Scary Movie

Scary Movie hit theaters June 5, 2026: a parody horror comedy from Paramount and Miramax, written by the Wayans family and Rick Alvarez. The brothers return for the first time since Scary Movie 2 in 2001, dragging the Core Four with them: Anna Faris, Regina Hall, Marlon Wayans, Shawn Wayans, plus Dave Sheridan’s Doofy and Chris Elliott’s tiny-handed Hanson. Twenty-six years of goodwill will walk into theaters for this. The punchlines will not.

Set 26 years after the original, Ghostface comes back for the teenage daughters of Cindy Campbell. Faris plays Cindy as a paranoid survivalist who spent decades in a booby-trapped compound waiting for the killer. Hall’s Brenda is the self-described “cool Black mom,” still married to still-closeted Ray (Shawn Wayans). Shorty (Marlon Wayans) survived decades of drug use and remains as unbothered as ever. The movie riffs on everything horror has spit out since Scary Movie 5: the new Screams, Get Out, Sinners, M3GAN, Terrifier, The Substance, Final Destination, and a pile more. A lot of references. Marketing also promised the Wayans would “cancel cancel culture.” That tagline promised more than they delivered.

The core failure is not taste or target selection. The film is loaded with setups, and the setups are good. The Wayans still know how to build a comedy scene: absurd positions, carefully framed references. Then the scene ends. No punchline. No payoff. The Get Out sunken-place bit drops Shorty into a chair, pulls him underground, and launches an animated weed fantasy set to a parody of “Golden.” That is the setup. The payoff is that the song exists. M3GAN shows up on a subway doing a booty dance. The joke is that you recognize M3GAN. Art the Clown appears as a mall Santa handing severed limbs to kids while Cindy scrolls her phone. You recognize Art. One of the girls is named Tuesday instead of Wednesday, like Wednesday Addams. That is the joke. There is no punchline.

The original worked because it built comedy on top of its Scream frame. Cindy dragging a body across the floor for three unbroken minutes was setup and punchline in the same breath. This movie keeps building the first half and walking away before the second arrives.

This is Member Berries: The Movie. Having the actors back, original roles or otherwise, was fun. Nice, in a way. I laughed through most of it. I was laughing because it felt like a barbecue with old friends you have not seen in years. The material on screen did not earn those laughs alone. The Wayans coast on a quarter-century of goodwill, and the audience lets them, because the alternative is admitting the reunion did not need to happen. Strip the legacy cast, hand this script to unknowns, and you have one of the weakest comedies of the year. Sad to say, when you love seeing that ensemble together again.

The marketing promised a movie that would go where modern comedy will not. “Cancel the Cancel Culture.” No. It pulled its punches. An Epstein files reference drops during a Substance parody. The audience perks up. No punchline follows: a wink, a rib nudge, then on to the next bit. ICE raids sit as background wallpaper. A few pronoun gags get close to committing, then leave a right hook on the table. The Wayans keep gesturing at charged targets and yanking back before they fire. You can mention the Epstein files or you can build a joke around them. Scary Movie does the first and pretends it did the second. A wink is not a punchline. A reference is not satire. If you sell yourself as the franchise brave enough to say what others will not, you have to say something.

The movie wants to be two things: a nostalgic reunion and a sharp new comedy that proves the Wayans still have the edge. It lands the reunion. It whiffs the comedy. Warmth from the first masks weakness in the second for about seventy of its ninety-six minutes. The Core Four still have chemistry. Faris commits to every physical gag like she is twenty-five again. Hall’s line readings land with precision. Marlon has enough charisma to carry a scene on energy alone, and he does, scene after scene, because the script keeps handing him energy scenes instead of joke scenes. A movie that promised to save comedy delivered proof that the Wayans are still likable. Those are different achievements at different price points.

Tickets run about $15. A film marketed as the one to “save comedy from Hollywood” needs material that stands on its own feet. This one borrows every leg from 2000. Banished to the Backlog. Five out of 10. Sad to say.