Scream has been one of the most successful horror franchises of all time. Each film in the series has been decent, if not excellent. Now, the franchise moves forward with the new characters from last year’s Scream 5, although there remained other legacy characters here as well.

Scream VI took the franchise out of Woodsboro and moved it to New York City. By doing so, the film felt to be much fresher than it has in several years while still maintaining much of the Scream style.

Sam Carpenter (Melissa Barrera) and her sister Tara (Jenna Ortega) are still having plenty of issues with the events from last year in Woodsboro, when Sam’s boyfriend and a friend became Ghostface and tried to kill them. Sam was in therapy and Tara was in denial over the memories.

When a new Ghostface gets murdered himself, things get wild once again as the Carpenter sisters find themselves in constant danger from Ghostface all over NYC.

I really enjoyed this movie. It was a lot of fun and it made everything feel new, even though we got Gale Weathers (Courtney Cox) and Kirby (Hayden Panettiere) as legacy characters returning for the film. They did not feel as if they were just there for nostalgia. Scream VI walked that tightrope between new and old brilliantly. To the film’s credit, it really felt as if anyone was vulnerable to Ghostface as well as anyone could have been under the mask.

Mason Gooding and Jasmin Savoy Brown returned as brother and sister Chad and Mindy from Scream 5. Skeet Ulrich was back again as Sam’s delusion-daddy Billy Loomis. Dermot Mulroney joined the cast as Detective Bailey. Jack Champion, Josh Segarra, Liana Liberato, Tony Revolori, Samara Weaving, Andre Anthony and Henry Czerny all had significant roles in the new film.

New York City was really a cast member of this film as well. As a setting, The City stood out as great moments in a bodega and on the subway. Both times, you can see New Yorkers and how they stepped up.

I loved how this film started off. It was familiar and, yet at the same time, original. I was surprised by the twists in the beginning and found it very intriguing. No spoilers of course, but I really was engaged in the film right off the bat.

The kills were pretty brutal and bloodier than I expected. Ghostface built suspense with its stalking of plenty of the characters.

The humor was well done and the meta-narrative continued as they moved into describing the situations from rules for a ‘requel’ to rules for a franchise.

Scream VI should be given credit for moving away from Neve Campbell’s Sydney Prescott and reinvigorating the series with new characters that feel very important and who fit wonderfully into the Scream franchise. The film was exciting and tense and I enjoyed the whole thing.

4 stars