- "Scream 6" adds a fresh twist to the franchise's iconic opening kill sequence.
- Writers James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick unmask an amateur Ghostface almost immediately.
Sequels always go bigger, and "Scream 6" does exactly that with the action moving to New York as Sam (Melissa Barrera) and Tara Carpenter (Jenna Ortega) try and start afresh after Richie Kirsch's (Jack Quaid) reign of terror through Woodsboro in 2022's "Scream."
But like any good "Scream" movie, the 2023 sequel kicks things off with a surprising opening kill sequence that keeps things fresh.
It starts with Ghostface luring Professor Laura Crane (Samara Weaving) into an alley to butcher her. After the kill, he unmasks himself as a student, Jason Carvey, played by Tony Revolori.
While Carvey goes back to his apartment, it isn't long before the film's true Ghostface surfaces and kills Jason for trying to steal the limelight. It's a fresh take on the typical slasher opening that lets audiences know the film is going to keep them on their toes once again.
Speaking to Insider, writers Guy Busick and James Vanderbilt recalled how they both came up with the same concept "independently of each other."
—Insider Entertainment (@insiderent) May 12, 2023
Busick explained: "On our first story session, I sort of pitched him this idea of like, 'OK, we're with Ghostface. Ghostface does a kill. Takes the mask off. Then we follow Ghostface and he's infiltrated the friend group. And then that Ghostface gets the call and then we go from there.'"
"He sort of had this look on his face and I was like, 'Oh, I'm bombing. This is terrible, isn't it?'" Busick recalled of Vanderbilt's reaction.
"And he holds up his notepad, and it says the same thing. It's like: 'Ghostface takes off mask. We follow Ghostface.' And I'm like, 'Boom! We're on the same page.' And that's what really got us excited."
Busick added: "That was one of the many things that got us excited about the movie. The other being, you know, the New York setting and like all the stuff we could do there. But that was one of our first ideas."
The writers both wanted to have three Ghostfaces hunting Sam and Tara, but the identities of the terrible trio changed while they were trying to figure out the story, and it wasn't originally Richie's family coming for revenge.
"It was always a family, but not necessarily Richie's," said Vanderbilt. "And then as we talked about it, we were like, 'This is the cleanest way to do it.' And Kevin Williamson talks about the great thing about most of these movies is that at the end of the day, the motive is always something primal."
He added: "It's Billy with Sidney and her mom. It's Nancy Loomis with Sidney. It always sort of goes back to something very primal, and this felt like the most cleanest and sort of primal thing of family versus family."
"Scream 6" is available to download and keep on video-on-demand now, and is available on DVD and Blu-ray from July 10.