Randy Meeks was born in late-1978 or early-mid
1979. He was the firstborn in his family; we never see his parents, but his mother
is mentioned in Scream 2. In 1982 or 1983, when he was 3 or 4, Randy got a younger
sister named Martha. The family lived in the northern California town of Woodsboro,
where Randy went on to attend Woodsboro High School with his friends Sidney Prescott,
Tatum Riley, Billy Loomis and Stu Macher. Randy was a self-professed geek and expert
of horror movies, particul
arly titles that featured the original Scream Queen,
Jamie Lee Curtis. In September 1996, Randy was 17 or 18 years old and working
in a video store. He was fired. Twice. But they still brought him back for a
third stint. Guess his film knowledge superseded what I can only assume is really
bad customer service or situational awareness. But holding a high school job would become the
least of Randy’s worries, when Woodsboro became the scene of a series of murders committed by a
killer in a fi
ve and dime store mask: Ghostface. To learn how Randy was an inspiration
for an entire subgenre of movies, how he almost played a very different role
in Scream 2, and how he left a legacy that still marks the Scream franchise today,
stick around to the end of this video. (metal music) Welcome to Horror History. I
am Randy Meeks. Or at least I would be if I was a Scream character
instead of an internet personality. Portrayed by Jamie Kennedy, Randy was
a legacy character and a fan favorite.
While Casey Becker brought the audience into the
tension and fear of Scream in the opening scene, it was Randy Meeks who would take over the role
as the proxy of the movie audience. As a result, his controversial death is still hotly
debated two sequels after his last appearance. I’ll be analyzing his entire
influence on the Scream franchise, so let's start at his 1996 introduction in the
small fictional town of Woodsboro, California. (mysterious music) We first meet Randy outside Woodsbor
o High School on
a September Thursday morning, the day after the murder of Casey Becker, sitting with his
friend and crush Sidney, her boyfriend Billy, her best friend Tatum and Tatum’s recent
boyfriend, Stu. Randy is the type of guy to put sunglasses on just to catch this grape
in his mouth, then immediately take them off. He secretly laments his inability to date Sidney,
who has been with Billy for two years at this point. It’s unclear when Randy and Sidney met,
but they’ve known each ot
her long enough to be natural and comfortable with each other. Sidney
doesn’t seem aware of Randy’s crush on her, or at least doesn’t mention it, while Randy is always
just missing his “chance” to shoot his shot. – [RANDY] Do you think Sid will go out with me?
– [RANDY] There goes my chance with Sid... – It’s too bad he never found out about
this compliment, intended for him. – [GHOSTFACE] Do you like Scary movies? – [SIDNEY] I like that thing you’re doing
with your voice, Randy. It’s sexy.
– [ZAC] He also has a friendly rivalry with Stu. They seem
to enjoy busting each other’s balls, which may stem from a rivalry over who is the true horror
expert of the group. Truth be told, all of them know a thing or two about horror. Except Tatum,
who doesn’t know John Carpenter from Wes Craven. – [TATUM] You're starting to sound
like some Wes Carpenter flick. – Stu and Randy have also both
had longtime crushes on Sidney which I imagine also helped fuel the rivalry. Our first impression o
f Randy is that he’s a
dork and a little bit of an outsider. He’s the only single in the group, which, according
to his rules, may be another factor in his survival. He has no tact when trying to dunk
on Stu. And he can’t read the room, obliviously describing gore and violence while his crush
with the murdered mother squirms in discomfort. Even his outfits are designed to
read “outsider”. Cynthia Bergstrom, the costume designer on the original
Scream, intentionally designed Randy’s look wi
th bright and bold colors to
say “look at me! I want to be seen!” As Cynthia Bergstrom put it “Randy was obviously
intelligent but a bit goofy, and not really taken that seriously. He had a big personality and
liked attention. Hence, the brighter colors. Hush Puppies were very popular at
the time. They were huge and ok, not so timeless. But totally
geeky and perfect for Randy.” While attending Woodsboro High, Randy
worked at the one place a teenage horror geek with little tact fits in. A v
ideo rental
store. Even there, he did not really fit in. His job not only gave him more
consistent access to movies, it also gave him a sense of authority
among his friends. When he and Stu are debating who could be the killer, Randy is
