Horror cinema has enjoyed growing popularity lately and is among the few genres to perform fairly consistently well even amid the three years (and still going) of Covid pandemic. Scream VI is one of the best and best received such films, continuing and improving a great revival of a beloved franchise. To find out more about the film’s superior quality and approach to the slasher genre, I spoke with editor Jay Prychidny about horror storytelling and his work on the latest entry in the Scream series.
Official poster for “Scream VI”
Scream VI grossed an impressive $168.5 million at the box office, the highest gross yet for the Scream franchise. This is off a $30-35 million production budget, for a healthy profit margin and inevitable strong numbers on home entertainment.
Indeed, Scream VI released on Digital this Tuesday, April 25th, ahead of a July 11th debut in a 4K UHD SteelBook, plus the usual releases on 4K UHD, Blu-ray, and DVD on that date as well. While home release doesn’t deliver the huge numbers it used to put up, it’s still plenty to make the studio happy and particularly profitable with these lower or more modestly budgeted films.
I’ve been a casual fan of the Scream franchise at best, to be honest. I liked the first couple of films but never fell in love with them the way many other horror fans and cinephiles did. I saw the third and fourth films much later after their releases, and again felt they were fine but generally not as good as the first two.
It was the 2022 revival film Scream that won me over finally to the series in a stronger way, and now this year’s arrival of Scream VI cemented it for me — I’m officially a Scream fan.
What follows will be a spoilerish discussion of the film’s themes and interesting approach to a now six-film-old concept, as well as my interview with the Scream VI film editor Jay Prychidny, so proceed with some caution if you’ve yet to watch this film — and you should, I recommend it, as you’ll soon find out if you read on!
Paying attention rewards viewers with hints along the way, including the physical attributes of the killer from one attack to the next. The characterizations of even minor characters get enough attention to make them feel legitimately incredulous about what’s happening, and about the explanations given along the way.
The film takes the killings out of typical slasher movie locales and setups even more than previous chapters did, bringing it all out into the sunny day to day world and otherwise banal public places. A convenience store delivers one of the best early horror sequences of the series, and demonstrates how this sequel steps off the traditional path to examine the concepts dragged out of their meta presentations. This makes the story, characters, and horror more visceral and immediate by their proximity to a world and places we recognize as our own.
The meta elements of the Scream franchise overall take a different turn in the latest chapter, as Scream VI moves beyond the meta-humor self-awareness of its genre existence, and instead posits homicidal motivations move beyond soap opera or thrill-killings or movie-obsessions. It still includes characters directly perpetuating a “franchise rules” narrative and setup, but usually only to prove them not just wrong but irrelevant.
Indeed, the killers this time around are far less impressed by or concerned with adhering to the genre tropes, often (and sometimes literally) walking over them in pursuit of a whole new kind of masked mass murder spree.
Official poster image for “Scream VI”
Yet some of the overarching “franchise rules” wind up actually true, but not for the reasons presumed by their assertion and setup. Instead, the introduction of this set of rules is presented directly to the killers themselves after initial killings and attacks failed to actually reflect a template until the meta-character uses them as the basis for the rest of the “rules.” So the killers take these assumptions and use them to their advantage, to misdirect the other characters and the audience, until things come full circle back to the rules themselves when it fulfills them.
Thus is a new layer of self-awareness introduced into the series, and it’s interesting not only for its own mechanics and how it helps distinguish this entry in the Scream franchise, but also because it would seem to set up and tease a sequel taking this new approach a step further with a familial “killer instinct” manifesting (which is surely a feint to set up a different sibling as the killer, or even more likely a setup making us think that’s the twist before — ta-da! — Sidney is revealed as the real killer?).
While there’s a limit to how many such layers can be piled on before it bogs the series down, for now it’s working like a charm.
