Warning: Spoilers for Scream below!
2022's Scream knows how confusing its own title is and even makes fun of it in the movie. The fifth-moving in the long-running franchise that began with 1996's Wes Craven-directed movie, Scream brings back legacy characters Sidney Prescott, Dewey Riley, and Gale Weathers to once again face off against a masked Ghostface killer. This time, though, things are a little bit different — including the title of the film.
Each of the Scream sequels has followed the traditional model of sequel titling, using simple numerical order to identify each successive movie. It was revealed early on, though, that the fifth movie would simply be titled Scream and several reasons were given for this. After Craven's passing in 2015, it was unclear if another Scream movie would even be made, but directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett (who are known for helming acclaimed horror-comedy Ready Or Not) wanted to move forward with a film that would both reinvigorate the franchise for a new generation while honoring Scream's original director. Still, the simple title of Scream has led to much confusion surrounding the movie — and that is something the 2022 movie is keenly aware of.
2022's Scream features many scenes that are now commonplace in the franchise. After Ghostface's return, the group of Woodsboro teens he is now targeting sit down to discuss the rules to survive a horror movie. Since it's been over a decade since Scream 4, though, things in the horror landscape have changed dramatically and Jasmin Savoy Brown's Mindy Meeks-Martin explains that they are now in a "requel" — a movie that is part sequel, part reboot. Mindy, who is the niece of Jamie Kennedy's original Scream character Randy, cites the 2018 Halloween requel as an example of a movie that adopts the name of a horror franchise's first movie, continuing the story of the franchise while retconning past sequels.
The Scream universe even has its own version of a requel. The Stab franchise, which is an in-universe stand-in for the Scream movies, is now on its eighth film and, like the real-life movie, is simply titled Stab. The eighth Stab movie is cited as the worst of the franchise by many characters in the film and is poked fun of constantly (it was even directed by who they call "the Knives Out guy," Rian Johnson). Johnson notably directed Star Wars sequel The Last Jedi, which inspired a slew of online toxicity from the fandom, tying into the ending of Scream and Ghostface's motive.
When Amber Freeman and Richie Kirsch are revealed as the pair behind the Ghostface mask, their motivations are laid bare and it's revealed that the whole reason they are killing people in Woodsboro is because of the requel Stab movie and how much they hated it. Just as the 1996 movie was hyper-aware of the horror movie landscape, so too is 2022's Scream. The recent requel trend shows no signs of slowing down, with trilogy capper Halloween Ends coming out this year, Netflix rebooting The Texas Chainsaw Massacre with a direct sequel to the original movies, and a brand-new new Exorcist sequel trilogy being produced by Blumhouse with Ellen Burstyn returning. With all the confusion surrounding these new titles, it would've been a major miss if Scream didn't acknowledge the title. Luckily, they are fully aware of just how confounding sequel culture is in this era.