I’m torn about Scream Queens. On the one hand, I find myself increasingly intrigued by the identity of the killer. The fact that the school’s mascot is the red devil opens the field of suspects wide open, as evinced in “Chainsaw”‘s cold open, which saw Zayday and Grace take down who they thought was the killer, only to find a portly poly sci student under the mask. It’s a mildly funny scene, but it speaks volumes about Scream Queens‘ main flaw, which, unfortunately, is also its driving conceit.
Let’s talk about this guy Eugene, who decided that in order to shoplift nuts, he should put on a costume that would be garish and conspicuous even if there wasn’t a similarly-dressed serial killer running around. Then, when making his escape, he decides to rush headlong at Grace. How much of this is supposed to be satire? How much should we take seriously? Grace and Zayday exchange an “oh shit” look as they realize that the killer could be literally anyone, which is effective showing-not-telling, but as it stands, three hours into the show, Scream Queens‘ comedy is undermining its horror in a huge way, leaving us with, well…camp.
The reason that frustrates me so much is that I really am enjoying the mystery portion of this show. We learn a lot in “Chainsaw,” proving that for all its faults, Scream Queens doesn’t look like it will ever have a dull episode. It turns out that Chad not only has a knife collection, but had also been sleeping with Chanels No. 2, 3, and 5. This could make a convincing case for him being the killer, but it’s a little too obvious this early on, so I’m ruling him out. Oh, and Chanel No. 3 is Charlie Manson’s illegitimate daughter, which was too out of left field to elicit any reaction beyond “WTF?” Although it is of a piece with Ryan Murphy’s tendency to involve real-life killers in his narratives (see the jazzman killer from AHS: Coven, or Lily Rabe’s forthcoming turn as Aileen Wuornos in AHS: Hotel).
Any good mystery worth its salt will have a red herring – possibly even a few – before the real culprit’s identity is revealed (22 Jump Street wrought an excellent punchline out of this maxim). The problem that “Chainsaw” presents is too many. The revelation that there are absolutely two red devils was a good one, and doesn’t exactly rule out my theory that Munsch and Boone are working together (the latter’s absence in “Chainsaw” was particularly notable). Except that Grace’s dad confronts Munsch and accuses her, so I’m throwing that theory out. I don’t think the killer will be revealed this early on, although I’m not ruling out Munsch’s involvement.
See? This is the part of Scream Queens that I really like. I want to spend more time parsing through clues, and less time watching Chanel be terrible to everyone. Three episodes in and the character is officially too over the top. She exists to say terrible things, and then to turn on a dime and beg Chad to take her back. The latter adds some dimension to the character, but I’m not rooting for them, because every time they get back together they just break up again. It wasn’t funny the first three times it happened in “Hell Week,” and it’s not funny now.
There’s a lot about this show I like. And I’m not bailing on it. But I myself in the weird position of thinking “Man, I wish this horror comedy had less comedy.”
A Few Thoughts
- “She wasn’t that cute to begin with, but that is not the point!”
- “It’s a bloody tragedy.” “Yeah, well, it was really bloody.”
- I’m enjoying the burgeoning friendship between No. 3 and Sam, but Jeanna Han (Sam) is turning in a pretty wooden performance
- “We’re going to play a game called ‘Cocaine or Dildo?'” The fact that this was never elaborated on makes it ten times funnier
- “Hash tag cahoots!”
- The whole bit about Zayday’s chainsaw killed me. The image of it in a huge evidence bag was a great sight gag, and I love the fact that she said her grandmother sent it to her for self-defense, and that that turned out to be totally true. Little touches like that go a long way towards building the bizarro world that Scream Queens operates in
- Current killer theory: I’m still liking Boone for this
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