HALLOWEEN 2K23 BONUS #3: A Review of "Halloween Ends"

It's humorous to me to think Michael's so old in the universe in this movie, if he wasn't living in a sewer eating rats and
hacking teenagers to pieces, he'd be sitting on his front porch complaining about Democrats.

Yeah, you knew this was coming given the context of the previous "bonus" post. Once again, Happy Halloween 2023 to all of you, and welcome back to Spoiler Alert! I'm here today to catch myself up (at least for the time being, until they make more) on all the existing Halloween movies, since a couple new ones came out while I was on a blogging hiatus in 2021 and 2022.

"Trust me, Mr. DJ. This hurts me a lot more than it
hurts you."

Halloween Kills, as we discussed in our OTHER bonus debuting today here, is a giant, farcical dud of a horror movie. "Evil dies tonight"... "Forty years ago"... "evil dies tonight"... "forty years ago"... "Evil dies"... "Forty years"... blah blah blah. A shamelessly dumb sequel that tried to disguise its inadequate storytelling and Monty Python-level characters with a couple cool kills and some grim savagery. Not enough. The movie still blew chunks. I'll still watch it, but I won't necessarily enjoy it, it's like a requirement since it's the middle chapter and key characters are killed off. So having gotten that... I was dreading the supposed "final chapter" in this reboot trilogy by Blumhouse coming out the very next year. Turns out, I had nothing to worry about because Halloween Ends kicks ass. WHAT? ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!

In a move literally nobody expected, not even me, Halloween Ends rebounded and accomplished what Kills fumbled on. Somehow, in keeping with the "reboot" style of filmmaking where originals are mimicked/copied slightly but other stuff is very discretely but effectively changed... Halloween '18 mimicked the original '78 Halloween, Halloween Kills very poorly but at least tried to do Halloween II from 1981... does that mean Halloween Ends since it has Michael Myers in it will try and do Halloween 4?? Which in and of itself was already a reboot-quel to Halloween '78? NOPE. Halloween Ends got even more brave than Kills, and in my opinion, succeeded much better by reboot-quel'ing Halloween III: Season of the Witch. You know, the one that didn't have anything to do with Michael Myers? The one everybody hates for no reason? How does it do that? How about having the balls to minimalize Laurie's screentime, cut Michael's screentime down to basically here and there and then ten minutes in the third act... and focus the ENTIRE rest of the fucking movie on some fuck named Corey?? What sounds like a fresh load of ass on paper, ended up being a ton of fun in the theater. Let's dig into Halloween Ends.

"Laurie, do you--"
"Want out of this franchise like I'm a trapped dog chewing
on its own leg to get free? Yes."
"--know where they keep the minced garlic?"

On Halloween night in 2019, one year after the events of '18 and Kills, 21-year-old Corey Cunningham (Rohan Campbell) babysits a young boy named Jeremy Allen (Jaxon Goldberg), who pulls a prank on him by locking him inside the attic. Just as Jeremy's parents (Jack William Marshall, Candice Rose) come home, Corey kicks the door open and accidentally knocks Jeremy over a staircase railing to his death. RIGHT there, the movie kicked me right in the balls and roped me in by having the balls to kill a kid brutally in the first five minutes. Corey is then arrested for intentionally killing Jeremy but is cleared of manslaughter, with outcasting results.

Three years later, the town of Haddonfield, Illinois, is still reeling from the aftermath of Michael Myers's latest killing spree in 2018, while Michael (James Jude Courtney, Nick Castle) has vanished. Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis) is writing a memoir and living with her granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak). Meanwhile, Corey is working at his stepfather's salvage yard. On his way home one day, he is accosted by high school bullies and injures himself in the process. An observing Laurie brings him to the doctor's office where Allyson works. Allyson and Corey develop a relationship... I don't know, somehow... and later attend a Halloween party, where Corey is confronted by Mrs. Allen. Corey leaves the party and runs into the bullies who throw him off a bridge. He is dragged into the sewers and choked by Michael, who eventually lets him go. Here we see Michael in a state we've never seen him in before... weak, tired, brittle, destitute, barren and completely unmotivated. As he crawls out, Corey is threatened by a homeless man. In a struggle, Corey stabs the man to death and flees.

"Michael, please, don't kill me! You won't learn how I saved
fifteen percent or more by switching to GEICO!"

At a dinner date, Allyson’s ex-boyfriend harasses her, leading to Corey later luring him into the sewer to be killed by Michael. Allyson is passed over for a promotion at work, in favor of a nurse who is having an affair with the doctor. Later that night, Corey kills the doctor at his home while Michael kills the nurse... a horrifically-inspiring tag-team of terror! An unknowing Allyson plans to leave Haddonfield with an insistent Corey because of the past trauma, while Laurie realizes Corey is infected by Michael's evil. Something I didn't quite understand about the movie is I didn't know if it was truly something Michael "passed on" to him, or if it was just a disease of Corey's mind ending up making him insane. I prefer the latter, the former is a little too supernatural for me, but I mean Michael himself is also supernatural so I guess it's not that big of a deal. Anywho, Laurie finds Corey sleeping in the spot where Jeremy died, and offers to help him on the condition that he distance himself from Allyson. Corey retorts by blaming her for the events that have occurred in Haddonfield and says if he cannot have Allyson, no one will. Isn't that the calming thing you wanted to hear from your granddaughter's would-be boyfriend?

Corey returns to the sewers where he successfully fights Michael for his mask and embarks on a rampage, murdering the bullies after luring them to the salvage yard, one of who accidentally kills Corey's stepfather. He goes on to kill his mother and a DJ at a local radio station, who had taunted him earlier. At the Strode house, Laurie fakes a suicide attempt to lure Corey to her, whom she shoots down the stairs. Corey then stabs himself in the neck to frame Laurie for his death in front of the arriving Allyson, who leaves in distress. Michael suddenly arrives, retrieves his mask... which by now I noticed and remarked has to reek to high hell, and kills Corey. A fight ensues in Laurie's kitchen, and Laurie manages to pin Michael to the kitchen table and slit his throat. After a struggle, Allyson, convinced of the truth behind Corey's death after receiving a call from Deputy Frank Hawkins (Will Patton), returns to help subdue and finally kill Michael by slicing his wrist.

"God, kissing the future Haddonfield serial killer star of
Halloween is so hot!"
"What?"
"What?"

In a truly ballsy ending, Laurie and Allyson take Michael's body to the salvage yard by police escort, attracting the residents of Haddonfield, who follow them in a procession, and dispose of it in an industrial shredder. For the first time ever, as far as I'm aware, this is the first time where we have seen Michael Myers definitively die at the end of a Halloween movie. I mean that guy is D. E. A. D. You see his head burst in the shredder like his body explodes like a balloon full of meat. You are not getting up from a bolt of lightning or satanic ritual from that. In the ensuing days, Allyson and Laurie reconcile, and Allyson leaves Haddonfield while Laurie finishes her memoir and rediscovers her romance with Hawkins...

... and thus brings the curtain down on the Blumhouse/Carpenter/Curtis Halloween reboot trilogy. You are not going to find a more definitive Halloween sequel ending than that... and I'll reiterate my controversial opinion, because I did find myself in the minority with it; the vast minority. I loved this movie. I thought it was a welcome, fresh take on the mythos and a worthy, trilogy-concluding movie. I thought by minimalizing Michael's screentime, cutting down Laurie's role, and maximizing the focus on Allyson and this psycho dude Corey was just the right move this third movie needed in the trilogy needed. I thought it was fresh, and when it's fresh in a horror movie, it's unpredictable... and when it's unpredictable, it's gripping and even scary again. People were lambasting this movie when it first came out and it was pretty much a repeat of when Halloween III: Season of the Witch came out forty years before it. "Michael's not in it enough", "the story's too radically different", "I want to see the same old shit again". This movie did not need to do the same old "Michael comes home" shit over again. This movie delivered terror and brutality fine without Michael Myers. All this movie had to do was give Michael and Laurie their final showdown it advertised in the last act, and it did. That was the only requirement. I did not care how they got there, and because of that, I thoroughly enjoyed the route they took to get there. Thumbs up.