animated with a strong, confident voice. – [RANDY] See, the police are always off track with
this sh*t! If they'd watch Prom Night they’d save time. There’s a FORMULA to it, a very
simple formula! Everybody’s a suspect! – But when Sidney and Billy come up…
– [RANDY] …maybe Sidney won’t have sex with him. – It’s obvious both Billy and Stu intimidate
Randy and Randy is the first one to correctly guess them as the killers. Initially it’s
just a guess based off of patterns he'd seen in movies, which is also why
he includes himself as a suspect. – [RANDY] You’re absolutely right. I'm the first to admit it. If
this were a scary movie, I’d be the prime suspect. – It’s not until the house party finale that Randy’s
approach gains credence. Up to this
point, nobody considers the murders to actually be following
well-known horror movie patterns. Except Billy and Stu, of course. So when Randy takes the stage to
present The Rules, it becomes his moment of power. – [RANDY] There are certain
rules that one must abide by in order to successfully survive a horror movie… – Like on the quad with his friends at the
beginning, and the video store with Stu, Randy is in his element here, though
he’s unaware of how right he is. – [RANDY] Number one: Y
ou can never
have sex. Big no no. Sex equals death. – [SIDNEY] Hey Stu, didn’t you used to date Casey?
– [STU] Yeah for like two seconds. (Casey grunts) – Number two. Never drink or do drugs. It’s the sin factor.
– What movie is this from, ‘I Spit on Your Garage?’ (Tatum grunts)
(glass shatters) – And number three. Never ever under any circumstances
say “I’ll be right back”. Cause you won’t be back. – Randy would soon break one of
his own rules, but before we unpack that, we’ve got to take a
break, so… I’ll be right back. – [crowd] OHH!!!!
– [Randy] You see, you push the laws… you end up dead. Alright,
I’ll see you in the kitchen with a knife. (impact) (creepy music) As I’ve discussed in my Scream
Things You Missed videos, Scream was built as a commentary on the
horror genre as a whole. Randy serves as the audience surrogate, he’s aware
of the typical horror movie tropes, and he’s at least somewhat aware that he’s in
the midst of a horror film scenario himself. – [RANDY] It’s
the millennium.
Motives are incidental. – Scream is a satire that leans hard on
its metacinema concept. It’s a movie that acknowledges other movies exist, while pretending
it’s not a movie at all. This is nothing new, director Wes Craven’s own “New Nightmare”
did something similar two years earlier with Robert Englund playing Robert
Englund becoming Freddie Krueger. What sets Scream apart from other
slasher films and other meta-horror movies is Randy. Randy’s acknowledgment of
the pattern
s and tropes of horror movies are so spot on because the killers are ALSO
aware of the rules and following them. But what makes Randy the perfect audience
proxy isn’t just that he asks the same questions we do while watching safely
at home; it’s that he can also be wrong. After “The Rules” speech, Randy takes a
call revealing that Principal Himbry has been ghosted… not like the ****ty millennial
version of ghosted, but gutted and strung up on the football field. Everyone leaves
to go catch
a glimpse of the corpse, leaving Randy drinking alone in the house,
apparently ignoring Rule #2. Ghostface sneaks up behind him, but gets distracted
upon hearing a screaming Sidney outside. (screams) – [SID] Help me! Help! – So that’s where they got the title of this movie from... Randy eventually realizes danger is afoot,
and steps outside where he is awarded with a few smacks in the face from a terrified
Gale Weathers’s car phone. I’m assuming he twisted his ankle or pulled a muscle
in h
is leg or something as he went down, because all he can do is scoot himself away
to avoid getting hit by the fleeing news van, and when we next see him, he’s limping and
holding his leg. We know that it wasn’t one of the Ghostface killers who injured his
leg, because Stu is in the house fighting Dewey at that time, and Billy should still
be playing dead in the upstairs bedroom. The movie doesn’t show us where exactly
Randy was in between this and this, but before anybody asks, NO. It was no
t Roman
who attacked his leg, that makes no sense. Anyway, Randy limps up to
Sid, who… pulls a gun on him, unsure who to believe is the killer between
him and Stu. She locks both of them out. We don’t see what happens behind the closed door
but we can hear Randy’s pleas to be let inside. – [Randy] Help me, he’s gone crazy! – But it seems like he’s able to separate himself
from Stu just in time to be let into the house, where he repeats his theory to Sidney and Billy. – [RANDY] Please help m
e, Stu’s flipped out he’s gone mad!
