After much anticipation, Scream 7 finally hits screens this weekend, and it gives us another frightful showdown with a new Ghostface killer who has taken their love of seventh installments in a horror franchise one step too far. The series has been known for many things, but perhaps its most horrific tradition is its killer opening scenes, which typically set the tone for the rest of the film. Will Scream 7’s opening scene measure up? We’ll have to watch to find out, but until then, here is our ranking of the Scream opening scenes ahead of the seventh installment.

6. Scream VI (2023) – A Fun Fake Out That Wastes Its Opening Star Cameo

Let’s start by saying that the opening scene of Scream VI isn’t bad; it’s just that when you have Samara Weaving featured, the hope is that it will just deliver a bit more. Weaving portrays Blackmore University professor Laura Crane, who is waiting at a bar on a date. She begins receiving texts from her prospective suitor, indicating that he’s having issues finding the bar. Laura is soon lured into a seedy New York City alley, where it’s soon revealed that she has been catfished by a Ghostface killer who quickly dispatches her. It’s soon revealed that her date is her student Jason Carvey (Tony Revolori), and that is when the opening scene takes an interesting turn.

Jason is plotting with his roommate, Greg Bruckner (Thom Newell), to kill sisters Sam and Tara Carpenter (Melissa Barrera and Jenna Ortega) so that they can finish the “movie” that Richie (Jack Quaid) and Amber (Mikey Madison) plotted to make from the previous film. However, everything takes another turn when Jason is killed by another Ghostface, which sets up a new round of terror for the sixth installment. The opening scene does succeed by diving into some clever subversion by taking the typical call and kill set-up and turning it on its head with the early Ghostface for Weaving’s character, and then setting the scene in the middle of the action (Jason runs into Tara and her friends on his way from murdering Laura).

The issue is how much Weaving is wasted for the scene, but it should be noted that her previous work with directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett is why she’s featured here, and there are reports that she may have received a bigger role had she not been busy on another project. It still ends up being a fun scene in the end, but it lacks the complete punch of the previous openings, despite the killer closing line of “Who gives a f**k about movies?” before the infamous title card.

5. Scream 3 (2000) – An Opening Victim That Mattered But More Tension Was Needed

Scream 3 has its issues, and some of them begin during the film’s opening scene, although it was a smart move to have it involve a high-profile victim that the audience was already familiar with. The film opens with Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber), from the previous two installments, cruising down the busy streets of Los Angeles. Cotton is now a talk show host, and he has been contacted by a new Ghostface killer who is demanding the location of Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell). The fake-out here is the introduction of a new voice changer that allows the killer to mimic other voices rather than just using Roger Jackson’s signature vocal frights. Before demanding Sidney’s location, the killer disguises his voice as a woman who calls Cotton by mistake, but soon turns it into flirtatious banter to initially get his attention.

Once it’s made clear that this is no mistaken sexy call, it’s revealed that the killer is inside the home that he shares with his girlfriend Christine (Kelly Rutherford). The action soon shifts to her location, where the killer uses the new voice changer to imitate Cotton’s voice before engaging in a stalk and chase with Christine throughout the home. Cotton soon arrives and, thanks to the killer’s bait & switch with the voice, Christine believes Cotton has gone nuts and begins attacking him. Before it’s all said and done, both are taken out by Ghostface as a new installment begins. Cotton Weary makes for a good opening scene victim because it raises the stakes for the audience since they have come to know him across the previous films.

The issue with the opening scene is that, once it switches to focus on Christine, it’s hard to muster up much interest because Rutherford, at the time known more for her role on Melrose Place before gaining bigger fame on Gossip Girl, isn’t as high-profile as the previous opening scene victims. The opening also lacks the dread and tension of the previous Scream openings, which is surprising because director Wes Craven made both of those openings cook. It’s an opening that lacks punch, but it’s significant because it chose to dispatch Cotton and gave the franchise an opening with a familiar character that made it clear their fate was definitely sealed.

4. Scream 4 (2011) – Lacks Frights But Is Cleverly Meta In Its Execution

Scream 4 is likely the sequel that has gotten better notices from fans since its initial release because of being a bit ahead of its time in its examination of the negative impact of social media. It’s also a clever installment in many ways, and this begins during the film’s opening scene, which is working on meta overload, but it gets points because it pulls the rug out from underneath the audience more than a few times. The opening scene features appearances from high-profile names like Anna Paquin, Kristen Bell, and Lucy Hale, but uses them in a clever way to fake out the audience.

The opening features two teenagers (Hale and Shenae Grimes) who are contacted by a Ghostface killer, only to be brutally murdered. It’s then revealed that they’re characters from the movie-within-a-movie Stab 6, which began as an adaptation of Gale Weathers’ (Courteney Cox) book The Woodsboro Murders. The film is being watched by another pair of characters (Paquin and Bell) at their home, and it appears that the movie sparks one of them to murder the other until it’s revealed that they’re characters from Stab 7, which is being watched by Marnie Cooper (Britt Robertson) and Jenny Randall (Aimee Teegarden), who are real characters featured in Scream 4.

Eventually, they are stalked and killed by the actual Ghostface killer, which kicks off the story for the fourth film. Admittedly, once the opening turns to the more traditional Scream blueprint, it lacks a bit of bite (this part of the opening was reshot and retooled), but the cleverness of what comes before it and its commentary on horror movie tropes make it stand out. It’s a wonderfully ambitious sequence that Craven handles masterfully, and Kevin Williamson writes with his tongue firmly in his cheek. It might not be riddled with as much dread and tension as the other openings, but it’s a lot of fun and sets the tone for what turned out to be a solid fourth outing with this franchise.