Since Corey takes front and center as a wounded duckling who became a violent psychopath fueled by hate and revenge, Michael goes from being an unstoppable horror villain impervious to conventional weapons to being old, decrepit, and a broken shell of a serial killer who serves as Corey's "sensei of slashing" so to speak... another exciting twist. Which was weird! I mean the movie takes place in 2022; in the in-movie universe, that would put Michael at sixty-five years old. He's literally a senior citizen, I mean he qualifies for a discount breakfast at Denny's, and he hasn't killed since 2018. It tries to tell us, or at least imply, that Michael's power derives from his murdering. The supernatural force that John Carpenter always touted about? The one that drives him. Supposedly it is controlled and fueled by his killings. That's retroactively adds depth to the mob scene from Kills, where Michael appears to be getting overpowered, but then all of a sudden he comes alive, becomes super strong, and just knifes and stabs and mercs everyone around him. I thought his partnership and eventual betrayal with Corey was just what the doctor ordered. It fools you into thinking Michael's just going to take a backseat the whole movie and in the final fifteen minutes he just pops back up and goes "Nuh uh, boy. This is still my show" and just kills Corey in cold blood.

This is how white people look in sports stadiums when the
PA system goes ♫Sweeeet Caaaaroooline♫

The final fight with Laurie and Michael, the icing on the sundae, the whole reason this trilogy got sold to get made in the first place, fits the mold of the movie and satisfied me. It was brutal, violent, bloody, intense, and we got the ending that Laurie, after forty-four years, deserved. To see Michael Myers die, even if the previous shitty sequels jerked us off with false deaths, diversion tactics, and misleading Michael kills, still was surreal. We've seen Michael "die" numerous times, but like I said earlier... this time he's deader than disco. I mean he's up shit creek without a paddle. If they renew the contract and do a fourth one, the way they try to explain him coming back from that will be so monumentally stupid it'll suck me out of the rest of the movie. Thankfully, with this being Jamie Lee's final outing as Laurie, John Carpenter's final involvement in the franchise, and Blumhouse's final Halloween release under their current contract, this movie brought the curtain down in a number of ways and it was a satisfying conclusion and I don't see them doing the stupid 80's slasher sequel re-hash tactic shamelessly in any way shape or form.

Halloween Ends ends the trilogy in a satisfying way. It's a fun new take on the Halloween and Michael Myers/Laurie Strode mythos, the character of Corey Cunningham takes a front-and-center role in this story and somehow knocks it out of the park in terms of being scary and feeble at the same time... and the kills in this movie are top-of-the-line brutal and violent. It is quite the Halloween movie, and I put it higher on my list than some of the others. I loved it in the theater, and I loved the rewatch I did when it came out on digital/video. It holds up, it's solid, it's a fun time, and thank GOD it's fresh. I fully recommend Halloween Ends. To me, the Blumhouse reboot trilogy stands as a great first entry/reintroduction to the story, and has a satisfying, wildly unpredictable conclusion at the end. I just look at Halloween Kills as that weird, cartoony middle chapter.

That's it for Halloween 2K23! Thanks for reading, stay safe out there, and HAPPY FRIGGIN' HALLOWEEN!

HALLOWEEN 2K23 BONUS #2: A Review of "Halloween Kills"

"Alright, which one of you firefightin' assholes want to tangle? You set my house on fire RIGHT AS the Bears were in
the Red Zone, and I missed their game-winning touchdown!"

Happy Halloween my dedicated, loyal social media scrollers. Be sure to leave your candy out tonight, dress up the wee ones in their favorite scary-or-cringy-or-lets-face-it-Bluey outfits and prepare for a trick-or-treating extravaganza. Or hey, if you don't have kids, order a couple of pizzas, kick back in your recliner, and put on some horror movies. You've earned the night off.

"Me and my wig are going to kill Michael Myers, once and
for all."
"No Jamie, this is the middle chapter, there's still one left."
"Oh son of a bit--"

I hope you guys didn't think the literal day of Halloween was going to go without a blog post from me, did you? Well, surprise surprise. Just like your ex, I pop up when you least suspect it to RUIN YOUR DAY with my shit, and I'm not just doing it once this year oh no no no. I'm here for a Halloween 2K23 BONUS double feature! That's right, TWO blog posts today for the price of one. Nothing either way! Hey zero-times-two is still zero, can't say I'm not at least somewhat competent at math.

I stopped blogging citing burnout end of '20 and focus on a personal podcast, but now that the podcast is done, I've picked up blogging again obviously. Probably didn't need told that, I've been at it this whole year! My point is; from end of '20 to now, in that time, TWO new Halloween movies were released. Remember when I first started this blog and wouldn't shut up about Halloween? If it wasn't Star Wars, it was Halloween. Part of Halloween 2K18, I reviewed the first of the Halloween reboot trilogy here, and re-reading it, I think my thoughts on it stand pretty similarly. UNFORTUNATELY, that can't be said for today's FIRST blog post. The 2021 sequel to the '18 reboot, Halloween Kills is a magnificently crafted load of shit. Lol, no really, it is. I had new-movie-goggles on when I first watched it and initially gave it a 'B' level verbal review... but upon rewatching it after a couple of years, good Lord it sucks something awful. It's just so cheesily written, the characters are absolute cartoon characters, the plot is INCREDIBLY outlandish, and it just suffers so badly from middle-chapter syndrome. It is absolutely on par with ass-ness of Rob Zombie's Halloween II, but in a completely different way. Let's take a look. Be sure to read the first movie's post before this to catch yourself up.

...

All good? Let's roll.

"Hands up, Michael. I've got a gun!"
"A gun? Oh no, whatever will I do? Lol jk gtfo here, nerd."

On October 31, 1978, Deputy Frank Hawkins (Thomas Mann) accidentally shoots his partner Tobias (Jacob Keohane) dead while trying to save him from Michael Myers (James Jude Courtney). He also prevents Dr. Samuel Loomis (Tom Jones, Jr... not the singer's son) from executing Michael. Forty years later, on October 31, 2018, after being stabbed and left to die by Dr. Ranbir Sartain (Haluk Bilginer), Hawkins (Will Patton) is found by Cameron Elam (Dylan Arnold), who calls an ambulance. Hawkins regrets allowing Michael to live and vows to kill him.

Meanwhile, Tommy Doyle (Anthony Michael Hall) celebrates the 40th anniversary of Michael's imprisonment along with fellow survivors Marion Chambers (Nancy Stephens), Lindsey Wallace (Kyle Richards), and Cameron's father, Lonnie Elam (Lonnie Elam), having each survived an encounter with Michael in 1978. How does he do that? By taking a fun open mic night and then mentally tormenting everyone there by embellishing a story of three teenager murders from forty years prior. Good Lord. Anywho, firefighters responding to Laurie Strode's (Jamie Lee Curtis) burning house encounter Michael, who slaughters them with their own equipment. Laurie, her daughter Karen (Judy Greer), and her granddaughter Allyson (Andi Matichak) are taken to Haddonfield Memorial Hospital, where Laurie undergoes emergency surgery, while Michael attacks Laurie's neighbors (Lenny Clarke, Diva Tyler) before walking back to Haddonfield.

Tommy, Marion, Lindsey, and Lonnie learn of Michael's killing spree through an emergency alert. Tommy forms a mob of vengeful Haddonfield residents to hunt down and kill Michael once and for all. Karen is informed that Michael is still alive and withholds that information from Laurie to allow her to recover, while Allyson reconciles with Cameron, her ex-boyfriend, and joins Tommy's mob to avenge her own father's death. While warning the Haddonfield community to stay inside their houses, Marion and bar patrons Vanessa (Carmela McNeal) and Marcus (Michael Smallwood) are killed by Michael. Lindsey escapes and is found alive by Tommy, Lonnie, Allyson, and Cameron. The group map out Michael's path and his victims' location and deduce that he is heading towards his childhood home. Surprise, surprise there. Tommy takes Lindsey to the hospital and reunites with former Haddonfield sheriff Leigh Brackett (Charles Cyphers...dude should've stayed home), whose daughter Annie (Nancy Loomis in Halloween '78) was killed in 1978, and informs Laurie about Michael's survival. Across town, Michael murders the current owners (Scott MacArthur, Michael McDonald) of his home as Laurie prepares to leave the hospital. I'm not sure why, they fixed it up quite nice.