– We all go a little mad sometimes. – [ZAC] He shoots Randy, hitting him in the
shoulder and sending him flying through the coffee table. This keeps him out of
the climax, but we can assume he was able to hear Billy and Stu’s entire plot as
he continued to lie on the foyer floor. He comes back to shortly after Sidney defeats Stu, but before he can finish telling her “I never
thought I’d be so happy to be a virgin…”, he’s knocked right back out by Billy, wh
ere he
stays until both villains are taken care of. – [RANDY] Careful. This is the moment when the supposedly dead
killer comes back to life. The argument could be made, within The Rules,
that Randy being a virgin superseded his drinking sin thus allowing him to survive. But
I personally think that the rules are more of a “best practices” and less of an “automatic
disqualification”. If you think about it, all of the survivors do break a rule at one point
or another. Sidney obviously loses
her v-card, Dewey says “he’ll be right back” at the precinct, Gale says she’ll be right back before heading
off with Dewey to investigate the abandoned car. As the sun rises on a September morning, Billy
Loomis and Stu Macher, the Ghostface killers, are dead (presumably). And our survivors, Sidney
Prescott, Gale Weathers, Dewey Riley, and Randy Meeks leave all the
tropes and rules behind to live quiet lives of contemplation. The
end. Not really, there’s a sequel. – Because, let's face it ba
by,
these days, you gotta have a sequel! But before that sequel would be
released, Randy breaks another rule. – Sex equals death. – Perhaps due to his confidence that
threat was over, sometime between the Woodsboro murders and the start of
college, Randy Meeks breaks his number one rule (and probably the rules of the
video store). He gives his virginity to: – [DEWEY] Karen Kolchak? – Karen Kolchak? – Yes. Karen Kolchak. – This is never shown directly, thankfully, and
described sparingly by
Randy so how it all went down is a matter of imagination. Like maybe… it’s a late night at
the video store. Randy and Karen are stocking videos in the adult
section, like any normal shift, when their hands brush against each
other and things escalate from there. Despite his moment of weakness with
Karen, Randy still seems to have some feelings for Sidney Prescott. I say
this, because he follows her to college. (impact) (mysterious music) It's Spring 1997 when we catch up to Randy,
having
graduated from Woodsboro High, and now enrolled in his freshman year at
Windsor College in Ohio. A quiet change from the blood-splattered landlines of
Woodsboro where this high school geek tries to come into his own, and leave
his traumatic past in the end credits. The evening of April 12th, fellow Windsor College
students Maureen Evans and Phil Stevens are both brutally killed at an early screening of the
in-movie franchise, Stab. Guess how they died. [CLIP]
[CLIP] (knife stab and grunt) (
scream and knife stab) The next morning, April 13th, at the Windsor
College Film Theory class, we’re introduced to a slightly new Randy Meeks. The bright colors
used for Randy’s high school wardrobe are now absent and Randy sits calmly in a preppy maroon
polo shirt. The class debates reality versus film, and this Randy doesn’t hesitate to
tell everyman creeper Mickey what’s up. – [MICKEY] It’s a classic case of life imitating art imitating life.
