Caffeinated Clint
‘’Glee’’ creator Ryan Murphy is out to give the lungs of some of Hollywood’s hottest up-and-coming female talent a workout again. Only this time, the lasses are screaming in their school as opposed to singing for their school.
What Wes Craven and Kevin Williamson did for the horror genre in the ‘90s, Murphy now does for spook TV. With his clever, well-cast horror anthology series ‘’American Horror Story’’ and now, cunningly imagined bubble-gum slasher satire ‘’Scream Queens’’, the man behind FOX’s song and soap hit breathes new life into a genre (for the same network) that, every few years, needs someone with a smart idea and fresh bucket of blood to come in and shake it up before it goes too fusty.
Essentially ‘’Mean Girls’’ by way of Scream 2 (well, it was the one set in college, right!?), ‘’Scream Queens’’ takes place in a university that, a couple of decades prior, was home to a grisly, mysterious death. Now, of course, it’s happening again. And it’s our job, of course, to work out who the villain is. Is it the snooty sorority queen Chanel Oberlin? (Emma Roberts) the commanding, all-powerful Dean Cathy Munsch (Jamie Lee Curtis in a welcome return to the genre)? Or maybe it’s the new girl at school, Grace Gardner (Skylar Samuels)?
With it’s silly storylines, welcomingly over-the-top characters, and laughable dialogue, “Scream Queens” could’ve gone either way – but thanks to Murphy’s divine touch, a superlative cast, and a recurring ‘wink’ at the audience, it’s pulled off brilliantly. Much like the perfect murder, really.
DVD : The disc comes complete with some fan-friendly extras including featurettes Rush Kappal, Between 2 Queens and Style Queens.
Season 1 of the killer comedy-horror, ”Scream Queens” is out on DVD August 24.
