So this isn’t the 1996 self-aware meta-horror movie, it’s the 2022 self-aware meta-horror sequel. (Or, as characters in the movie tried to call it, a “requel” that’s a combination reboot/sequel, inasmuch as it’s essentially ignoring most everything that happened after the first movie or two.)

It’s basically taking some characters from the original movie (Courteney Cox, David Arquette, Neve Campbell) and a bunch of new characters who are children of other original-movie characters, and then — surprise! — a ghostface killer is on the loose, going after people for mysterious reasons.

In broad outline, it’s basically the same as the recent Halloween “requel” with Jamie Lee Curtis, and it has a lot of that same “older, competent women save the day” energy to it, where modern teens are all stuck in their genre tropes, but the originals who lived through these things decades ago are Not Putting Up With This Shit.

But of course, since it’s Scream, it’s extremely self-aware, with lots of characters talking about how movies like this one work, and David Arquette even giving a reprise/reworking of the famous “the rules” speech. The plot doesn’t really work if you think about it too hard — it relies a lot on coincidences and people having exactly the right reaction at all times — but it has enough internal logic to keep the movie moving forward in a way that makes sense at the time.

If you liked the original movie back when you were young, but haven’t kept up with the franchise since — and this describes me perfectly — this is a solid if unspectacular update to the franchise. I think Halloween does it better, but this one definitely does it with more of a wink.

(And if you hated the original movie — as my wife did — then you’re going to super-hate this one, because it is everything you hated about the first one and then some. This might be the first horror movie we’ve watched together that was mostly for my enjoyment.)