Editorials
MTV’s ‘Scream’ TV Series – Revisiting the Franchise’s Three Seasons on the Small Screen
At the time, Scream 4 seemed like a pretty definitive end for the franchise, providing Sidney Prescott with a second round of closure and riffing on all of the (then) recent trends in horror media. Of course, no matter how satisfying they may be, endings are always bittersweet, so fans were understandably bummed that this would be the last we’d ever see of good old Ghostface. That’s why it makes sense that folks were ecstatic when MTV announced that they were producing a televised follow-up to Scream, Wes Craven’s iconic horror franchise.
After all, a small-screen adaptation of a series known for its satirical meta elements and memorable protagonists could absolutely thrive on network television, especially with the TV horror renaissance of the mid-2010s gifting us with plenty of shows to satirize. From American Horror Story to Hannibal and Bates Motel, there was more than enough material to inspire a new masked killer.
Unfortunately, that’s not exactly what we ended up with. When Scream: The TV Series premiered back in 2015, many fans were outraged by MTV’s reimagining of the beloved franchise and its questionable creative decisions. First of all, the series ditched the iconic Ghostface mask due to legal complications, replacing it with a bizarre lookalike inspired by a deformed in-universe killer. Second, the show itself was more of a teen drama than a slasher-inspired meta experience, letting several episodes go by without any kills and not really taking advantage of the television format to comment on the medium.
If you haven’t seen MTV’s Scream, the first couple of seasons follow high-schooler Emma Duval (Willa Fitzgerald) as she becomes the target of a masked serial killer known as the “Lakewood Slasher”. With law enforcement unable to identify the criminal, our leading lady and her friends decide to investigate the dirty secrets of Lakewood for themselves, casting suspicion on Emma’s loved ones and frenemies as this small town is confronted with its sins.
Maybe they should have called it “Stab – The TV Series”.
All in all, it makes sense that hardcore horror fans were calling this show “Scream in name only,” and I was actually part of the original choir of dissenting voices claiming that MTV was ruining the franchise’s reputation. However, once I heard that Craven himself had given the project his blessing and even allowed the showrunners to credit him as Executive Producer, I finally decided to give it a chance.
Sure, it takes a while to get over how generally un-Scream-like the production is, with no sultry sounds from Roger L. Jackson and no iconic Ghostface mask, but as the show went on (especially during the second season, when Michael Gans and Richard Register took over the series), I found myself weirdly engrossed by these soap-opera charms. She may not be Sidney Prescott, but Emma becomes a truly compelling protagonist once she has to deal with the psychological aftermath of the series’ initial murder spree. Her evolving relationships with Audrey (Bex Taylor-Klaus) and the movie-loving Noah (John Karna) ultimately serve as the real heart of the story as things steadily become more horrific. Even Carlson Young’s bitchy Brooke Maddox becomes more fleshed out and entertaining as the saga goes on, and I even started to warm up to the Lakewood Slasher costume as the kills became more creative.
And despite not featuring any references to the events of the films, the first two seasons of MTV’s Scream were also chock-full of shout-outs to other beloved horror franchises. From familiar kills to obvious Carrie homages, it’s pretty clear that the showrunners were huge horror fans, especially Gans and Register. In fact, it was later revealed that the Weinsteins themselves prohibited the production team from referencing anything from the movies and refused to license FunWorld’s Father Death costume, against the wishes of the production team. Even so, a proposed third and fourth season was supposed to make things decidedly more meta, revealing that everything we’ve seen so far was part of Scream: The Television Series as the show’s actors begin to get killed off in “real life.”
Unfortunately, after consistent fan backlash and low ratings, MTV decided to completely re-imagine the show instead of concluding Emma’s story. This led to a six-episode mini-series in the form of Scream: Resurrection, a curious attempt at transforming the show into a horror anthology. Featuring a new showrunner and a brand-new cast, Resurrection was certainly a different take on the source material, but it wasn’t necessarily a better one.
A familiar face returns!
Executive produced by Queen Latifah, the rebooted show finally brought back the original mask (along with Roger L. Jackson) and aired over the course of three summer nights in 2019. Relocating the action to Atlanta, the story follows high school football player Deion Elliot (RJ Cyler) as he becomes the target of a new Ghostface and has to rely on his friends and family to survive, with the updated cast including heavy hitters like the Academy-Award nominee Mary J. Blige and the always-charming Keke Palmer.
While Resurrection’s new setting and more diverse characters were certainly a breath of fresh air, the show’s actual story wasn’t really an improvement on the soap-opera thrills of the previous seasons. Not only was there not enough time to really develop these potential victims, but our own Trace Thurman criticized the lackluster finale for clearly being written by a non-horror-fan. It’s also a shame that the story once again avoids most of the clever meta commentary present in Kevin Williamson’s original scripts.
As if that wasn’t enough, the low saturation and heavy digital filters (meant to invoke a colder aesthetic) coupled with the original killer’s costume meant that the rebooted show ended up looking a lot like a mid-budget fan project rather than an official Scream production. That being said… the kills were a tad bit more entertaining this time around, and it was definitely refreshing to see Ghostface in a slightly more urban environment years before taking Manhattan in Radio Silence’s upcoming sequel.
While neither of MTV’s attempts at adapting the Scream franchise to the small screen could even hope to compare to Craven and Williamson’s beloved creations, I’d argue that they’re a lot better than most fans seem to remember. I mean, if you can separate them from the movies, the first couple of seasons of Scream are just harmless teen-oriented fun with a horror-loving twist, and you have to give props to Resurrection for trying something new with a familiar premise. These televised experiments may not have been entirely successful, but the TV slasher would only be perfected in future shows like Chucky and the later seasons of the appropriately titled Slasher, and I like to think that Scream was instrumental in getting this genre off the ground.