– [RANDY] Let me tell you about reality, Micke
y. I lived through this. Okay? Life
is life. It doesn’t imitate anything. It’s a far cry from Randy’s relationship with
Billy which involved much more flinching, shrinking, and apologies. Similarly, where
in the video store Randy argued and got loud to prove his point, college Randy has developed
some more confidence. Instead of being jeered by his peers at a high school party, Randy takes Joshua
Jackson, aka Film Class Guy #1, to horror school. – [JOSHUA] Aliens is a classic
okay? “Get aw
ay from her, you b*tch!” – [RANDY] I believe the line is “Stay away from
her you b*tch.” This is film class, right? – And… he’s wrong! But confidently
wrong. After an incredibly stressful high school career full of
toxic friends and murder, Randy has come into his own in college. This
is the beginning of a new act for Randy Meeks. – [GIRL] So Mr. originality, how would you make it different?
– [RANDY] I’d let the geek, get the girl. – Unfortunately, this would
also be Randy’s final act. –
[SIDNEY] It’s starting again, Randy.
– [RANDY] It’s not. A lot of sh*t happens at the movies. People get robbed, shot, maimed, murdered…
multiplex is a very dangerous place to be.” – And that Sidney has a boyfriend. Again. – [RANDY] Hello Derek. How you doing? – [Zac] Pre-med too. Whatever, he dies anyway. It’s interesting that Randy would choose to go
to an Ohio-based school for film in the first place when some of the most popular
schools for film studies are located in his home state of Ca
lifornia. I assume
this was for one or two reasons. Perhaps, after the nightmare of his senior year at
Woodsboro, Randy opted for an environment with as much distance from his teenage home
and least chance of murder as manageable. However, I believe Randy most likely chose Windsor
in Ohio to stay close to his crush and final girl, Sidney Prescott who was attending
Windsor for theater studies. Unwittingly, this choice put Randy right back to
the wrong end of a Ghostface blade. Any good frie
nd would have encouraged Randy to
give up this longstanding crush on Sid. After all, if you survive two slashers together
and the girl still isn’t into you, where else is there to go? What can a gift of
flowers do that taking a bullet couldn’t? But then again, most of his friends are dead or
full-grown adults living in another state. In general, making friends as an adult can
be tricky. So he and Sidney are still close, perhaps trauma-bonded in perpetuity. Regardless, Randy is initially rel
uctant to see
the mounting evidence even when presented by Sidney. But when news reporter Gale Weathers
arrives, Randy switches gears. Because Randy knows, once the legacy characters arrive, there’s
no stopping the horror movie plot from unfolding. – [RANDY] Sydney, look, it’s Gale Weathers! – What?
