- Date of Release: 27 February 2026
- Genre: Horror, Mystery
- Language: English
- Watch On: Theatres Only
Scream 7
Introduction
At this point, Ghostface from Scream 7 (yep, the 7th edition of the Scream franchise) is similar to your ex-partner who always threatens to come back to your life. This, even as the eventual meetup is after multiple body counts (pun intended) – just that the body counts here are with respect to murders galore! In many ways, the Scream franchise has stood out for its meta-ness that had flipped the horror genre in 1996 during its first outing. I can’t deny that I have been a fan of this franchise ever since I was first acquainted with the film(s) on Star Movies.
Unlike the other popular slasher film ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’, the campiness is what stood out for me (I didn’t know the meaning of this word back in the day), even as the kills remained entertaining to the core. In many ways, the franchise since then had struck a right balance – of being a fun watch mixed with deliberate sprinkles of playfulness, so much so that some of the weaker elements in the screenplay were less pondered on by me, even as the entertainment quotient preceded over the logic. And in that regard, Scream 7 isn’t any different – I could see some glaring loopholes from a logical standpoint, but the entertainment quotient was directly proportional to the unfiltered reactions (read: Screams) around me. That is a win in every sense of the word!
Story & Screenplay
Written by Guy Busick and Kevin Williamson, the ball is set rolling early on in Scream 7, much like most cold opens of the franchise that feature a bunch of people venturing into the jaws of death oblivious of the fact that they are about to be stabbed/butchered to death. Here when you witness a young couple – a horror buff and his pretty girlfriend, you know exactly what they are stepping into. But the idea lies in slowing the proceedings, playing with the anticipation of the viewers, and eventually delivering a killer blow. If one thing that is a touch underwhelming in this sequence, it is the meta-ness in play with only a sliver of nostalgia being served with a famous line – ‘What is your favourite scary movie?’.
The core dynamic of the drama here remains the rocky bond between Sidney Evans (Neve Campbell) and her daughter Tatum (Isabel May). In many ways, Tatum can be termed as Sidney 2.0 particularly given the setting here that is eerily similar to the events of the first Scream (1996). While Tatum wishes to know about the bloodied past of her mother, the stakes of Sidney wanting to protect her daughter is tragically similar to her inability to protect her bestie Tatum from the first Scream. In that sense, the arcs of both Tatum and Sidney form a parabola – each starting from a different end, only to join at a high-point. So at the start, you see them as polar opposites, only to warm up to each other in the midst of the killings in play.
The template of the first Scream doubles up as a check-list here – there is a slight reference to a play that Tatum is a part of (ironically, she isn’t the scream-queen in it), the range of suspects include a boyfriend, an unassuming friend, a friend’s friend, and the recalling of yesteryear’s killer Stu (Matthew Lillard) – a character that forms the ‘evil’ connective tissue of the film. The idea being floated of that being an AI-generated video of Stu (who is presumed to be the killer) was a sub-plot half-baked, and never realised its full potential. And in the same breath, the one issue that I had here instantly was with respect to how the characters were written – most of them felt sketchy and one-dimensional with hard much to do apart from queuing up the suspects list, and dying.
But where the drama scores is ironically in the kills – be it a masked killer slashing the stomach of a girl suspended from the roof, or the sequence wherein the hunter becomes the hunted, or even the campy but fun sequence at the bar wherein most kills take place. There is an instant anticipation of fearing the worst for the characters, and given the ambience around me – I found myself participating in the screams, a clear indication on me being invested in the proceedings and absorbing the atmosphere around me.
What also scores here is the investigation bit – a space that not only allows you space to piece the puzzle together, but also allows you to play the guessing game. There is a lot of finger-pointing here – and everytime you think you have zeroed in on the suspect, the tables flip and that character is stabbed for good. It almost felt like a slasher version of Game Of Thrones at one point, something that further immersed me in the narrative. But….and there is a huge BUT here – the final reveal will go down as one of the worst ever, simply because of how simplistic it felt and how the stakes with the reasoning never felt as high.
The criticism with respect to the meta-ness in the drama, or the lack of it – comes back to haunt the narrative at the end. And that unfortunately, lowered the overall impact of the drama. But at the same time, I couldn’t discount the journey here which was campy but entertaining – even as I found myself covering my face in awe during the sequences involving the kills. So that was a big plus, here.
Dialogues, Music & Direction
The dialogues are campy and absorbing while perfectly complimenting the mood of the drama. But, a little more meta-ness was the need of the hour here to further elevate the proceedings. The BGM is reminiscent of the first film, and it perfectly accounts for the moments of excitement sprinkled throughout the narrative. The cinematography is stellar with frames that are designed to give you cheap thrills. Be it the camera marginally incorporating a shadowy figure in the background, or a specific camera-angle featuring a character hiding behind a vault designed to make you jump with anticipation, or even the use of lighting to compliment the mood of the drama – the cinematography is terrific.
The editing pattern is adequate here – scoring well in scenes involving kills, but also not always accounting for the lags in the narrative. The lags are evident at the start, mostly during the world building phase that neither quite created an emotional core nor fully allowed the viewers to be invested in the characters. Director Kevin Williamson does a fair job here – mostly scoring brownie points during the investigation phase and the kills that ensue. His world building is wobbly, and the final reveal is poorly handled (you needed to play around with the angles while also catching a glimpse of the reactions of characters around the killer). But the killings remain entertaining and campy – two important cogs in the narrative that keeps the drama afloat. In that sense, the direction is pretty decent here.
Performances
The performances are decent by the members of the cast, even though most characters feel sketchy in the narrative. The likes of Sam Rechner as Ben, Celeste O’Connor as Chloe, Asa Germann as Lucas, Anna Camp as Jessica, Michelle Randolph as Madison, Joel McHale as Mark, and Jimmy Tatro as Scott are decent at best, given how the writing doesn’t offer much scope for the actors to fully bloom. Jasmin Savoy Brown as Mindy and Mason Gooding as Chad are marginally better, offering a playful and mildly meta outlook to the investigation. Courteney Cox as Gale (along with a string of other cameos) offers a sense of nostalgia to the proceedings, and she does a pretty solid job here. Isabel May as Tatum is good, accounting for a sense of urgency in the drama despite having a lesser personality than her onscreen mother. Once again, it is Neve Campbell as Sidney who manages to hold her own while shepherding the narrative here with crucial bouts of intensity. She is a treat to witness here in yet another ‘scary movie’ outing of the ‘scream-queen’.
Conclusion
Despite its flaws and a wobbly finale, Scream 7 offers unhinged entertainment. In other words, it is screams galore in this campy and entertaining slasher version of Scooby-Doo that makes for a fun watch. On a side note, if this was a Hindi film, would it be called ‘Saat Khoon Maaf’? Available in a theatre near you.