First Impressions: 'Scream Queens'

 

 

I don't review everything that I watch (that's a lot of stuff!) but whenever something really strikes me, I need to rave about it. Sometimes a show just hits all the right buttons for me and can't contain my excitement towards it. So I've decided to start a series of first impression mini-reviews that I'll call...First Impressions! I know right? Hold your applause. I don't intend these to be long, drawn out raves, and they're not even reviews as such, simply an outpouring of excitement about shows that provoke a strong reaction in me one way or another.

 

To kick things off I simply couldn't not post about Ryan Murphy's latest televisual triumph Scream Queens, a horror-comedy anthology series centering on a slasher killer terrorising a college campus. Whilst there are naturally influences of his past and present works (Glee and American Horror Story respectively) in Scream Queen's DNA, it also takes cues from the Scream franchise, and perhaps even more-so in some ways the Scary Movie films. This is a slasher show, and incidentally I expected there to be some self-aware humour and tongue-in-cheek moments, but let me just say that I never expected to laugh so much. I don't think I've laughed more at a new show in a long time. In fact perhaps unsurprisingly the last time I had such a strong reaction to a pilot in this way was when Glee premiered in 2009.

 

Every character, scene and exchange is so perfectly tuned down to the tiniest background detail that it almost has the feel of a sketch-show, each scene delivering its own self-contained hilarity, yet with each preceding scene building on what came before.

 

There are a lot of characters introduced but each one is so memorable that there is no danger of forgetting who is who. The cast is absolutely fantastic (I mean, of course it is! Have you read the cast list?!), bringing these larger-than-life (and in some cases all too realistic) personalities to life. Standouts are of course Emma Roberts as the deliciously manic Chanel Oberlain, President of sorority Kappa Kappa Tau, and original Scream Queen herself Jamie Lee Curtis as college Dean Cathy Munsch. Also a very un-Rachel Berry-like Lea Michelle as neckbrace-wearing potential psychopath Hester Ulrich. Nick Jonas also delivers a pitch-perfect turn as not-so-closeted fratboy Boone. I have to say, he knows where his fanbase lies and isn't afraid to play up to them, and I for one am grateful!

 

Queen B-itch!

The show also features a plethora of hilarious supporting characters such as sorority house maid Ms. Bean (or White Mammy as Chanel calls her!), inept security guard Denise Hemphill (I defy you not to laugh at least once in every scene she's in) and KKT pledge Deaf Taylor Swift (just too funny).

 

We've been guaranteed by Murphy himself that there'll be at least one death per episode and he more than delivers on that in the two-part premiere. What is interesting however, is that as much as many of the characters are little more than two-dimensional caricatures (at least so far), when they are offed it is actually a painful moment, because each character is so fun in their own way that their exits mean we will be deprived from further hilarity from them. It's pretty ironic that fellow freshman horror series Scream (which I reviewed previously) made this exact phenomena its mission statement, vowing to make us care about its characters so that when they are killed off we really feel it. Whilst that show did eventually succeed in making its characters genuinely likeable (some of them at least) and their deaths pack an emotional punch, becoming a real guilty pleasure of mine in the process, it's a funny quirk that Scream Queens succeeded in this endeavour straight off the bat by making its characters unlikeable and one may argue less developed. Never let it be said that Ryan Murphy and co don't know how to create strong characters that provoke strong reactions one way or another. We may hate some of them, but we love to hate them and that makes all the difference.

 

The two-part premiere was literally a laugh-a-minute joy to watch and I am beyond excited for the next episode. Whilst Murphy's shows do have a tendency to start out very strong and then become less sharp in subsequent episodes (the man sure can make a pilot!) I'm hopeful that Scream Queens can go the distance. If it maintains this strength throughout the next 14 episodes, then this is going to be one hella fun season. Favourite show of the new season right here. I'm calling it already. All you other shows have a lot to live up to.