– Star of the Gale Weathers press conference. Based on the book
by Gale Weathers. Soon to be a major motion picture starring Gale Weathers. – Randy uses his trademark humor to mask what has
to
be a moment of abject dread. Gale and Sidney are intimately connected to Ghostface through the
September 1995 murder of Maureen Prescott. Judging by the events of Scream in 1996, when both are in
the same place, everyone becomes collateral. Then Deputy Dewey arrives. – [DEREK] Who was that guy? – [SID] An old friend. – [RANDY] Deputy Dewey. Woodsboro’s
finest. What’s he doing here? – Randy’s expression in this scene, more muted
and tight than while holding his own in class, shows he’s aware
of exactly what Deputy Dewey
is doing here. He also already knows, with his horror expertise, where this plot goes when all
the survivors of the original film are all in one place. This would have been a great time for Randy
to skip town. Isn’t it Spring Break or something? But this is Randy. Randy, who came back to
Stu’s house for Sid after he knew Stu was the killer. This is Randy who stayed OUTSIDE
THE DOOR with Stu, the KILLER, when Sid locked them out. This is Randy who wouldn’t leave
Sidney to die, even after getting shot. The reason the media is swarming Windsor
campus is that two students lost their lives in a screening of Stab. Rumors
that a series of serial killings could be happening again are spreading around the quad,
so naturally, there’s only one thing to do. Party. But first, despite his outward hesitance, to fully accept Ghostface’s return, Randy
stops at home to record a very special video. – Told you I’d make a movie someday. – [ZAC] This video wouldn’t be
seen by
audiences, or the Scream gang, until the 2000 release of Scream 3. But there are
some details in Randy’s final recording that are relevant to him in the Scream 2 portion of his
timeline. Let’s go to the tape. From the footage, we can determine a couple of things. Randy most
likely lives in a dorm and has a roommate named Paul who doesn’t knock when entering. And, since
Randy is sporting the same maroon polo shirt he wore in Film Theory class, we can assume he
recorded the video so
metime after the press conference but before the sorority party where
he’s wearing a collared black button-up sweater. The tape reveals his encounter with Karen Kolchak
and provides the rules for a theoretical third rampage, just in case Randy doesn’t survive
this second one. We’ll come back to that. That night Randy goes to a greek house party.
Could anyone have imagined back in Woodsboro, Randy Meeks walking into a gathering of
frat bros and sorority sisters out of his own free will? In a
black polo shirt, no less?
Well, Sidney was there, so I guess it tracks. – [RANDY] Cocktail?
– [SIDNEY] What took you so long? – And here’s another moment exemplifying
Randy’s maturity. Sure, he has a drink waiting for Sidney. But he doesn’t hover
around, and ends up walking off with a blonde, decked out in a black lace long-sleeve... uhhhh wait, no he doesn't. But this positive emotional development
doesn’t last long. Cops fill the street in front of the sorority house down
the road and t
hat’s the end of the Delta Lambda Zeta sorority party. And
the beginning of the worst reunion. – [RANDY] Nothing like a funeral
to bring family together. – The Windsor body count rises with the confirmed
death of fellow film classmate Cici Cooper on April 13th. Death by Ghostface. It’s not
long after when Sidney herself is targeted, making it impossible to deny that Woodsboro is
happening again in the midwest. However, Randy has already let go of his denial, as demonstrated by
his recordin
g of the tape earlier that afternoon. April 14th, the day after Cici’s unfortunate
swan-dive, Randy sits down with former deputy Dewey. As they walk through the dining hall, he
expresses his frustration with his Stab casting. – [RANDY] I don’t get it. They get Tori Spelling to
play Sid and they cast Joe Blow Nobody to play me. – Having his likeness cast with “the guy
who drove Jane Seymore’s stagecoach” had to hurt Randy as a cinephile AND Sidney’s
self-proclaimed “love slave”. I think Rand
y is too mature to take it completely seriously, but
it doesn’t help prevent him from backsliding to his Woodsboro past. Interestingly, Randy’s
wardrobe also begins to reflect his past, with a return to the brighter greens
of his teenage years. I believe this is to illustrate Randy regressing
as the past catches up to him. – [RANDY] The way I see it, someone’s out
to make a sequel. Cash in on all the murder movie hoopla. So it’s our job
to observe The Rules of the sequel. – [ZAC] Randy run
s through The Rules much quicker
and much more succinctly than in Scream, where he was admittedly drunk, and rattling off
the rules in between empty bottles winged at his head. This illustrates that
though Woodsboro is coming for him, he’s pushing back against Woodsboro. He doesn’t
just hope, he knows he can still survive. – [RANDY] Number one, the body count is always bigger.
