Over three years of anticipation, the last season of “Scream,” the TV series, left me excited to see what would happen next after the cliffhanger ending.
But, much to my surprise season three started with a new set of characters and storyline that didn’t reference anything that happened in the earlier seasons.
I thought to myself, “Great a remake of a remake.” But I decided to watch the six episodes that make up this third season anyways.
I quickly shuddered at this new season, the new characters stuck out to me the most, with the majority of their lines being flat and just plain awful.
As the series begins with the main characters in detention — a Breakfast Club style set up — my eyes rolled out of their sockets.
But what made it worse? The group named themselves the Deadfast Club after the murders started.
Beth, a horror movie fanatic who uses the tropes of horror movies to decide what the group will do next, was another aspect I had a problem with. Beth is a duplicate of a former character Noah Foster, and many characters this season follow this duplicate style.
The elements of the show that tried to mirror earlier seasons and the “Scream” movie franchise were the parts that felt the most awkward and forced.
We are in a time where things are being constantly remade and rebooted. I get trying to introduce a beloved story to a new generation, but the remake has to be changed slightly from the original so that things don’t feel awkward or forced.
This is why the first two seasons of the “Scream” TV series worked because it was different than the “Scream” movies. With multiple serial killers and the mystery of Emma’s mom “dating” the serial killer who was loose when she was in high school made the show less predictable and actually enjoyable.
Don’t get me wrong, the third season worked in some ways. The show would have been fairly decent if it hadn’t tried so hard to be something that it just wasn’t.
With aspects like a woman being the serial killer, which is unexpected as it is not overdone and gives the show a sense of diversity.
And characters who didn’t try to mimic other characters in the franchise, like Kym, actually gave depth to the show and made it enjoyable to watch.
The show also explored some social issues that neither movies or the earlier seasons even touched. One of them being the racial issues that our country still faces today, as Kym is not taken seriously whenever she talks to authority figures as a person of color. So after that Kym always brings Beth with her to talk to the police officers, because as Kym says, “having a white girl around establishes credibility.”
I would recommend checking this show out it if you enjoy gory horror, but not if you are a diehard fan of the “Scream” franchise because you’ll be disappointed like I was.
Nicole Hindberg can be reached at [email protected]