We are not sure if this is a birthday party that anyone would want to actually attend, but a birthday it is as Ghostface and the Scream franchise turns 26 today! The terrifying face has been on our screens since 1996 and become a staple of the horror genre with its campy, slasher themes and iconic performances from the likes of Drew Barrymore, Neve Campbell, and Courtney Cox.
Ghostface themselves turned to social media (who gave a murderer access to Twitter?) to celebrate their “birthday” with the picture of a bloody cake topped with whipped cream and cherries. It appears that even murderous psychopaths feel the desire to celebrate at least once a year – when they’re not plotting their next killing spree that is.
The self-referential horror is one of the highest-grossing slasher films of all time, beaten only recently by 2018’s Halloween, with the film’s musical score having achieved cult status. It went on to receive critical success as well, winning the Best Movie award at the 1997 MTV Movie Awards.
Thanks to the immediate success of the first film the second and third were immediately greenlit allowing it to turn into a trilogy. The story was then picked back up again for Scream 4 in 2011, with the fifth and most recent film released at the beginning of this year, with some of the surviving characters including Cox’s reprising their roles. Scream 6 will round off this second trilogy of the franchise on March 10, 2023.
So happy birthday to a franchise the reinvigorated the slasher genre and gave us all something to scream about.