Scream 2022 (Scream 5): Cast, Plot and Ending Explained

Scream 2022 begins in Woodsboro, 25 years after the original murders, with teenager Tara Carpenter home alone when a caller turns a chat about scary films into a deadly game. A Ghostface killer stabs her, and she survives and is taken to hospital.

The opening echoes Scream (1996), directed by Wes Craven, where a phone call about horror movies is the first move in the killer's game. The difference here is that the victim lives, which hands the story a wounded witness and a family problem to solve. Tara's estranged older sister Sam comes back to Woodsboro with her boyfriend Richie after years away, and Tara's friends gather around her as the town braces for a new round of killings.

If you want the series context first, the scream movies in order guide shows where this film sits, and the scream timeline puts it 25 years after the first murders.

Scream 2022 had no red carpet premiere, because Paramount cancelled the planned Los Angeles event for January 11, 2022 amid a rise in Covid activity, according to a report that cited Deadline.

The film went straight to theaters instead. Box Office Mojo lists the earliest releases on January 12, 2022 in Europe, the Middle East and Africa and in Asia Pacific. The film opened in the US on January 14, 2022, according to Paramount, and TMDB lists the UK date as January 14 and the Australian date as January 13.

Scream 2022 was shot in Wilmington, North Carolina, even though the story is set in Woodsboro. Willston Middle School and Cardinal Lanes Shipyards were among the locations used, according to local reporting from WRAL.

Other entries filmed elsewhere. Scream 7 shot in Georgia, including Great Point Studios in Atlanta, and Scream (1996) shot its school scenes at the Sonoma Community Center in California, according to local press at the time.

Scream 2022 grossed $137.7 million worldwide on a $24 million budget, according to Box Office Mojo, which is more than five times what it cost. Its domestic take of $81.6 million is more than double what Scream 4 made in the US. The wider picture is on the scream box office page.

A few other facts stand out:

• Brian Tyler scored the film, replacing Marco Beltrami, who composed the first four Scream films.
• The budget matches Scream 2, which also cost $24 million.
• The planned Los Angeles red carpet premiere on January 11, 2022 was cancelled by Paramount.
• Skeet Ulrich returns as Billy Loomis, the role he played in the first film.
• Roger L. Jackson is credited as The Voice, the same phone voice credit he holds in Scream VI and Scream 7.
• The film is the first in the series without a Wes Craven directing credit, and the first directed by Gillett and Bettinelli-Olpin.

In release order it is the fifth film, and chronologically it is the fifth too. The next film in the saga is Scream VI, and the franchise continues with scream 8. The full list lives on the scream movies hub.