"Michael? It's a Halloween sequel... everyone's entitled to
one good load of ridiculous bullshit."

Lance Tivoli (Ross Bacon), a fugitive convict from Smith's Grove Psychiatric Hospital, who escaped alongside Michael when their bus crashed, arrives and is mistaken for Michael. How? I'm not sure. Michael's over six feet and slender, while this guy looks like Danny DeVito's Penguin from Batman Returns. Tommy's mob pursue him through the hospital like a bunch of idiots before Karen, the only one I guess with a brain cell, realizes that he is not Michael. Despite her attempts to calm the mob and help Lance, he jumps out of a window to his death... way to go, Tommy, you ASSHOLE. Laurie urges Karen to work with Tommy and Brackett to hunt Michael down. Elsewhere, Lonnie enters Michael's home alone, like a complete idiot (noticing a pattern here?) and is killed. Allyson and Cameron rush inside and find his corpse before being attacked by Michael, who murders Cameron. Well... at least you won't have to miss your dad, so much.

As Michael prepares to kill Allyson, Karen appears and stabs him in the back with a pitchfork, steals his mask, and taunts him to follow her. She leads Michael into Tommy's mob... re-doing the "gotcha" bit from the last movie because... I don't know I guess they decided to double-down? Anywho, even that seems recycled. The mob of pajama and costume wearers with blunt objects and a gun seemingly kill Michael. When the mob disperses, Michael awakens and massacres the entire mob, including Tommy and Brackett. Back at the Myers house, Karen sees a vision of a young Michael in Judith Myers's old bedroom and goes upstairs to investigate. Michael appears and stabs Karen to death as Laurie stares out of her hospital room...

Seriously... look at how hard he's trying. He's so ridiculous
that you just can't help but laugh, lol

... and that's how Halloween Kills ends. No, that's not how Halloween Ends, though more on that in today's other surprise. Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge. Good God, Halloween Kills. Let's discuss.

First off, the characters in this movie as I stated are bleedin' freakin' cartoon characters played by way way way too over the top actors. I mean this movie would have the same presentation if everyone was a Looney Tune. Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Yosemite Sam; I feel these characters would make this a very similar experience. My main gripes fall into one of two categories with Kills: 1) The needless digging up of characters that don't matter anymore, and 2) Characters who over-sell the situation and story, or are under-utilized in the film's crucial points. For 1, Marion the geriatric nurse who drove Loomis to go pick up Michael in Halloween and showed up for a cup of coffee in Halloween II? WELL NO WAIT You can't even count Halloween II so yeah, just the nurse that was Loomis's liaison in Halloween... WHY IS SHE HERE?! What is her importance BEYOND being Loomis's chauffeur? What's that bag-of-bones got for Michael forty years on? What did he do to her? Terrorized her and dragged her out of her car, sure, but spared her and drove off?! Then there's LONNIE ELAM. The kid who bullied Tommy Doyle in Halloween '78 is now his buddy and the father of Allyson's douchebag boyfriend Cameron. What did Michael do to that guy? Grabbed his shoulders and gazed at him before letting him run off and stalking Tommy? What's Lonnie's big vendetta against Michael Myers? WHY IS HE HERE?!

... and then there's Tommy Doyle. Good. God. Tommy Doyle. Anthony Michael Hall must've had his family held hostage, choosing to play this guy the way he did. Tommy Doyle acts like a guy who's back from Vietnam living in Chinatown, New York. He is clearly suffering PTSD after watching a serial-killer in a mask stalk somebody who wasn't even him forty years ago. Now, I get that could be pretty traumatizing for somebody Tommy's age in 1978. I get that. I get why Tommy has some kind of vendetta against Michael. It isn't a HARD vendetta, but it's all he's got. But apparently he must've held on to a lot of the hate and anger from Michael chasing him through his house and again, not targeting him, because he then takes it upon himself to hop on at an open-mic night and ruin the mood and everybody's fun by once again reminding the bar-goers of one time forty years ago where a guy in a mask killed three people... good God almighty. What's worse is once Michael's "forty years later" killing spree (trust me the movie repeats the "forty years" note pretty frequently, it isn't just me) goes public... Tommy takes it upon himself to turn Haddonfield's scared and traumatized citizens into an ANGRY, VIOLENT MOB. The same thing they did in Halloween 4, a superior movie, and that also had a mob that was five-times more threatening/entertaining. Tommy manages to lead his mob into killing the wrong guy in the hospital, and then leads a group of people carrying hardware from their garage as weapons in a mob confrontation with Michael that gets everyone including himself killed. Bravo, sir.

"Dear God, is this idiot ruining everyone's fun night again?"
"He does this every Happy Hour."
"Somebody just got this guy some therapy for God's sake."

On top of that, Jamie Lee Curtis, the literal star of the movie and one-half of the reason these Blumhouse sequels/reboots got made, spends ninety percent of the fucking runtime lying in a hospital bed while all these C-list characters get chased around and of course slaughtered. The movie's kills aren't even that gut-wrenching or brutal, they're pretty run of the mill. Something Halloween Ends did ten-times better were the kills, which considering this movie is literally called Halloween Kills... is pretty hysterical in retrospect.

Now, takeaway the senseless shoe-horning of old-fart characters in for marquee value just to end up slaughtering them again... in some cases for the second time in their careers... and take away the cliff-hanger ending which I thought was cheap. The movie didn't end, it just stopped. The other thing that really grinded my gears was this movie's infatuation with selling you on the horror of the night of 1978. Look, Halloween '78 still is my favorite horror movie. I watch it every year on Halloween, and have since the 8th grade. So if there's anyone out there that will defend that movie's honor, it's me. That being said, the 2018 rebootquel Halloween did a fine job of, well, sort-of minimalizing Michael Myers' impact on that town. Cameron in the previous film (At least I think it was Cameron) had a line that was like "What, three people stabbed forty years ago? So what?"... you know basically saying "three people dying by knife isn't that big of a deal" thanks to the modern day "mass shooter" world we live in today. Halloween Kills on the other hand decides to play it way the fuck back up by pretending that Halloween '78's murders were so tragic... but also acting like every other Halloween sequel/reboot/remake happened in its timeline by having dialogue that makes you think Michael Myers may have killed hundreds of people. Once again, I look to Tommy Doyle deciding to ruin open mic night for everyone as the prime example of this.

I could go on, but I want to also wrap this up. This is getting long-winded enough. Look, Halloween 2018 played it safe, for sure, so they definitely had to gamble on storytelling and scriptwriting with Halloween Kills. I'm sorry to say, to me, they lost. Halloween Kills is one big dud, but it's at least entertaining. It's the horror movie that makes you laugh at times, and that's not really what you should do with your horror movies. No, it's not Resurrection levels of laugh-out-loud mockery, but you will probably find yourself shaking your head here and there going "What in the absolute fuck". I'd say skip it, but you kind of need it to view today's other bonus post movie... check it out!

Nuts to Halloween Kills. Check out my review of the sequel and trilogy conclusion, Halloween Ends, here! Happy Halloween, everyone!

HALLOWEEN 2K23: A Review of "Scream VI"

"A stab, a slice, and a do-si-do... where I'll stop, nobody knows! A twirly-dee here, and a twirly-dee there... stick around,
Woodsboro; you'll be in for a scare!"

Happy Halloween! I hope you all enjoyed this rapid fire, vomiting of posts I did because I'm such a shit scheduler and have no control over my life, it would seem. Thanks for tuning in this year to Spoiler Alert's Halloween 2K23 extravaganza. Oh, and be on the lookout later on today for some surprise posts from me too. Hinted at a couple of times, but they're sure as heck coming down the pike.

"Jeez, a den of Ghostface props and costumes from previous
murders. This is either an evidence locker... or the basement
of Wes Craven's house."

