‘Scream’ Movies Ranked on Letterboxd: Did They Get it Right?
I resisted the Letterboxd craze for a long time. Sure, its visual flourishes are nice, and I can’t really scoff at its social capabilities, but for me, the Internet Movie Database remains the preeminent way to catalogue and rate the movies I’ve seen. Everything Letterboxd does, IMDB does it just a tiny bit better (and it did it first). The hype has swelled, however, and now I’m on there. I coast along with just 12 followers, exclusively logging my horror watches for year-end consideration. Resultantly, I’ve been exposed to some pretty whacky ratings, especially when it comes to my favorite slasher franchise of all time—Scream.
My trusty IMDB ratings, with the same account I’ve had since I was 10, don’t have a single entry rated less than 8 for me. Letterboxd is an entirely different beast. It’s like I’ve unmasked the killer, but rather than seeing their face, I’ve been bamboozled. It’s just another mask below a mask. The Letterboxd rankings for each movie in the franchise are wild. Here, I’ll be taking a look at each and (spoiler) disagreeing with almost all of them.
Scream – 4.0
Wes Craven’s original Scream is as perfect a movie as movies get. Kevin Williamson’s script flew in the face of convention, subverting expectations at every possible turn with a clever riff on teen slashers. Even a dozen or more watches in, it manages to surprise and excite. It’s as sharp a meta-commentary as the genre has ever seen, gracing audiences with inimitable final girl Sidney Prescott. It’s a movie I never turn down. If someone wants to watch Scream, I’m watching Scream. If Scream is on cable, I’m watching Scream on cable. While I wish the rating on Letterboxd were a little higher, it is fitting that the first—and best—sits comfortably at the top of the list, with a pretty huge margin between it and the next entry. As a classic, it deserves to tower over its brethren.
Scream (2022) – 3.4
Radio Silence’s revitalized Scream likely ranks second by dint of recency alone. Not even a year old yet, it has still managed to log more ratings and reviews than even Craven’s original. The first and so far only entry (until the forthcoming Scream 6) entry not directed by Wes Craven, 2022’s Scream was a welcome breath of fresh air. With the franchise sitting dormant for over a decade, fans were rightfully wary of what a new entry would bring. Imbuing Williamson’s clever meta-commentary with Craven-esque tension, Scream didn’t just feel like an homage. It felt like an organic entry in the franchise, one Wes Craven himself would have been proud of. It propelled the franchise into the new decade. While time will tell whether it was more than just a fluke, it’s a fitting revitalization of a horror icon.
That being said, whether it’s the second best in the franchise is debatable. While a wistful audience might look kindly on it, and for as much as I love what Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett managed to accomplish, it’s not up there with 2 or 4. With Scream, Radio Silence is still working within the constraints of franchise expectations. Scream 6 is another beastie entirely. There, they’re poised to draw fresh blood with an exercise in terror wholly untethered to the past.
Scream 2 – 3.3
Scream 2 just barely edges out Scream 4. While their numeric ranking is the same, Scream 2 has logged around 3,000 more reviews than 4, and resultantly, its 3.3 ranking is just a bit stronger than 4’s. With the best opening in the franchise, Scream 2 wildly exceeded expectations. Constrained by a truncated production schedule (Scream 2 was released less than a year after the first), script leaks, and behemoth expectations, it’s a miracle Scream 2 is as good as it is. Controversial as it might be to say, but 2 is arguably on par with the first. Bringing a different, gory flavor to the table, they’re hard to compare side by side. But make no mistake—Scream 2 is no less a classic than the original. Laurie Metcalf all day, baby.
Scream 4 – 3.3
Scream 4 has been critically reevaluated since release in 2011. Its ending especially, one that sees Emma Roberts’ Jill slicing up her friends and family for internet fame, resonates stronger today than it did at the time of release. The cast is uniformly strong, too, even if Scream 4 committed a cardinal sin in ostensibly killing every new player off. At the time of release, Hayden Panettiere’s Kirby was left for dead, begging the question; if this was supposed to launch a new trilogy, how exactly was that going to be done? It would take over a decade for Scream 4’s elevated motives to come to fruition. It’s the rare case of a past entry improving with the release of a sequel. In a canonical timeline that includes 2022’s Scream, 4 is rendered considerably stronger and fresher than it looked way back yonder.
Still, it’s probably in the right place. As much as it pains me to say, no one seemed as present as they could have been here. Scream 4 looks weird, has a wildly vacillating tone, and feels more like a bottle massacre than anything. The connective tissue is there in theory, but it never coalesces quite as strongly as other franchise entries. In fact, an argument could be made it’s the weakest in the franchise, with Scream 3 more deserving of this second-to-last spot.
Scream 3 – 2.9
Why all the Scream 3 hate, Scream fans? Rotten Tomatoes has infamously conceded the third entry in Craven’s original trilogy as “falling back on the same old horror formulas and cliches it once hacked and slashed with postmodern abandon.” Scream 3 knows what it is. Time has been kind to Craven’s ostensible final bow with the franchise. The first (at the time) entry not scripted by series scribe Kevin Williamson, Scream 3 certainly feels different than what came before it. Yet, where Scream 4 and Scream (2022) at times posture as more serious than they are, 3 never endeavors to be more than a hoot. It knows it’s deeply silly. It knows it’s retconning what audiences know, sprinkling some supernatural shenanigans on a series that didn’t need them.
Parker Posey’s Jennifer Jolie is the best evidence of that. Contemporaneous critics evaluated Scream 3 as something it wasn’t. They shifted audience expectations toward something Craven and company never intended to deliver. Scream 3 is wildly creative, ridiculous, funny (the funniest in the series), and features the best iteration of Sidney Prescott the franchise has ever seen. Try not to get chills as she shouts, “Do you know why you kill people Roman? Do you? Because you choose to. There is no one else to blame!” Go get him, Sidney.
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