3. Scream (2022) – A Solid Opening That Recalls The Franchise’s Roots

It was anyone’s guess how the fifth installment of the franchise would open following the big gap between its release and Scream 4, with the added pressure that Craven, who had sadly passed away between films, was now replaced by the Radio Silence duo of Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett However, any fears were put to rest when the opening of Scream (2022) turned out to be an exercise in unrelenting tension which also featured one hell of a performance from our opening scene victim, Jenna Ortega.

It has been twenty-five years since the events of the first movie, and high school student Tara Carpenter (Ortega) is home alone when she begins receiving calls from Ghostface. Given the lore of the town of Woodsboro and the release of several Stab films, Tara doesn’t buy the threat at first, but it soon becomes very real for her, which turns the opening into one hell of a ride. With this film being a legacy sequel, a certain amount of fan service was expected, so it was a stroke of genius to have the opening mirror the Drew Barrymore opening scene from 1996’s Scream in several ways. It’s a fun callback to the first movie and proof that the creatives wanted to take things back a bit to how it all began. It pays homage to the cleverness and terror of the first movie, even if it doesn’t quite match its effectiveness.

This isn’t meant as a dig whatsoever since that opening is hard to top, but where the opening does surprise is that it’s ultimately revealed that Tara survived her attack, and this is used to set up a brand new story involving her and her sister Sam (Barrera). The opening of Scream (2022) surprised in so many ways, with its biggest victory lap being that it held its own against the better openings that have become a staple of the franchise.

2. Scream 2 (1997) – Proof That Being In A Crowded Movie Theater Doesn’t Mean You’re Safe

Craven had already cooked up one hell of an opening with the first movie and likely knew that he had to use all of his suspense skills to try to match what made that film’s opening so iconic. With the help of clever writing from Williamson, the pair craft something very different, but ultimately very terrifying, that comes so very close to generating the same breath-stopping frights of the first film’s beginning minutes. The opening begins with two Windsor College seniors, Maureen Evans (Jada Pinkett-Smith) and Phil Stevens (Omar Epps), attending a sneak preview of the film Stab, which is based on the events of the Woodsboro murders from the first film.

After some witty banter, Phil leaves the theater to head to the restroom and is killed by someone wearing a Ghostface costume, leaving Maureen alone in a crowded theater with others dressed up as Ghostface for the sneak preview event. The killer in the Ghostface costume then sits in Phil’s place next to Maureen, wearing his jacket, which makes her believe that her boyfriend has returned. As the action of the film-within-a-film escalates, the killer stabs Maureen as she sits in her seat and continues to repeatedly slash her as the raucous crowd cheers it on. It’s not until Maureen climbs on stage to cry for help that the crowd learns this is no publicity stunt and something very real as she falls dead before the Scream 2 title card slashes onto the screen.

The opening is full of meta-commentary as soon as it opens, with the characters commenting on films and horror movie tropes. The most pointed and funny commentary is Maureen speaking about how women are sexualized in horror films and the genres lacks of racial diversity (there is honestly something darkly funny about how Black people typically die first in horror films, only to have two featured prominently in an opening scene where this is likely to happen). The opening also introduces audiences to the Stab films, with Heather Graham being featured as Drew Barrymore’s Casey Becker in the action taking place in the movie the characters are watching.

Perhaps the most sinister thing about the opening, which honestly allows it to stand tall with the grisliness of the first opening, is its commentary on how desensitized audiences have become to violence that it can unfold right in front of them, and they won’t do a thing to stop it because they doubt the validity of it. Scream 2’s opening ends up being highly funny but also a dark view of audience spectatorship, as this public declaration of violence says a lot about society as a whole.

1. Scream (1996) – Still An Iconic Masterclass Of Escalating Tension

What else can be said about the opening scene of 1996’s Scream that hasn’t been said already? It shocked audiences and critics alike with its boldness to kill off a big star like Drew Barrymore during its first few minutes, and it set the tone for a franchise that has continued to thrive for nearly thirty years. The film opens in Woodsboro, California, with high school student Casey Becker (Barrymore) home alone as she begins to receive phone calls from a mysterious caller. It all seems like fun and games as they discuss horror films until the call becomes a clear and sadistic threat against her life. Soon, the caller on the phone reveals that her boyfriend Steve Orth (Kevin Patrick Walls) is tied up outside, and he demands that she answer various questions about horror movies to save his life.

When Casey gives an incorrect answer about Friday the 13th, Steve is killed, and Casey is soon pursued by a figure wearing a Ghostface costume, which ultimately results in her being stabbed to death, disemboweled, and hung from a tree for her parents to find. It’s widely known now that this sequence is what made Dimension Films believe that they actually had something unique with Scream, something Craven knew would be the case as well, since he felt the film wouldn’t work for them if he couldn’t pull it off. The Master of Suspense threw all of his creative juices into the scene and expertly brought Williamson’s frightfully funny yet terrifying opening to life.

This opening has since become the gold standard for a lot of horror movies, particularly slasher films, that believe they have to start things with a similar bang. Barrymore was originally brought on board to portray Sidney Prescott, a role that ultimately went to Campbell, but it was reportedly her idea to change direction and portray the opening scene victim because she knew, based on her professional stature, audiences would be shocked to see her killed so early in the movie. What results is Barrymore becoming a Janet Leigh for a brand new horror generation, and Scream setting a new tone for the genre that was desperately needed at the time. This is a prime example of ten out of ten. No notes.

Scream 7 hits screens this Friday.

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