes Craven’s original 1996 film, embracing the premise and tropes that go along with this genre, assist in making this a terrifying trip into the franchise.  Of course, this is coming from someone, who is not a horror fan.  Having said that, I can tell you and those like me that it won’t make a difference.  James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick  do an exemplary  job keeping the energetic, Nancy Drew vibe by taking the “core four” from  “Scream V” (2022), Tara Carpenter (Jenna Ortega), Sam Carpenter (Melissa Barrera), as well as,  twins Mindy (Jasmine Savoy Brown) and Chad Meeks-Martin (Mason Gooding), who have left  Woosboro for New York in hopes of starting anew.

Directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett pick up on the Carpenter sisters on Halloween night, where a film professor is murdered leaving the iconic Ghostface mask on the scene.  Terrified that history may repeat itself, Mindy Meeks-Martin (Jasmin Savoy Brown), the official horror cinephile, taps into her acute understanding of horror tropes to figure out who the killer might be amongst their crew.

Women in this franchise are not wilting flowers waiting for someone to rescue them, especially Courtney Cox, who returns as the meddling media reporter Gail Weathers, holds her own when she and the killer have a good old-fashioned showdown.  Hayden Pantierre, Jenny Ortega and Melissa Barrera are giving Ghostface a run for his money and then some.

I was there for the whole Vincent Price macabre serial killer energy and was pleasantly surprised.  No, I have to go back and have a ‘screamfest’ of my own. Produced by Paramount Pictures, ‘Scream VI” will have you jumping and talking to the screen like you have lost your mind while encouraging a perpetual pit in your stomach the whole time.