We arrive at our final (so far anyway) produced Scream film. The 2022 reboot-quel, upon doing some light research, was very well received and stands as a cornerstone of how to do a quality reboot-quel. Nothing too over the top, nothing in your face, nothing annoying; tickles all the necessary bones in just the right spots. No more, no less. Well, it was such a hit, that we now have a sequel released less than a year afterwards. Welcome to the latest (so far) Scream film, and the last one on our list this Halloween season, Scream VI. It too was stylized in the posters, this time as something funky I'll try to do in text... ScreaIVI or something. Nah that looks like ass, but oh well. Since the last one killed off Dewey, and it's also the first one to not feature Neve Campbell in any capacity... how does it fair? Let's dig into it and find out!

One year after the Woodsboro killings orchestrated by Richie Kirsch (Jack Quaid in Scream '22) and Amber Freeman (Mikey Madison in Scream '22), Blackmore University professor Laura Crane (Samara Weaving) is catfished and murdered by her student Jason Carvey (Tony Revolori) wearing a Ghostface costume. Jason plots with his roommate Greg to kill sisters Sam (Melissa Barrera) and Tara Carpenter (Jenna Ortega) to finish the "movie" that Richie and Amber wanted to make. However, Jason receives a call from a different Ghostface (voiced by Roger L. Jackson), who has killed Greg and subsequently stabs Jason to death. Sam and Tara now live in New York City, with Tara attending Blackmore University alongside fellow survivors Chad and Mindy Meeks-Martin (Chad Gooding, Jasmin Savoy Brown), their roommate Quinn Bailey (Liana Liberato), Mindy's girlfriend Anika Kayoko (Devyn Nekoda), and Chad's roommate Ethan Landry (Jack Champion). Sam attends therapy with Dr. Christopher Stone (Henry Czerny) and is ostracized in public because of an online conspiracy theory that she was the true mastermind of the latest killings. Quinn's father, Detective Wayne Bailey (Dermot Mulroney), calls Sam in for questioning as her ID was found at the scene of Jason's murder, along with a Ghostface mask worn by Richie and Amber. On the way to the station, Ghostface calls Sam from Richie's phone, who then attacks Tara and kills multiple bystanders in a bodega, and leaves behind another Ghostface mask worn in the 2011 Woodsboro killings... as depicted in Scream 4 of course.

"Why yes, I would like to change my long distance plan...
what does the 'knife in my back' add to my cell plan?"

At the NYPD police station, the sisters meet with FBI special agent Kirby Reed (Hayden Panettiere), a survivor of the 2011 killings, and reporter Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox), who has since written a book on the previous Woodsboro killings, much to Sam and Tara's anger. Remember when the previous film had a happy ending that said she wasn't going to do that? Well NUTS TO THAT I guess. Gale tells them she spoke to Sidney Prescott (not played by anyone here) and that she has gone into hiding to protect her family. A.K.A... Neve Campbell told the producers to leave her the f*ck alone. Dr. Stone is murdered by Ghostface, who steals Sam's file and leaves behind a mask worn in the Hollywood killings, Scream 3. Mindy theorizes that the killer is following the rules of film franchises, specifically the rule that anyone can die while the franchise will still continue. From his window, Sam's boyfriend Danny (Josh Segarra) witnesses Ghostface stabbing Quinn in Sam and Tara's apartment before attacking the group and killing Anika, leaving behind a mask worn in the Windsor College killings... Scream 2. Gale takes the group to an abandoned theater she found while investigating, which has been set up as a shrine to the Ghostface killers, featuring many items of evidence related to previous massacres now displayed like film props.

Ghostface calls Gale at her apartment and torments her about the death of Dewey Riley (played in Screams 1-5 by David Arquette) before killing her boyfriend and attacking her. Sam and Tara arrive just in time to stop Ghostface from killing Gale, who is taken to the hospital... so somehow with SIX movies under her belt, Courteney Cox misses the knife yet again. The group agrees to meet Kirby at the theater to trap Ghostface. Mindy is stabbed by Ghostface on the train. At the theater, Sam sees a hallucination of her father, original Ghostface killer Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich). Taking his knife from the original murders... in Scream... she realizes they have been locked inside. Two Ghostfaces appear and attack Chad. Wayne and Kirby both arrive with guns drawn. Wayne attempts to lend credence toward Kirby being the killer, only to shoot her, revealing himself as a third Ghostface and the mastermind; his accomplices are his children, revealed to be Ethan and a still-alive Quinn, who faked her death to ease suspicion.

"Oh Lord, I just got the script for Scream VI... well, hang on,
I do need a new screen-end porch on my house..."

The trio reveal that they are Richie's family who want to avenge his death. They were responsible for defaming Sam online and plan to frame her for their killing spree. Sam denounces the Bailey family's motives before she and Tara gain the upper hand and fight them off, with Tara stabbing Ethan and Sam killing Quinn, while briefly knocking Wayne unconscious. Sam then dons her father's Ghostface costume, taunts Wayne with a phone call using the voice changer, and viciously stabs him to death. Ethan resurfaces, but Kirby smashes the television set that killed Stu Macher (played in Scream by Matthew Lillard) over his head, killing him. Sam agrees to let Tara live her life more independently and Tara agrees to go to therapy. As Mindy, Chad, and Kirby are taken to the hospital, Sam stares at her father's Ghostface mask before discarding it and following Tara and Danny into the city...

... and so ends ScreaIVI, and to date, the Scream franchise. All wrapped up in a neat little bow. A scary bow, a bow that calls you on your cellphone and heckles the shit out of you before chasing you, stumbling down the stairs, and letting you get away, kind of scary. What do I think of Scream VI?

I thought it was okay. It was just the right amount of Scream-iness sprinkled in to the right amount of whodunit to the right amount of chilling moments, with just the right amount of throwback/previous sequel references. They didn't even shoehorn in a lot of legacy characters to steal the thunder from the new characters this time. Just Courteney Cox got the callback to show up again. That, or Neve Campbell just refused to show up again. I don't know, I didn't really get a definitive answer on that one in my brief rounds of research. Still, I liked Scream VI. I very much enjoyed the callbacks to the previous movies, seeing all the previous Ghostface costumes and tools used for murder. It was like a Scream fan's biggest wet dream, this movie... and naturally, Roger L. Jackson brings his usual A game when voicing Ghostface. I hope that guy comes back for all the Scream sequels. Won't be Scream without him. Be sure to check out Scream VI, while it's expedient release to theaters seemed like Halloween 5 levels of suspicious since it was so fast, but it was actually the same level of fun. Really enjoyed it.

With talks of Scream 7 finding its director recently, this franchise shows no sign of slowing down. Will Scream 7 be another great entry into the franchise? What new rules are we going to hear there? I can promise you I'll have it ready and reviewed by the time of its release, no doubt. Until then. Thanks for joining me in Halloween 2K23, we'll see you in November!

HALLOWEEN 2K23: A Review of "Scream" (2022)

In the 2022 reboot of Scream, Ghostface takes on his most difficult challenge yet... not letting TikTokers record his
ass getting tossed around like a ragdoll!

Hello, hello. Well I hope you enjoyed our review of Scream 4, even if you didn't agree, because I'm already back with another Scream review. Not much time left in the month now, so we're running low on days versus the number of reviews I want to do for Halloween 2K23. ENOUGH CHIT CHAT! *Slams Red Bull*, let's dive into our next entry.

"Hello, Domino's? You don't have to worry about Neve
Campbell calling you, anymore. I'm the new girl on the block,
and I love Pepperoni pizza!"

Scream 4 may have closed the book on the franchise in a few ways. It was the last one with any sort of involvement by Wes Craven, as mentioned in the previous post, Craven died unfortunately in 2015. The Scream franchise's future was thrown up in the air with his passing. However, during 2015, the Scream TV series debuted. I'm not sure I can review the show accurately, as I've only seen the first season and half of season two, but let's just say shortly before his death, Craven declared "MTV should've left the mask alone and let Ghostface be Ghostface". Let that short, one-line review stand on its own, I suppose.

