Scream Directors Tease "Misdirects" in First Trailer for New Movie

It's been ten years since Scream fans last caught up with Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell), Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox), and Dewey Riley (David Arquette) in the town of Woodsboro. The long-awaited fifth installment to the franchise is hitting theaters in January, and yesterday saw the long-awaited release of the first trailer for the film, which is simply titled Scream. There's a lot to unpack from the trailer, but don't get too wrapped up in everything you see. According to directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin & Tyler Gillett (Ready or Not), the trailer is filled with misdirects. 

"That is a very safe assumption," Bettinelli-Olpin replied when asked by Bloody Disgusting if the trailer includes important plot details as well as misdirection. "This was a hard trailer for [marketing] to put together, and I think one of the things we're happy with is that anything that you might think is a spoiler in this, there's a good chance you're wrong. There are misdirects within the movie. There are misdirects within the trailer. For us, that's just the fun of the whole thing to make this a big whodunnit. Spoilers suck, but the fun as fans is to talk about who might be the killer. Then to go through it forensically to try and find out and see if you can win the game, basically."

"I can say that every corner of this movie, during the making of it, we have been very aware how to service fans, where the misdirects are happening, and the path that we want to lead people down. Obviously, without spoiling the movie, we can certainly say that the trailer is definitely doing that dance," Gillet added. "Part of what we love about the Scream movies, and what we love about the Scream fandom is just how deep people watch these movies. We think some of the fun of this experience is this forensic watching of things and trying to figure out who the killer is. It's all a part of what's so unique and so special about this franchise to us. As deep, deep fans of the original four, we took pains to populate the world of this movie, and certainly the materials with as many fun nods and Easter eggs and misdirects as possible."

Gillet continued, "I'll add to that, one of the things we love about the original four and, of course, the script that Jamie [Vanderbilt] and Guy [Busick] wrote, is that there's a level of meta sophistication to what these movies are. They're so aware of what you, as an audience member, are probably aware of going into the experience, so it's the job of the story to flip those expectations upside-down as many times as possible. And it's begun. Now that these materials are out in the world, that process has started, and it's been so exciting to see people's reactions."

The new Scream is scheduled to debut in theaters on January 14, 2022.