There’s also a clear and interesting theme about inadequate men who resent women, with references to the so-called (and self-proclaimed) “incel” movement. This isn’t merely a theme in Scream VI — although the film definitely intentionally presents it as an overt theme — but also a subtext often present in other horror pictures even when it goes unrecognized or (as is usually the case) isn’t intended as a theme.
An aside I can’t help mentioning: My shortlist of casting preferences for Lois Lane in James Gunn’s upcoming Superman: Legacy reboot film continues to grow, with Scream VI star Melissa Barrera the latest contender. Costar Jenna Ortega is no doubt on some lists for the role, and would obviously also be a good choice (similar to Karen Allen when she would’ve made a great alternate casting of the character in the Christopher Reeve movies) if a bit young depending on who is cast as Superman.
Getting back to Scream VI itself, the film is elevated not only by a terrific cast, strong writing by James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick (who also penned the 2022 revival film Scream), and excellent directing by Matt Bettinelli-olpin and Tyler Gillett (who directed the 2022 revival), but also by the most complicated editing of the franchise to date.
Jay Prychidny had to utilize several different approaches and genre styles for Scream VI, and the character work is especially impressive here. Prychidny achieves some of the most fluid and natural pacing I’ve seen in a slasher film, and I was reminded of the horror film X which was edited by the film’s director Ti West and David Kashevaroff, and that film’s sequel Pearl (also edited by director West).
That’s good company to be in, obviously, and it made me excited to get Prychidny’s thoughts on several topics concerning Scream VI, horror editing, and film editing. So without further ado, here is my exchange with Scream VI film editor Jay Prychidny…
MARK HUGHES: How did this movement away from the traditional expectations of slasher narratives and rules, while retaining some elements just when the audience thinks it’s been subverted, change with this film as compared to the previous installments?
JAY PRYCHIDNY: The modern horror audience is so incredibly savvy, and I think the Scream fans are perhaps the savviest of all! To delight and surprise such a knowledgeable fanbase is certainly a daunting challenge.
The directors, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, and I are certainly well aware that the fans have an encyclopedic knowledge of the franchise. Luckily, since we are also huge fans, we do as well! So we are able to get inside the heads of our fans to some degree and, hopefully, play with their expectations in a fun way.
As the editor, my main contribution in this regard was playing with the rhythm and pace of scenes in fresh ways for the series. If we can’t surprise our audience with what happens, at least we can surprise them with when.
This often meant elongating scenes to slightly unnatural lengths, such as Mindy looking around the darkened subway for the killer. The idea was to create a sense of prolonged unease and fear. The audience knows the other shoe has to drop, and the overlong length hopefully has them on the edge of their seat waiting for it.
One of the biggest subversions of this “slasher” film is really the fact that all the main characters survive. I’m pretty sure no one really saw that one coming.
So many modern pop culture plot twists center around which beloved character will meet a shocking and untimely death. I think it’s a fun subversion that this film doesn’t play into that, though I do know some fans disagree. Editorially, the benefit is that we can end the film in an exhilarating, upbeat, and almost “feel-good” tone. It’s so fun to see audiences leave the theater in such an energized rush. The directors and I often talked about this film as a secret “feel-good” movie, and maybe that’s the biggest subversion of all.
MH: Can you tell me about how slasher films differ from other subgenres of horror in terms of pacing and editing?
JP: Well, I really see the editing of Scream as being different from even other slashers. For one, the character work is of such primary importance. In other slashers, audiences are fans of Jason, Freddy, Jigsaw, or Michael Myers. The victim characters often exist just for the body count.
In Scream, audiences have always loved the characters and mourn them if they die. This has always presented unique tonal challenges. The films need to balance fun and scary thrills with making the events land on our characters with emotional gravitas, but without bogging the film down in overbearing trauma. Quite a little high-wire act.
But for me, the other thing that differentiates the Scream series from other horror films is the suspense aspect. So often, what’s fun about the kills isn’t the kills themselves but the lead-up to them — that delicious moment of tension when the audience sees something coming before the characters do.