But we're not here to talk about the Scream TV series, we're here to talk about its inevitable reboot! In the wake of Hollywood's overly-safe, nostalgic reboot phase of movie-making, Scream seamed like it was a ripe option for one of its own. Let's face it, movies like Jurassic World, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, and Halloween (2018) were all, in and of themselves, soft-remakes sold as half reboots, half sequels. 2022's return to Woodsboro was no exception. Welcome to Scream 5... or, wait, I'm sorry, in keeping with the trend of marketing-safe reboots, 2022's Scream. Not to be confused with 1996's Scream. See what they did there? If you ask me, like Scream 4 was clever for naming itself Scre4m on the movie posters... this one could've been clever by naming itself 5cream or something equally cheesy. Let's dig into this all-new, kind-of-rehash, totally-fresh-sort-of-not reboot-quel to the Scream franchise!

Twenty-five years after Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich in Scream) and Stu Macher's (Matthew Lillard in Scream) killing spree in Woodsboro, high school student Tara Carpenter (Jenna Ortega) is home alone when she is attacked by Ghostface (voiced by Roger L. Jackson) and left hospitalized. In Modesto, Tara's estranged older sister Sam Carpenter (Melissa Barrera) is informed by Wes Hicks (Dylan Minnette), one of Tara's friends, about the attack. Sam returns to Woodsboro with her boyfriend Richie Kirsch (Jack Quaid) to visit Tara at the hospital, where Sam is reunited with Tara's friend group: Wes, Amber Freeman (Mikey Madison), twins Chad and Mindy Meeks-Martin (Mason Gooding, Jasmin Savoy Brown), and Liv McKenzie (Sonia Ammar). That night, Liv's ex-boyfriend Vince Schneider (Kyle Gallner), who is Stu's nephew, is killed by Ghostface. After an encounter with Ghostface at the hospital, Sam tells Tara that she has been dealing with hallucinations of Billy, who Sam learned as a teenager was her biological father. Sam's true parentage resulted in their parents' separation and this is why Sam became estranged from Tara.

Ah, I must've missed the release of this cereal: Kellogg's
Frosted Tips. Now part of a complete circa-2000 breakfast.

Sam and Richie visit Dewey Riley (David Arquette), who is divorced from Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox). They ask for his help in stopping the killer, and he contacts Gale and Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell), warning them about the return of Ghostface. Dewey joins them at Mindy and Chad's home and is reunited with the twins' mother Martha (Heather Matarazzo), Randy Meeks' sister. Mindy deduces that the killer is making a "requel"... or as I've said before, "rebootquel", using Tara and her friends as the new generation and using Sam's connection to Billy as a way to weave the legacy characters, revealing to us yet another list of Scream rules:

1. Never trust your love interest.
2. The killer always has something to do with the past.
3. The first victim always has a circle of friends that the killer is a part of.
4. Don't fuck with the daughter of a serial killer.

Ghostface then murders Wes and his mother, Sheriff Judy Hicks (Marley Shelton), at their home. Dewey reunites with Gale, who has arrived in town to cover the story. At the hospital, Tara and Richie are attacked by Ghostface, but are saved by an arriving Dewey and Sam. Sam, Tara and Richie escape, but Dewey is killed when he attempts to finish off Ghostface. Not gonna lie... I thought someone was going to die, and didn't know who. I thought Sidney was untouchable, and really thought Gale would get it. Kind of sad when it was poor Dewey, who wouldn't hurt a fly.

"I'm going to kill you, once and for all, Sidney. But first, I'm
going to swallow this entire knife for your amusement!"

Sidney arrives in town after learning of Dewey's death and meets both Gale and Sam at the hospital. Sidney asks Sam to help stop the killer, but Sam declines, choosing to leave town with Richie and Tara. Sidney and Gale follow the trio to Amber's, which is revealed to be Stu's former home where the original Woodsboro massacre took place. While a party is in progress to honor Wes' memory, Chad and Mindy are both attacked by Ghostface. As the friend group convenes, Amber pulls out Dewey's gun and shoots Liv in the head, revealing herself as the killer. Sidney and Gale arrive, and Richie is revealed as Amber's accomplice. He stabs Sam, and he and Amber take Sam, Sidney, and Gale into the kitchen where Sidney had first faced off against Billy and Stu.

Richie and Amber reveal they are fans of the Stab film series who met online. Disappointed in the trajectory taken with the most-recent Stab 8, they decided to embark on a new killing spree to bring back the "original cast" and provide new-and-improved "source material" for a future Stab film, then frame Sam as the killer. Sam attacks Richie and Tara attacks Amber but is incapacitated; Richie goes after Sam while Sidney and Gale fight Amber together, ending with Gale breaking free and shooting Amber, who lands on a turned-on stove and is set on fire. Richie pursues Sam, who sees another hallucination of Billy, which brings her attention to Amber's abandoned knife. Embracing her paternal heritage, she uses the knife to stab Richie repeatedly and fatally slit his throat, before shooting him to ensure he is dead. A horribly burnt Amber attempts to attack the group again but is shot to death by Tara.

Tara and the Meeks twins are loaded into ambulances to be taken to the hospital, and Sam thanks Sidney and Gale for their help. Gale promises not to write a new book about the new murders and give the killers notoriety, opting to write a tribute to Dewey instead. Sam joins Tara in the ambulance and the night's events are covered in a news report...

"So what are you buying with your Scream reboot money?"
"A new pool house, you?"
"Running shoes!"

... and that is the reboot-quel to Scream, also called Scream. How does it compare to the ones we've reviewed thus far? Well my friends, it was pretty top-tier, not going to lie. The movie has just the right mix of legacy characters and new, fresh-faced characters. Tara and Sam being the new front-runners bring a fresh look into the franchise, and it's fitting that Sidney, Gale, and Dewey all support and take their backseats or side, supporting seats, to these new characters. The best part is, none of them are remotely annoying. You can tell that some real love and affection went into writing these characters. The callbacks were very well done, and not just shoved down your throat but befitting to the plot in the way only Scream can make it happen. Some real top-notch methods to use to reference each of the previous films. I sure doing that doesn't get old, ha ha ha... *cough*

Being the first Scream film not directed by Wes Craven must've shook the faith in a lot of the die-hard fans, but I'm happy to say a lot of them still turned up in droves to see it. Rightfully so; with the return of the legacy characters, touching tributes to Dewey, badass new characters, some pretty Scream-esque kills, dynamite twists with the reboot-quel going back to the roots of the original by having the massacre once again take place in Stu Macher's old house; 2022's Scream is a solid entry in the series, and definitely made up for 4's shortcomings. Roger L. Jackson's creepy Ghostface voice, now in its fifth go-round, just sprinkles on the creepiness for all to enjoy. I thoroughly enjoyed Scream, or 5cream as I called it.

Only one post to go in Halloween 2K23, and it'll probably come out tomorrow on the biggest day of the year! Cheers all, here's to a right good scare.

HALLOWEEN 2K23 BONUS #1: A Review of "Five Nights at Freddy's" (2023)

"Hey kid, your mom said finish your pizza before you run off to play the arcade games. Dont'chu dare get up from that
seat until you do."

SURPRISE! A bonus for all of you to enjoy! We're only three days from the big day this year, and I unfortunately still have many posts to make. I've just been so exhausted week-to-week, night-to-night, it's hard to keep track of. I'm thinking of taking off December from my Blogger to recharge and think of new ideas. I think that's an idea getting more and more approval internally from me.

"I've got a good job for you, Mike. It's a real SCREAM."
"Is this Matthew Lillard?"
"No, this is Steve Raglan."

For our first bonus review this year, I thought I'd have a little fun. This movie came out only Thursday, forty-eight hours ago, both in theaters and on the streaming service Peacock. (Shout out to Peacock). Based on the popular horror point-and-click games starting from 2014 of the same name, this is 2023's Five Nights at Freddy's. A security guard gets a post at an abandoned pizzeria and finds its animatronic inhabitants try to hunt him down each night, and the key is to survive from 12a to 6a. That's the premise of the game. Simple, and you survive five nights. Six if you survive all five, seven, if you survive the sixth. Confusing, but hey I was able to pick it up. With a simple premise like that, I was imagining they weren't going to make a very good movie out of it. Before I give my honest opinion, having only gotten into the games just this past year, let's go through the plot as usual and I'll introduce you to the lore before I give my opinion on the movie.