Editorials
11 Years Later: The Horrific Cycles of Violence in ‘Only God Forgives’ Starring Ryan Gosling
Traditionally, movie theater walkouts are usually associated with the horror genre, with infamous cases ranging from 1973’s The Exorcist (particularly during the crucifix masturbation scene) and even Lars Von Trier’s controversial serial killer memoir, The House That Jack Built.
That being said, there are exceptions to this rule, as some movies manage to terrorize audiences into leaving the theater regardless of genre. One memorable example of this is Nicolas Winding Refn’s 2013 revenge thriller Only God Forgives, a film so brutal and inaccessible that quite a few critics ended up treating it like a snuff film from hell back when it was first released. However, I’ve come to learn that horror fans have a knack for seeing beyond the blood and guts when judging the value of a story, and that’s why I’d like to make a case for Winding’s near-impenetrable experiment as an excellent horror-adjacent experience.
Refn originally came up with the idea for Only God Forgives immediately after completing 2009’s Valhalla Rising and becoming confused by feelings of anger and existential dread during his wife’s second pregnancy. It was during this time that he found himself imagining a literal fistfight with God, with this concept leading him to envision a fairy-tale western set in the far east that would deal with some of the same primal emotions present in his Viking revenge story.
It was actually Ryan Gosling who convinced the director to tackle the more commercially viable Drive first, as he wanted to cement his partnership with the filmmaker in a more traditional movie before tackling a deeply strange project. This would pay off during the production of Only God Forgives, as the filmmaking duo was forced to use their notoriety to scrounge up money at a Thai film festival when local authorities began demanding bribes in order to allow shooting to continue.
In the finished film, Gosling plays Julian, an American ex-pat running a Muay-Thai boxing club alongside his sociopathic brother Billy (Tom Burke). When Billy gets himself killed after sexually assaulting and murdering a teenager, Julian is tasked by his disturbed mother (Kristin Scott Thomas) with tracking down those responsible for the death of her first-born child. What follows is a surreal dive into the seedy underbelly of Bangkok as the cycle of revenge escalates and violence leads to even more violence.
SO WHY IS IT WORTH WATCHING?
There’s no right or wrong way to engage with art, but there are some films that clearly require more effort from the audience side in order to be effective. And while you can’t blame cinemagoers for just wanting to enjoy some passive entertainment, I think it’s always worth trying to meet a work of art on its own terms before judging it.
Despite being a huge fan of Drive, I avoided Only God Forgives for a long time because of its poor critical reception and excessively esoteric presentation. It was only years later that I gave the flick a chance when a friend of mine described the experience as “David Lynch on cocaine.” It was then that I realized that nearly everything critics had complained about in the film are precisely what made it so interesting.
If you can stomach the deliberate pacing, you’ll likely be fascinated by this stylish nightmare about morally questionable people becoming trapped in a needless cycle of violence and retaliation. Not only is the photography impeccable, turning the rain-slicked streets of Bangkok into a neo-noir playground, but the bizarre characters and performances also help to make this an undeniably memorable movie. And while Gosling deserves praise as the unhinged Julian, I’d argue that Vithaya Pansringarm steals the show here as “The Angel of Vengeance,” even if his untranslated dialogue is likely to be unintelligible for most viewers.
However, I think the lack of subtitles ends up enhancing the mood here (even though some editions of the film ended up including them against the director’s wishes), adding to the feeling that Julian is a stranger in a strange land while also allowing viewers to project their own motivations onto some of the “antagonists.”
And while Only God Forgives is frequently accused of burying its narrative underneath a pile of artsy excess, I think the heart of the film is rather straightforward despite its obtuse presentation. I mean, the moral here is basically “revenge isn’t fun,” which I think is made clear by the horrific use of violence (though we’ll discuss that further in the next section).
To be clear, I’m still not sure whether or not I enjoyed this movie, I just know that I’m glad I watched it.
AND WHAT MAKES IT HORROR ADJACENT?
There are two different kinds of gore effects. One of them is meant to entertain viewers with exaggerated wounds and excessive blood as you admire the craftsmanship behind the filmmaking. The other kind is simply a tool meant to simulate what actually happens when you injure a human body. Like I mentioned before, Only God Forgives isn’t trying to be “fun,” so you can guess what kind gore is in this one…
From realistic maimings to brutal fist fights that feel more painful than thrilling, the “action” label on this flick seems downright questionable when the majority of the experience has you wincing at genuinely scary acts of grisly violence. I mean, the story begins with an unmotivated rampage through the streets of late-night Bangkok and ends with the implication of even more pointless violence, so it’s pretty clear that you’re not really meant to root for an “action hero” here.
I can’t even say that the deaths resemble those from slasher flicks because the movie never attempts to sensationalize these horrific acts, with Refn preferring to depict them as straightforward consequences of violent people going through the motions – which is somehow even scarier than if this had just been yet another hyper-violent revenge movie.
Not only that, but the characters’ overall lack of moral principles makes this story even more disturbing, with the main antagonist being the closest thing to a decent person among the main cast despite also being a brutal vigilante.
Only God Forgives doesn’t care if you like it or not (and actually takes measures to make sure that the viewing experience is often unpleasant), but if you’re willing to step up to this cinematic challenge and engage with the narrative and visuals on their own terms, I think you’ll find an unforgettable nightmare waiting for you on the other side.
There’s no understating the importance of a balanced media diet, and since bloody and disgusting entertainment isn’t exclusive to the horror genre, we’ve come up with Horror Adjacent – a recurring column where we recommend non-horror movies that horror fans might enjoy.
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