Editorials
Is ‘Scream 5’ The New ‘Ghostbusters 3’?
This is from someone who kind of liked Scream 4… I don’t need a Scream 5. Back in November I wrote up a small piece talking about how incredulous Wes Craven seemed that there would even be sufficient demand for a fifth movie. That was when Craven wrote on Twitter, “No news on ‘Scream 5’ yet. You guys really want another one?”
It just seems like there’s no momentum on the project. The other day Collider asked Neve Campbell what she thought about the film’s chances and she answered, “We’ll see. I’m not sure they’re going to make it, to be honest. If that were to come up again and they were to approach me, I’d have a chat with them about it.” This is a polite way of saying she thinks this movie is in no way a priority for Dimension right now, and she’s probably right.
I think this is starting to teeter into Ghostbusters 3 territory, where a core group of people who loved the first installments of a franchise are clamoring for a new one. Of course there are some differences here (it’s been 2 years since Scream 4, not 20). But I feel like both franchises have, for different reasons, been irretrievably sucked into the vortex of diminishing returns. Too many people need Scream 5 to be too many different things. A reboot? A straight sequel? Do they kill the original cast? Do they make it found footage? There are almost too many options and with this many cooks in the kitchen it’s impossible to come up with a unifying take. Remember how Scream 4 didn’t really focus on an angle? It would just bring up a new thesis, drop it and then pick up another one? It would take a miracle to keep Scream 5 from exacerbating that issue.
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Look at the Ghostbusters 3 they’re about to make. The characters are written to be too fat to get into their clothes. Egon is blind in one eye. It sounds horribly depressing. And “passing the torch” to “give it new energy” is just pablum, the reality is that these brands are far too valuable for anything creative to actually happen with them – even with a new cast. And Scream 4 started to head into that territory. This was a movie in which Dewey was neither shot nor stabbed but beaten with a bedpan. I’d be praying for a new movie that comes out of left field and surprises me, like Scream did (and like Ghostbusters would have if I could remember seeing it in theaters).
Do you really want Scream 5? Or do you just want something that recaptures the energy of the first Scream? Because I can promise you that those two things are not the same movie.
Pulitzer Prize-winning author Daniel Kraus took the literary world by storm back in 2023 with the release of his hit novel Whalefall. A terrifying yet intimate survival thriller with mythological undertones, the book was almost immediately bombarded with offers from movie studios wanting to adapt its claustrophobic imagery to the big screen.
Fast forward to June of 2026, and we finally got our first glimpse at Brian Duffield’s long-awaited adaptation of Whalefall, starring Austin Abrams as our unfortunate lead who gets swallowed alive by a sperm whale. While this two-and-a-half-minute teaser only covers the beginning of the story, it’s already been making waves online (and in-person at select 4DX promotional screenings) as one of the most stressful cinematic experiences of the year.
In fact, my own wife had to cover her eyes and exclaim, “You’re definitely not dragging me to watch this one” when we saw the whale’s jaws begin to close in on Abrams, with this incident alone already leaving me convinced that this will likely be one of the biggest genre hits of the year. With that in mind, I’d like to invite you to take a closer look at the teaser in order to break down interesting details and get a better idea of what’s in store for genre fans when the movie finally comes out this October.
Of course, as usual, don’t forget to comment below if you noticed something we didn’t!
Now, without further ado, here are five things we learned from the Whalefall trailer!
5. Austin Abrams Performed Many of His Own Stunts
Much like in his previous film, No One Will Save You, Duffield insisted that this visceral experience should be grounded by our main character’s believable reactions, regardless of the plot’s effects-heavy setup. That’s why the camera always makes sure to linger on Abrams through his diving mask, so we know that it’s really him going through this ordeal alongside the audience.
While plenty of CGI was used in order to bring this larger-than-life story to the big screen without killing our leading man, Abrams apparently insisted on performing many of his underwater stunts himself (several of which are visible in the trailer) – much to the chagrin of a worried Duffield and the flick’s stunt coordinator, Shauna Duggins.
4. The Film Seamlessly Transitions Between the California Coast and Underwater Sets
Duffield obviously wasn’t about to drag his crew out to the middle of the ocean and shoot inside a real sperm whale, but it’s reassuring to see the filmmaker blend on-location footage with the underwater tank segments and the literal belly of the whale set.
There may be plenty of CGI stitching these elements together, but the trailer shows us that only the truly impossible shots are completely digital, meaning that the filmmakers didn’t take the easy way out when it came to adapting this unique story.
3. The Whale is Only Part of the Story
Book adaptations tend to leave out inner monologues and the occasional flashback in order to streamline the narrative (which is one reason why it’s so difficult to translate Stephen King novels to the big screen), but a claustrophobic parable like Kraus’ Whalefall would get a bit dull after a while if the whole thing was entirely set within the creature’s stomach.
That’s why it’s such a relief that the trailer hints at how Duffield will also be adapting many of the book’s introspective moments chronicling our protagonist’s harsh upbringing under his troubled father. Not only do these inclusions give the audience some much-appreciated breathing room, but they also give Josh Brolin a chance to shine as a truly complicated character.
2. The Movie is Keeping the Book’s Scientific Accuracy…
While Kraus’ novel was inspired by a viral video of kayakers nearly being swallowed by a humpback whale, the writer ended up consulting with marine biologists about exactly what kind of situation might lead to a whale actually eating a human being alive.
The answer was surprisingly specific, as cetaceans are almost universally known to be friendly towards humans. However, even a gentle giant can make mistakes, and as we see in the trailer, Abrams’ unpleasant fate is more of an accident than anything else – with the massive sperm whale only trapping the poor diver in the first (and thankfully acid-free) chamber of its stomach due to a mix-up involving a giant squid.
Fortunately for the film’s special effects artists, they can now reference the first-ever footage of a real-life sperm whale chowing down on one such squid, as this freaky recording was released late last year.
1. …With a Catch!
Duffield may be doing his best to recreate the grounded (or is it submerged?) thrills of Kraus’ novel, but there are limits to what can be depicted onscreen while still guaranteeing an entertaining movie. That’s why it’s no surprise that Whalefall will take advantage of certain cinematic parlor tricks as the director tests the limits of both physics and biology so we can actually watch his movie.
For starters, the innards of the whale itself have been greatly exaggerated so there’s enough space to make out the action, and in the spirit of movies like Neil Marshall’s The Descent, there also seems to be plenty of non-diegetic lighting meant to show us what’s going on even if Abram’s character wouldn’t necessarily be able to see anything.
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