Mike Schmidt (Josh Hutcherson), a mall security guard, is fired after assaulting a negligent father who he mistook for a kidnapper. He is sent to visit career counselor Steve Raglan (Matthew Lillard), who offers him work as a night guard at an abandoned family diner known as Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria. Though initially reluctant, Mike accepts the offer after social services threaten to take custody of his younger sister Abby (Piper Rubio) and pass her over to his estranged aunt Jane (Mary Stuart Masterson). On his first night, Mike falls asleep and dreams about the kidnapping and presumed murder of his brother Garrett (Lucas Grant), before seeing five children who witnessed the kidnapping, but they run away. On the second night, Mike's dream is repeated, but when he attempts to confront one of the children, he is attacked and wakes up. Mike meets police officer Vanessa Shelly (Elizabeth Lail), who notices his wounds and patches him up. Vanessa shows him around the restaurant and tells him that the place closed in the 1980s after five children were murdered there; the bodies were never found.

"I just heard one of the animatronics say something. It said...
'It's Fazbear'ing time'."
"Mike, it's 9a, you're 3 hours over, go home."

On the third night, Jane hires a group of juvenile delinquents to vandalize the restaurant in order to get Mike fired, an act which would enable her to gain custody of Abby. As the break-in occurs, the restaurant's animatronic mascots – Freddy Fazbear (Kevin Foster), Chica (Jessica Weiss), Foxy (puppet, voiced by Roger Joseph Manning Jr.), and Bonnie (Jade Kindar-Martin) – come alive and murder the delinquents. One of the vandals is Abby's babysitter Max (Kat Conner Sterling), which requires Mike to bring Abby to his next shift. When the mascots activate that night, they befriend Abby, but are hostile toward and corner Mike and Vanessa, though they survive. Mike discovers that the mascots are possessed by the ghosts of the murdered children, whose leader, a blonde boy, consistently mentions a "yellow rabbit".

In between shifts, Mike takes sleeping pills to help him visualize Garrett's kidnapping, which went cold years ago. On the fourth night, Vanessa panics over Abby's increasing friendship with the mascots and warns Mike to not bring her to the restaurant again. Mike gets Jane to babysit Abby, much to Abby's frustration, as he goes back to the restaurant during the day and overdoses on his sleeping pills. Inside the dream, the five children appear again and tell Mike that he can stay with Garrett forever, in exchange for Abby. At Mike's house, Jane is murdered by "Golden Freddy", a variant of Freddy Fazbear possessed by the blonde boy, who takes Abby back to the restaurant by hitching a ride with a taxi driver. Mike is repeatedly attacked in his dream and wakes up strapped to a torture device that attempts to tear off his face. He escapes the device and flees the restaurant with Vanessa's help.

"Welcome to Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria. A place where
Steam games can become surprise hits and rake in dough
for you off weird ideas for years to come!"

After Mike explains his dream, Vanessa reveals that she is the daughter of William Afton, the serial killer who murdered Garrett and the other five children, and that his victims' souls and the mascots are under his control. Realizing that William is planning to murder Abby, Mike rushes to the restaurant with the necessary equipment to disable the mascots. At the restaurant, Chica attempts to murder Abby but Mike arrives and saves her. Mike is attacked and separated from Abby. The mascots are eventually defeated, but they are reactivated by Steve, who arrives wearing the "yellow rabbit" suit. Steve reveals himself to be William before knocking Mike unconscious. Knowing that the mascots need to understand the truth, Abby draws a picture of William murdering the children. She shows her drawing to the mascots, and they turn on William. The Cupcake, another one of the mascots, bites off part of William's suit, which triggers the suit's internal springlock mechanisms which severely wounds him. The mascots drag him into the back room where the blonde boy locks the door. Mike and Abby carry a wounded Vanessa out of the restaurant, though she falls into a coma afterwards and is taken to a hospital. Mike continues to look after Abby and they return to their normal lives.

... and ta-da, they have indeed survived "five nights" at Freddy's. So, when I play the game (at the time of writing this, I've beaten six nights of Five Nights at Freddy's and three nights of Five Nights at Freddy's 2. I was dragging my feet through the games trying to get hyped for the movie, and quite frankly, I was very excited to view it. I streamed it on Peacock last night, absorbed as much as I could and once it was done, I indeed had some thoughts. I did enjoy a lot of the characters, Mike was a great casting, Vanessa while I appreciated her presence I kept laughing about like "Isn't she supposed to be on patrol?" Steve/William played by the great Matthew Lillard was a very welcome portrayal since I love Lillard in practically everything he does. Abby had some quippy one-liners that were amusing, but she was also kind of the reason why I was a bit annoyed with the story's direction.

"These animatronics are real-to-life, just like they appear in
the game. We've gone as far as using live children inside to
imitate the soul possession."
*Muffled* "Director lady? I can't breathe in here!"
"PIPE DOWN!"

While I purely and whole-heartedly understand it would be very difficult to make a movie based off the simple premise of watching security cameras, keeping tabs on moving electronics, and then shutting doors and flipping on lights when animatronics get near to protect your own ass... repeatedly for five nights... some of the elements they stuck in felt kind of cliche to me. The whole "child and their robot" arc was unnecessary and kind of torpedoed the movie's chances at being scary to me. I get it's PG-13 and Blumhouse came out recently saying "Well it's also a horror movie for children", which is a fascinating take, but at the same time that means it isn't really scary at all. Not only with the scene on Night 3 when they're building a fort out of tables in the pizzeria... which was just silly in my opinion... but with the movie in general. Thankfully there's hardly any gore, if any at all, and barely any swearing/cursing. So it is a horror movie for kids, much like the games are scary games kids can play.

The movie's final ten minutes try to save the story though, and with the whole "dream to remember what happened" Nightmare on Elm Street shtick wearing thin to me and not really paying off when the discovery of who Spring Bonnie was came outside of the dream world anyway, the final ten minutes really did redeem much of my ire with the story. I did enjoy Five Nights at Freddy's the movie, it is entertaining, the set design is TRÉ MAGNIFIQUE, same with the Jim Henson Creature Shop animatronic puppets used for the mascots in the movie... top notch work by that facility once again. The aesthetic saves the movie, and the scares/kills are gripping enough, even if toned down or off-screen to save the PG-13 rating, even if the movie feels overstuffed with cliche sillyness just to make a good runtime.

Check it out if you have a night off or heck if you're a cool parent who has kids. It's pretty good, and by kids' standards it's a wild ride. Peacock, or in theaters everywhere.

HALLOWEEN 2K23: A Review of "Scream 4"

"My name is Ghostface, some call me 'Ghostface'. My shtick may be getting old, but my victims aren't!"
*Ba dum tss*

It's time for Octoberfest to continue, after a long fourteen day wait. I've been horrifically slacking. Get ready for a rapid-fire of planned posts over the next (and final) week of October. Hey this is Spookytober on Spoiler Alert, so my scheduling is a bit out of whack. I've also been thinking of taking the month of December off from blogging for the future. Just as a breather/refresher and to give me time to come up with some new ideas to kick off the next year.

"How much are we getting paid for these cameos?"
"I just wanted to have my chance at sitting on a couch with
the great Rogue of the X-Men!"
"Oh my God, could we hire someone who's not a complete
nerd?!"

BUT NO TIME FOR THAT! It's time to review the next three Scream movies! Between one post in 2019, and the two we've done for this October in 2023, we've covered the original trilogy. So far, it's been a slowly descending quality line. Scream is great, Scream 2 is equally great, and Scream 3 tried to be equally good but came up short in a few places; ultimately it's still a good movie in my eyes. But that was then, and this is now. We're onto the big reboot-quel that came out eleven years later. This movie came out after my 18th birthday in 2011, and was once again directed by Wes Craven like the three movies before it. It was also written by Kevin Williamson just like Scream and Scream 2 were. So the movie-jargon-rambling dialogue is back! Who's also back? Sidney? Gale? Dewey? ALL of the above! So it's the perfect Scream reboot-quel right?