Number two, death scenes are always much more elaborate. More blood, more gore, carnage
candy. Your core audience j
ust expects it. And number three if you want your sequel
to become a franchise, never ever… – How do we find the killer
Randy? That’s what I want to know. – Dewey cuts off Randy before the third
rule. However, a teaser trailer featured an extended version of the scene which
revealed the third rule would have been… – Never, ever, under any circumstances
assume the killer is dead. – This was initially a reference to Randy’s last
line in the first movie and a deliberate in-joke by the crew as
a nod that it’s impossible
to ensure a successful horror franchise. Before moving on, let’s look at
the production of Scream again, as there were some decisions in the development
and on set that had major lasting effects for the entire franchise. Writer Kevin
Williamson had already planned out two sequels before Scream 1996 was optioned.
However, during the development of Scream 2, the original script was leaked online revealing
the identity of the Windsor College killers. In the theatri
cal release of Scream 2, Randy
points out Sidney’s roommate Hallie as a suspect despite Dewey’s assertion that serial killers
are typically, as he puts it, “white males”: – [RANDY] That’s why it’s perfect, it’s sort
of against the rules but not really. Mrs. Voorhes was a terrific serial killer and
there’s always room for Candyman’s daughter. – Randy also points to Sidney’s current
boyfriend Derek as the “Billy Loomis”, the obvious killer posing as a boyfriend… but
quickly walks it back, cl
aiming that the killer would want to “break some new ground” and would
have “half a brain”. This is obviously Randy’s resentment towards Derek for dating Sid. But, had
the original script been produced, Randy wouldn’t have been wrong. The leaked script included four
Ghostface killers: Hallie, Derek, Cotton and Mrs. Loomis. The
leaked script also had a very different role for Randy. Instead of attending college with
Sidney, he was Gale Weathers’s new cameraman. There’s no way to know how the
original
Scream 2 script would have been received. But while most fans agree that four
killers would have been overdoing it, the fandom can be split on whether the
choice to have Randy behind the camera was the better direction. Personally, I
wouldn’t want to have to trade in Joel. What’s interesting, is though Randy
dies in the same manner in both the leaked and produced script, it was
in Williamson’s rewrite that Randy provided The Rules to Surviving a Horror
Sequel. Strange to think T
he Rules, which are now a franchise staple,
were almost completely left behind. It was by unforeseen circumstances,
not by the original design, that Scream 2 launched a meta-commentary
subgenre, and it never would have worked without a character like Randy Meeks
at the center. Unfortunately for him, and his fans, the death he dodged in
Woodsboro eventually caught up with him. (impact) (dark upbeat music) Gale, Dewey, and Randy are together on the quad
when Gale’s phone rings. Assuming it t
o be spam, Randy picks up Gale’s phone in frustration, – GALE’S NOT HERE. – [ZAC] Only to have Ghostface on the line. While Gale and
Dewey split off together to assault strangers with phones of catching the caller, Randy attempts to
keep Ghostface on the line as long as possible. – [RANDY] So uh… what’s your favorite scary movie? – The exchange quickly gets personal. – [GHOSTFACE] Why are you even
here Randy? You’ll never be a leading man. – [RANDY] F****CK YOUUUU. – And Randy makes a critica
l error, a far more
fatal one than sleeping with Karen Kolchak. If he’d been thinking clearly, he might have
remembered his own expertise. He might have, at least, walked over to a group of people
just to avoid being alone. He might have played it safe with his commentary
on the original Ghostface killers. – [RANDY] And Billy Loomis. Billy Loomis, what the f*ck. Jesus. What a rat lookin, homo repressed mama's
boy. Why not set your goals higher, huh? – He couldn’t have known that that “mama’
s boy’s”
mother was the very person he was speaking to, and that line did not put him in her
good graces. Or take him off her list. Had he been less emotional, he might have
considered he was holding GALE’S phone, meaning Ghostface was targeting GALE, as he wandered
aimlessly over to GALE’S van, where this happens. (stinger) (door shuts) (Randy grunts) Randy’s death was and remains controversial among