One of my primary desires in coming to edit this film was to marinate in those moments of suspense as much as possible and give the audience those uneasy tingles of fear and delight. I love hearing those nervous audience giggles when they realize what’s about to go down.
These are some of my favorite moments in the Scream franchise, such as Sidney talking on the phone to the killer when she thinks it’s Randy, or Sidney and Haillie crawling over the passed-out Ghostface in the police cruiser. In Scream VI, we had a few opportunities to create these classic Scream suspense scenarios, such as the happy Core Four dinner scene when the audience knows Ghostface is attacking Quinn in the bedroom or when Gale approaches a passed-out Ghostface in her apartment. For me, the fun as an editor is discovering how much you can juice these moments for maximum suspense before it starts to fall apart.
MH: What are the key differences you bring to editing a character-driven horror as compared to editing an action and scares-driven horror?
JP: The character scenes were really important for myself and the directors, and we were very protective of them.
The scene in the University quad after the frat party, for instance, where the two sisters argue it out, was a very key scene for all of us. Chad and Tara’s kiss, the Core Four dinner party, and the sister scenes towards the film’s end are essential in getting the audience to fall in love with these characters.
We all had some worries that these scenes might become a target in an effort to reduce running time, but thankfully everyone was on board with this vision of the film! There’s such a wonderful emotion in all of them.
I think what sets the Scream films apart from other horror movies is that, at heart, they are really about love, both the audience’s love for the characters and the characters’ love for each other. So when editing, I’m always looking to highlight those special moments of love between the characters. It could be the way a character looks at another, but it infuses the scenes with an emotional relatability and a special feeling that really makes you connect with the characters.
The original films had such beloved characters as Sidney, Dewey, Gale, Randy, and others, so it was important for me to try to get the new characters on that same level. I personally think we did some great work in achieving that. By the end of this film, even as a long-time Scream fan, Sam and Tara do legitimately feel like the new franchise leads to me.
MH: The violence this time feels rawer and more brutal, which says a lot for this series — do you edit differently depending on the level and brutality of the violence? Does a more gory scene require faster editing, for example, or is it simply driven by whatever is transpiring? I assume some attention to the pacing within such scenes will affect the way it lands — and no pun intended, but a great example is how the rapid-fire pace of the apartment attack at the midpoint suddenly slows during the ladder escape, and we’ve been racing so fast by that point that the sudden slamming on the breaks brings us to the edge of our seats exactly the way you wanted.
JP: I absolutely love cutting action and movement and see it as a specialty of mine. I always try to make my editing feel fresh, visceral, and surprising, and when you apply that to editing violence, it really just enhances it even more. I almost don’t think of the gore, or I’ve just become desensitized to it.
To me, it’s about the rhythm, sound, and dynamic impact of the cutting. I want to make the hits and impacts as strong as possible. Part of that is definitely sound, but it’s also just trying to find ways of varying the rhythm to make a stab really surprising. We’ve all seen dozens of stabs in movies, so it’s not shocking anymore. The only thing you really have to play with is how and when the stabs happen.
It was very gratifying to see the film with test audiences because there would be huge reaction moments even though many scenes were missing the CGI knife and gore. For example, Sam stabbing Ethan several times in the shoulder is a huge cheer moment, and I think part of that is because it’s not really led up to. It just happens in an abrupt, surprising, and aggressive way.
I always try to make the cut work without visual effects and not rely on the hope that the VFX will somehow make a cut better.
Varying up pace in sequences is something that I love to do as well. I just love the feeling of rapid-fire scenes, such as the apartment attack, because it gives audiences a kind of breathless, exhilarated feeling. But something fast doesn’t feel fast unless it’s beside something slow, so you do have to pick your moments strategically with how and when to make those shifts.
MH: There’s even more attention to the criminal investigation side this time, which introduces the procedural element into the equation. There’s similarity of course in the procedural and the murder mystery structure, the latter being a long tradition within Scream films obviously. How did this impact your editing process? Did you refer to any specific films across genres in this regard?