WRONG! Haha, while not a a great movie, Scream 4... also stylized as Scre4m, tried to really grasp a new generation of movie goers. It did, I'm sure it did. The three original trilogy movies are loved and worshipped horror movies, so why shouldn't Scream 4 succeed? Especially in 2011? Well... upon a rewatch by me for this review, it kind of ended up being just... plain dull. I think this was the script where I saw Kevin Williamson really starting to believe Scream 4's hype just a little too hard. Let's dive in and dissect this turkey.

On the 15th anniversary week of the original Woodsboro murders, as of course depicted in Scream, high school students Jenny Randall (Aimee Teegarden) and Marnie Cooper (Britt Robertson) are murdered by Ghostface (voiced by Roger L. Jackson). Sidney Prescott (Neve "This bit is getting old" Campbell) returns to Woodsboro the following day to promote her self-help book with her publicist, Rebecca Walters (Alison Brie, of all people!). After evidence is found in her rental car, Sidney becomes a prime suspect in the murders and must stay in town until they are solved... somebody clearly has it out for Sidney! ................. again!

LIVE LOOK IN: Courteney Cox, with the end of Scream
and F*R*I*E*N*D*S upon her, watches her career come
crashing down upon her.

Sidney's cousin, Jill Roberts (Emma Roberts), who is coping with the infidelity of her ex-boyfriend, Trevor Sheldon (Nico Tortorella), gets a threatening phone call from Ghostface, as does her friend Olivia Morris (Marielle Jaffe). Jill and Olivia, alongside their friend Kirby Reed (Hayden Panettiere)... ya gotta love these Kevin Williamson/Scream-ass names. Anywho, they're questioned about their calls by Dewey Riley (David "My pro wrestling career is starting soon" Arquette), now the town's sheriff, while his deputies Judy Hicks (Marley Shelton), Anthony Perkins (Anthony Anderson... no not the Psycho guy), and Hoss (Adam Brody) assist him in the case. Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox-Arquette), Dewey's wife, is struggling with writer's block and decides to investigate the murders against her husband's wishes. That night, as Sidney stays over with Jill and her aunt Kate (Mary McDonnell), Olivia is killed by Ghostface as Jill and Kirby watch in horror from across the street. Sidney herself is then confronted by Ghostface, and they fight until Ghostface is forced to flee when Perkins and Hoss arrive. Sidebar: I wonder if Neve Campbell goes to therapy and her therapist has her beat the shit out of a dummy dressed as Ghostface to get her anger/rage out?

At the hospital, Sidney fires Rebecca after learning of her desire to exploit the murders to increase book sales, and Rebecca is subsequently murdered by Ghostface at a parking garage. NOOO now who will Dave Franco marry? Gale enlists the help of two high school movie fanatics, Charlie Walker (Rory Culkin) and Robbie Mercer (Erik Knudsen). Charlie theorizes that the killer is following the rules of horror remakes, and Gale and Sidney conclude that the killer will likely strike at the "Stabathon", a screening party held in a barn where teenagers gather to binge watch all seven movies of the Stab franchise. "What are the rules of a horror remake?" I hear you cry out from the toilet? Well my friends... it goes like this:

1. Don't fuck with the original.
2. The Death scenes have to be way more extreme (which isn't original, this is Scream 2's rule but just... again).
3. Unexpected is the new cliche.
4. Virgins can die now.
5. New versions are always 2.0, so the latest technology is always involved and integral to the plot. This means the killer may start filming the murders.
6. You have to have an opening sequence... (which is just a lazy rule).
7. If you want to survive in a modern-day horror movie, you pretty much have to be gay. (Hasty justification, if you ask me).

LIVE LOOK IN: David Arquette pulls a gun in his latest
hardcore wrestling death match.

Gale sneaks into the party to investigate, but Ghostface attacks her, stabbing her in the shoulder. Hoss and Perkins, who were assigned to guard Jill's house, are also murdered. Sidney discovers through another taunting call from Ghostface that Jill has left for Kirby's, before Ghostface attacks her and Kate, killing the latter. Jill, Kirby, Charlie, Robbie, and Trevor arrive for an after party at Kirby's house when Ghostface strikes, killing a drunken Robbie. Sidney arrives to leave with Jill, but they are both chased by Ghostface. As Sidney calls Dewey and tries to find Jill, Kirby frees Charlie, who was bound and gagged, but he immediately stabs her, revealing himself as Ghostface before leaving her to bleed out. Sidney is confronted by Charlie and a second Ghostface, who reveals herself as Jill. She admits to masterminding the murders out of jealousy from the fame that Sidney received for surviving the previous killing sprees and desires to achieve clout as a pseudo-victim of the murders, intending to frame Trevor as Ghostface. Jill kills Trevor and betrays Charlie, stabbing him to death to pin him as Trevor's accomplice so she can be the sole survivor. She then stabs Sidney and mutilates herself to frame Trevor further.

Dewey and the police arrive as Sidney and Jill are taken to the hospital. After discovering that Sidney has survived, an enraged Jill goes to her hospital room and makes a final attempt to kill her, but Sidney fights back. Dewey, Gale, and Judy intervene, after Dewey learns she was the killer by the fact that Jill somehow knew exactly where Gale was stabbed. Jill subdues Dewey and Hicks and holds Gale at gunpoint, but Sidney incapacitates Jill with a defibrillator and ultimately kills her by shooting her heart. Dewey calls in all police units, as reporters outside erroneously name Jill as the "sole surviving hero".

That's Scream 4. Wes Craven's last foray into the Scream franchise before his untimely passing in 2015. The last one also that had the OG three as the titular protagonists; Neve, Courteney, and David. How does Scream 4 hold up? Well... to sum it up in one post-ending paragraph, I wasn't a fan upon a rewatch. Scream 4 isn't as good as the original trilogy, and gosh dang it it tried. At this point, in my opinion, the main three characters' gimmicks got stale. The only thing that's this movie's saving grace is the side-characters and little fan-service moments, like referencing once again the in-universe Stab movies, having celebrity cameos for the Stab movies as well (Anna Paquin and Kristen Bell).

These two nerds took the concept of being Twitch streamer
nerds and made it uncool five years before it became
mainstream cool.

Still... it's a worthy enough entry in the series, which is something to say about Scream 4. Even when I consider it the weakest entry in the series, it's still watchable and enjoyable. It isn't painful to sit through at all; it's still entertaining. So, while I don't favor it above the first three, or what comes after, it does still hold a candle and does the franchise justice. While I think some of the rules that were invented for this one seem lazy and recycled, at least to me, it's still ticking all the checkboxes of what makes a Scream movie great. That's all we need. Murders? Wes Craven? Neve Campbell? Courteney Cox? David Arquette? Roger L. Jackson? All here, all putting in effort. Man, the day Roger L. Jackson dies is the day Scream dies if you ask me.

If you're watching through Scream this Halloween season, make sure to give Scream 4 a try at least. Maybe you'll like it more than me. That's fine, but at least it's worth a watch! I give it a thumbs up... but just one.

As for the rest of our show for October this year, check in soon as we rapid fire our remaining posts for Halloween 2K23 at you! Stay tuned, my dudes and ladies. We're nearly to the spookiest day of the year!

HALLOWEEN 2K23: A Review of "Scream 3"

"Surprise Sidney. Are you surprised to see Ghostface again, Sidney? NO?! Well surpiiiiise anyway, Sidney."

Spookytober 2023 continues on! Welcome back. Dust off your five and dime "Father Death" costumes, we're rolling with the Scream series.

