The following contains spoilers for Scream VI, now playing in theaters.
Scream VI once again subverts horror movie expectations. This time it is with the death toll of the movie. The first Scream establishes how there are specific rules in horror movies. For instance, having sex, drinking or doing drugs often is a death sentence according to Scream's residential movie buff, Randy.
Other trends also make it easy to guess who will die. This includes the trope of killing off the Black character early on, as the upcoming film The Blackening directly challenges. Another broader trope is the "Bury Your Gays" trope. Meanwhile, in franchises, legacy characters are no longer safe, which Scream VI addresses. With all this in mind, Scream VI attempts to subvert expectations in regard to who will die. In doing so, it has a small body count in regard to the protagonists and raises the question do horror movies need large kill counts.
Who Does Ghostface Kill in Scream VI?
The protagonists of Scream VI include Gale, Kirby, Sam, Tara, Mindy, Chad, Danny and Anika. Out of all of them, only Anika -- who was introduced in Scream VI -- is killed. Meanwhile, Gale, Mindy, Kirby and Chad are almost killed. Chad and Gale specifically have near-death experiences that are meant to trick viewers into thinking they died.
Outside the main protagonists, only a few non-villainous characters are killed off. These include a handful of strangers in the bodega, Gale's boyfriend (Brooks), Sam's psychiatrist and Laura Crane. There is a lack of investment in the bodega victims as they are unnamed persons. Meanwhile, Brooks appears on-screen for about five minutes before dying, and Laura is the sacrificial first kill, a franchise staple for Scream.
Of all the characters, it's the villains who have the more substantial death toll. In this case, all three Ghostfaces are disposed of. Meanwhile, Jason and his roommat -- who were teased as the film's initial Ghostfaces -- are killed in the opening. Where seven of the protagonists out of the eight survive, all the villains are killed.
Scream VI Subverts Horror Movie Rules With its Kill Count
When most people think of slasher movies, they think of memorable kills. Especially in a pre-Scream world, many slasher movies only had one surviving protagonist: the final girl. Even after Scream, it's not uncommon for slasher films to have substantial body counts and/or iconic kills. Because of this, Scream VI subverts expectations by killing off only one protagonist instead of only having one survivor.
Along with that, the expectation of the marginalized characters not making it to the end is subverted. The "core four" is composed entirely of POC characters and mostly women, with one of them being a queer woman. Meanwhile, both legacy characters are women, and Anika is Mindy's partner. While Anika and Brooks are marginalized characters and killed off, having such a diverse primary cast inherently shakes expectations because horror movie rules in the past were based upon predominately white, straight casts.
While there are few dead protagonists, Scream VI still delivers on violence. When it comes to the climax, audiences feel the same catharsis Sam and Tara feel when they execute all three Ghostfaces. The near-death experiences also deliver on shock factor, with Gale putting up a captivating fight while Mindy is featured in a memorable set piece. Most of the heroes do live, but Scream VI does not hold back on violence. Specifically the villains' deaths are memorable, and Anika's is one of the tensest in the film.
Scream VI Lowers the Stakes with Its Kill Count
While having most of the protagonists survive subverts expectations, this inherently lowers the stakes. When one character survives a near-death experience, it is one thing, but when three characters survive near-death experiences in a row, it's hard to buy that anyone is at risk, even if they've already suffered a critical attack.
Along with that, it is not uncommon in the Scream franchise to have multiple survivors. The first film had four of the protagonists -- Dewey, Gale, Sidney and Randy -- survive. While keeping many of the protagonists alive was revolutionary in the past, it is not subversive for the franchise nowadays.
It is also not as revolutionary as it may seem for the horror genre at large in the 21st century. Us delivered a horror movie where all the protagonists survived. Meanwhile, other horror movies have subverted expectations without undermining the kill count. Cabin in the Woods, for instance, has no survivors in the end. Ready or Not, on the other hand, only has one protagonist who is put through the ringer, yet it still does not hold back on killing off characters.
While there are pros to Scream VI's low kill count -- like breaking away from trends that have targeted marginalized characters -- this approach lowered the stakes. It's also not as subversive as it initially seems given Scream's history, and there are other ways to break problematic and dated trends while keeping stakes high.