JP: The procedural element does really stand out in this film, compared to some of the others, and it was something that the directors and I noticed early on as a key element to this film’s interest and drama.
The mystery element is always a huge part of any Scream film, but I think this is the first time since the original Scream where that investigation has been a primary driving force of the plot. That was actually one of my favorite parts of the original film when I saw it back in 1996, so I was thrilled to get to play in that sandbox.
I have edited a number of faux-procedurals — ones that aren’t straight representations of the genre. Orphan Black, Altered Carbon, The Alienist, Snowpiercer, and Wednesday all have very strong procedural elements within a genre wrapper, so I’ve learned quite a lot about giving those investigation scenes a fun mystery vibe while also keeping it a bit hard-boiled.
Dermot Mulroney provided many different performance options in his scenes, but I loved playing his character straight with that sardonic humor just bubbling under the surface. It brings a kind of electric tension to his scenes, such as the interrogation of Sam and Tara, which otherwise could have felt too expository or two-dimensional.
MH: For me, this installment stands out in particular because the killers’ motives weren’t movie-obsession or thrill-killing or soap-opera backstory about people and events we’ve never seen or heard of. I like the series, but never felt much sense of stronger motivation for the massacres until this film. You really get a sense of it beneath the surface, even before we’ve got enough clues to piece it together, which is hard to do but it worked well here. And I get a sense this works because there’s such a strong undercurrent of characterization and emotion here, working in both directions actually from all of the heroes and victims but also from the killers and even relatively minor supporting characters.
Can you talk about how the editing around these relationships and arcs, some of them interwoven and others with their own through-lines, affects your approach to the editing?
JP: That’s amazing to hear! I think what I most wanted to bring to the killer reveal was a sense of emotional gravity. It’s somewhat of a tradition in the Scream series for the killers to get very big and crazy in the last act, and this film is certainly no exception. Dermot Mulroney especially came to play with a huge performance in the third act, and there are many dozens of ways this scene could have been tonally constructed in the editing.
In my history of editing complex villains — Orphan Black, in particular, comes to mind — it’s been drummed into me to make them as multi-layered and emotionally complex as possible. So I literally took every opportunity I could find to layer the killer’s motivation in as much real emotion as possible.
The moment when Sam figures out the killers are Richie’s family, and we see this truth land on all of them, is a surprisingly hard-hitting moment. I surprised myself during a watch-through of the film with a test audience that it actually made me tear up.
These third-act reveals are always fun because of how melodramatic and over-the-top they are, but I did want to temper that with real emotional weight so it doesn’t just become a cartoon. And, like so many other character scenes in the film, I did this by focusing on the love that Richie’s family had for him. The more you feel what they’ve lost, the more you understand their motivation.
I definitely do have to credit the writing of James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick, though, who really did an incredible job of making the mystery element of the film all make sense on paper. When you go back and analyze the film a second time, all the kills really do make sense in terms of the motivation. There are no random kills like in some of the other films. So having that strong spine to work from really made my job a lot easier, as I could focus on fleshing out the character undercurrents throughout the story.
Whenever I edit a mystery, I always aim to make the ending feel inevitable yet surprising – a bit of an oxymoron. That means that you do have to layer in a lot of clues and suspicions throughout to build to the final reveal, but not so many that it becomes obvious. And you also have to misdirect from those with a lot of red herrings. The balance of that is hard to be objective about sometimes, but we used the feedback from test audiences to guide us in whether we were hitting that sweet spot.
I also think it’s a film that really rewards a second viewing. So much of the fun in editing is that you simultaneously have to think about how things play for first and second-time viewers, and I love tweaking those clues and moments to play differently for different viewings. This film is great because when you watch it a second time, you see the killers’ plan unfold in front of your eyes in a way you didn’t notice the first time around.
Thanks to Jay Prychidny for taking time to answer my questions about his work as a film editor!
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