The Scream franchise is back on the big screen with Scream 7, and the brand new installment in the 30-year saga just smashed through even the highest of box office estimates.
Scream 7 opened in 3,540 theaters across the United States beginning this past Thursday night, scaring up $64.1 million domestically and a whopping $97.2 million worldwide!
The film had been tracking to make around $40 million – $50 million in its opening weekend here in the States, which would’ve been a massive win for the long-running franchise. But it quickly became clear that even those high numbers were going to be slashed to ribbons, with the final weekend total for Scream 7 surpassing early estimates by as much as $24 million!
The franchise’s record for highest opening weekend was held by Scream VI, which opened to $44.4 million in 2023 and went on to rake in $166.5 million worldwide. That means Scream 7 just had the highest opening weekend in the entire history of the Scream franchise, and it’s already well on its way to smashing through Scream VI‘s $166.5 million worldwide haul.
If Scream 7 ends its run at the box office with more than $173 million worldwide, it will become the highest grossing installment in the franchise. That seems very likely right now.
Here are the U.S. opening weekend totals for each film in the franchise:
- Scream (1996) – $6.3 million
- Scream 2 (1997) – $32.9 million
- Scream 3 (2000) – $34.7 million
- Scream 4 (2011) – $18.6 million
- Scream (2022) – $30 million
- Scream VI (2023) – $44.4 million
- Scream 7 (2026) – $64.1 million
Neve Campbell is back as Sidney Prescott in Scream 7, with original Scream writer Kevin Williamson in the director’s chair for the first time in the franchise. The film is currently a rotten 33% on Rotten Tomatoes, though the Popcornmeter score is much higher at 78%. The takeaway there is that fans are digging the movie more than critics. More importantly, the fans are showing up to their local theater to support Sidney’s latest battle with the latest Ghostface.
With a reported production budget of around $45 million, Scream 7 is already a massive hit for Paramount and Spyglass. And what happens when horror movies are massive hits at the box office? They get sequels. Scream 8 is likely to be announced very, very soon.
Stay tuned…