Today we take a look at Scream 3. Released in 2000, Scream 3 does the same old schtick of Neve Campbell's character Sidney Prescott, oddly enough, being stalked and nearly killed a few times by a person in a widely-manufactured, easily available "Ghostface" costume. Usually after she's been called on the phone and mocked and taunted a few times to the point of reducing her to tears. What kind of introduction to the movie is that, you might ask? Well, where this one differs from the previous two we've reviewed so far is that due to the April 1999 high school massacre at Columbine, violence in media was drastically toned down in a few places. Sure, some places like South Park and video games stayed lewd and crude, but other things? Like widely produced horror franchises? Yeah, they got hit hard.

Parker Posey's hair looks like it's trying to accomplish three
different styles all at the same time.

Therefore, Scream 3 to me is one of the weaker movies in the series and doesn't really act like a true "horror" movie. Comedy was favored in the screenplay and it's slapstick plays out on screen with Ghostface getting tossed around like a ragdoll and not really being all that frightening. Let's slice into Scream 3 shall we?

Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber), now the host of a successful talk show for some reason, is contacted by Ghostface (voiced by Roger L. Jackson), who demands to know the whereabouts of Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell). When Cotton refuses to cooperate, Ghostface breaks into his home and attacks his girlfriend Christine (Kelly Rutherford). Cotton rushes home, only for Ghostface to kill Christine, then Cotton. Detective Mark Kincaid contacts Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox-Arquette) to discuss the recent murders, prompting her to travel to Hollywood, where she finds Dewey Riley (David Arquette) working as an adviser on the set of Stab 3, the third film in the series based on the Ghostface murders. Ghostface kills Stab 3 actress Sarah Darling (Jenny McCarthy), causing production of the film to be halted. The remaining cast, along with Dewey and Gale, gather at the home of Jennifer Jolie (Parker Posey), the actress playing Gale in Stab 3. Ghostface murders her bodyguard and uses a gas leak to cause an explosion, which kills actor Tom Prinze (Matt Keeslar).

Sidney is living in seclusion as a crisis counselor for an abused women's hotline, fearing another killer may strike. Having uncovered Sidney's location, the killer begins taunting her by phone using a voice changer to sound like her deceased mother Maureen Prescott (Lynn McRee), forcing Sidney out of hiding and drawing her to Hollywood. Martha Meeks (Heather Matarazzo), the sister of Sidney's murdered friend Randy, visits Sidney and the others to deliver a videotape that Randy (Jamie Kennedy) made before his death, posthumously warning them the rules of a horror film do not apply to anyone in the third and final film of a trilogy and that any of them, including Sidney, could die. The new trilogy-ending rules are as follows:

"Seriously, Domino's; I'm getting sick of your shit!"

1. "You've got a killer who’s gonna be superhuman. Stabbing him won’t work, shooting him won’t work. Basically in the third one, you gotta cryogenically freeze his head, decapitate him, or blow him up."
2. "Anyone, including the main character, can die. This means you, Sid."
3. "The past will come back to bite you in the ass. Whatever you think you know about the past, forget it. The past is not at rest! Any sins you think were committed in the past are about to break out and destroy you."

Sidney is later attacked by Ghostface at a movie set, forcing the police to withhold her at their station. Dewey, Gale, Jennifer, and the remaining cast, Angelina (Emily Mortimer) and Tyson (Deon Richmond), attend a birthday party for Stab 3's director, Roman Bridger (Scott Foley). After Gale discovers Roman's body in the basement, Ghostface attacks the group, killing Angelina, Tyson and Jennifer. The killer then orders Sidney to the mansion to save Gale and Dewey. When Sidney arrives, Ghostface lures her inside to where Gale and Dewey are bound and gagged. As Sidney is freeing them, Ghostface appears, though Sidney gains the upper hand using a hidden gun to fight him off. Kincaid shows up but is knocked unconscious by Ghostface. Sidney flees and hides in a secret screening room where she is discovered by Ghostface, who reveals himself as Roman, having survived being shot by wearing a bulletproof vest.

Roman admits to being Sidney's half-brother, born to their mother Maureen when she was an actress in Hollywood. Four years prior, he had tried reuniting with her, only for her to reject him due to him being the product of rape. Bitter over the rejection, Roman began stalking her, filming all the men she philandered with and showing Billy Loomis (played in Scream by Skeet Ulrich) the footage of Billy's father with Maureen, which motivated Billy and Stu Macher (played in Scream by Matthew Lillard) to kill her, thus setting off the string of murders in Sidney's hometown and at her college. When he discovered how much fame Sidney had attracted due to those events, Roman snapped and lured Sidney out of hiding, planning to kill her and frame her for the murders. After Roman kills Stab producer John Milton (Lance Henriksen), whom he accuses of being his biological father and one of their mother's rapists, Sidney denounces him and his motives, provoking an enraged Roman to engage Sidney in a fight that ends when Roman shoots Sidney in the chest; however, Sidney survives the shot and stabs Roman multiple times, revealing to him that she, too, was wearing a bulletproof vest. As Dewey and Gale arrive, a screaming Roman suddenly resurfaces with a knife; Sidney yells at Dewey to shoot Roman in the head, which Dewey does, finally killing him.

LIVE LOOK IN: David Arquette and Courteney Cox
take their vows at their wedding.

Later at Sidney's house, Dewey proposes to Gale, who accepts. Sidney returns from a walk and leaves her gates, which were previously shown to be alarmed, open. She enters her home and is invited to join Dewey, Gale, and Kincaid to watch a movie. As she goes to join the others, her front door blows open behind her, but she walks away, leaving it as is.

...and so we come to the end of the Scream trilogy. A trilogy it would remain for many years indeed. Scream 3, if it stood as the end of a trilogy, would stand as a weaker ending to a trilogy, in my opinion. Thankfully the next three films occurred so this movie got bailed out. Take away the prospect of "ending a trilogy", Scream 3 is okay. It definitely suffers by not having Kevin Williamson in the writer's role as he wrote Scream and Scream 2. The Scream-esque tongue-twisting dialogue that also showcases a love for movies seems carbon-copy in this one, with that knowledge in mind. Only Kevin could really make those wordy "who talks like this?" dialogue exchanges seem fluent and natural. The classroom scene in Scream 2 comes to mind, for sure. Scream 3 is kind of devoid of those moments.

As mentioned, Scream 3 also suffers from a lack of genuine scares and horror. It's more of a mystery-thriller with a lot of comedy and some slapstick sprinkled in as well, making it less of a horror movie. It's a slasher movie for sure, but the idea of being scared by watching this movie is a lost idea. Scream had some spooky moments, Scream 2 was straight eerie a couple of times. Scream 3? Not so much. I get it though, right? Real life violence is much more horrifying than a horror movie, so the horror movie's always going to suffer. They even inserted some goofier cameos; Carrie Fisher cameos as a clerk who "almost got Princess Leia in Star Wars but lost it to the girl banging George Lucas"... ha ha. There was also a brief Miramax-stroking-themselves cameo of Jay and Silent Bob, played by Jason Mewes and Kevin Smith. Which goes hand in hand with Wes Craven's cameo writing/directing another Scream movie in Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back. I thought that was a nice, if not weird, insertion.

"Hey, what are you chewing on? Don't chew on that!
Give that to me."

The characters in Scream 3 were top tier though, at least in my view. In keeping with true Scream fashion, the main three characters Sidney, Gale, and Dewey play their roles just as you'd expect, and their brand-new side characters are entertaining, to say the least. One thing though is for some reason Courteney Cox picked a really bizarre hairstyle for this one. Almost like she buzzed her head and then got hair extensions for some reason. WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR BANGS, COURTENEY?! I also failed to mention in my Scream 2 review that I was happy Randy got the axe. In Scream, Randy was a relatable loser nerd I liked, but in Scream 2 he was an obnoxious dillhole and I was quite pleased to see him get got. His absence in Scream 3 was not missed by me, but they still had to shoe-horn him in with a "Oh by the way in case a third movie happens Randy recorded the trilogy-rules for us because we can't just write a new character or have of us boneheads figure it out". Ha. Sorry, unpopular opinion there.

To summarize, Scream 3 is okay. It doesn't hold a candle to Scream or Scream 2, but thankfully comes off better than what we get next. Wink, wink. Stay tuned, SPOOKYTOBER HALLOWEEN 2K23 continues soon!