You could be forgiven for having missed Scream Queens. Running for only two short seasons over the space of fifteen months, it barely had time to establish itself before being unceremoniously cancelled in May 2017. Despite this, co-creator Ryan Murphy has now stated he’s working to revive the series.
While Murphy is best known among the genre community for the long-running anthology series American Horror Story, Scream Queens also takes horror tropes and runs with them, but as a far more tongue in cheek affair. Imagine something more overtly comedic than Scream but not as puerile as Scary Movie. He stated late last year that bringing the series back was a possibility, and it seems that those weren’t just empty words, according to a response to a comment made on his Instagram.
NEWS: Ryan Murphy has OFFICIALLY confirmed that he is working on SEASON 3 of #ScreamQueens!!! pic.twitter.com/kys8ntjd7x
— Scream Queens News (@sqnewsupdates) May 5, 2020
The first season of the show saw a sorority of suitably bitchy girls being targeted by a serial killer wearing their university’s devil mascot, which may or may not have had something to do with a pledge who died at a sorority party giving birth in a bathtub twenty years previously. The second season kept the same characters but relocated to a dilapidated hospital and saw the emergence of a new murderer, this time in a green demon outfit, whose rampage may or may not have had something to do with a man who died in the hospital and whose body was dumped in the adjacent swamp thirty years previously.
Despite the comedically satirical nature of the setup, it was the excellent cast that made the series, so to truly rise unscathed from death like an unkillable slasher stalker, they and their hilariously snarky interactions would each need to be brought back. Otherwise, the show would run the risk of fading to a pale imitation of itself and ending up cancelled all over again when fans become disappointed.
Of course, it’s worth pointing out that the ambiguous wording of Murphy’s short response can be taken two ways: that he’s actively working on developing the new season itself, which seems to be the conclusion to which many people have excitedly jumped. Or that he’s merely working on getting it renewed. Given that the rights to the series are currently owned by Fox, who are notoriously fickle with their scripted shows, it might be a little early to start celebrating hard enough to leave a suspicious body behind.
Whatever the accurate meaning of Murphy’s words, it’s encouraging to be reassured that he hasn’t discarded Scream Queens, and still considers the unsung series worth putting in the effort to bring back to our screens.
