Culture Crash: Halloween Horror

Now that it’s October, it’s that time of year when so many of us look for some Halloween-themed thrills and get into that spooky autumn vibe that the internet loves so much.

While I found the WB horror film, Malignant, which is streaming on HBO Max through October 10, to be a huge disappointment, the service does have some other familiar titles that may be worth checking out or revisiting.

The Scream franchise was a pop culture sensation in the 1990s, but as a child of the 90s, I had never seen them until recently. Though the series does offer diminishing returns as it goes on, and has little to say in Scream 3, I still found myself to be blown away by the first two films, especially the original Scream.

Something of a meta-commentary on horror movies from a master of the genre, Wes Craven, Scream sees a group of high schoolers searching to avoid being killed by a masked murderer, while also deconstructing the horror genre and providing some laughs along the way. Funny enough to be considered a comedy and scary enough to be a horror film, Scream truly looks at what makes audiences crave horror films, what role violent entertainment plays in America, and more. Additionally, I found it to be the rare high school horror movie that really seems to understand what being in high school is like. Scream isn’t sanitized like a Disney film would be, but it also doesn’t treat its characters like full-grown adults. They stay on the phone a little too long, they express feelings they may not fully understand, and they feel very real.

Often, a 20-to-30 year old franchise will feel dated, but the original Scream felt like it could have come out last week, and I really found a lot to enjoy in the popcorn thrills of the 1990s.

Scream, Scream 2 and, if you’re willing to push your luck, Scream 3 are now streaming on HBO Max.