fans. After all, he was relatable to the audience, their proxy, the one character saying w
hat anyone
would be thinking watching the horror unfold. – It shouldn’t have been
Randy. It should have been me. – [ZAC] Imagine a world where THAT happens. There’s some irony in that, after Randy takes a
solid stance on sequels being inferior in class, a Stab sequel was guaranteed after he became
one of the victims. On top of that, his actor proxy would probably be the lowest billed and,
despite it being fiction, he STILL probably died, and didn’t get the girl. Maybe he can be
thankful t
hat he passed away before he saw it. But death wasn’t the end of Randy Meeks. Or
at least his bloodline. His younger sister, Martha Meeks, was still alive and well. – [MARTHA] Don’t shoot, I’m only seventeen! – [ZAC] And now she was 17, about the same
age her brother was during the first Ghostface encounter. In this interaction,
Randy’s lasting effect on others is clear. Randy was loved and still missed as Martha,
Sidney, Dewey, and Gale share a somber moment before Martha hands over the VH
S tape that
Randy recorded before his untimely death. So… the tape. Before continuing into Randy’s
legacy after death, we should talk about why this tape exists and how it almost didn’t. Again, you
can’t fully dissect Scream without considering the real-life development and production. Screenwriter
Kevin Williamson saw a lot of success with Scream. With so many projects on the slate, he didn’t have
time to write the third one, though he did provide an outline. Bob and Harvey Weinstein hired
Ehren
Kruger to replace him. Surprisingly, this would not go down as Harvey’s most heinous crime.
Ehren’s not that bad. Though Kruger did follow Williamson’s outline initially, the backlash after
the 1999 Columbine massacre caused producers to request a script change with a greater focus on
satire and less focus on teen-on-teen violence. In short, before production began, Scream
3 was a mess and needed something familiar and beloved to anchor the series back
to its 1990s roots. Due to the
negative feedback from fans over Randy’s death in
Scream 2, the answer seemed obvious. The production considered different ways to
possibly bring him back from the dead- But it was agreed Randy surviving that
brutal van takedown was too unbelievable, (I’m looking at you, Fast and Furious)
no matter the retrofitted circumstances, so the pre-recorded tape was written in. Speaking of the tape and the unbelievable,
why did it take Martha two years to hand over a tape recorded specifically to h
elp
her dead brother’s friends? Maybe Randy explicitly told her to give it over only if
Ghostface was active, but five people died before she brought it! She could have mailed
it? Called and said she had it? Teenagers. – [RANDY] If you’re watching this
tape, it means, as I feared, I didn’t survive the killings here
at Windsor College. – Randy warns that if they find themselves
dealing with an unexpected backstory and a preponderance of exposition, then
this isn’t just another sequel. It’s
the concluding chapter of the rare horror
trilogy with a new set of amended Rules: – One. You've got a killer
who’s gonna be superhuman. Number two. Anyone, including
the main character, can die. Number 3. The past will come
back to bite you in the ass. Basically, in the third one, you gotta cryogenically freeze his
head, decapitate him, or blow him up. – [ZAC] Or put him in an industrial shredder. Not
every aspect of Randy’s Rules for Surviving a Horror Sequel came to pass in Scream 3, b
ut 100%
accuracy isn’t really the point of Randy Meeks. In a 2021 interview, Kevin Williamson
reflected on the reaction to Randy’s death in Scream 2. “I remember people
took [Randy's death] very hard because, at the time, that was a beloved character,
which, to me, is what keeps the franchise moving... If you kill someone you really
love, it makes it personal for people.” Which, yeah, the audience proxy or surrogate
dying does feel pretty damn personal. Randy was the heart of the series; h
is
“expert” analysis could have been obnoxious or written only as a greek (geek) chorus,
with his relationship to the other legacy characters limited to supporting their own
characterization. Reportedly, production filmed at least two hours of footage with Jamie
Kennedy for the tape, and it was condensed down to a quick three minutes. Who knows what sort of
Randy gems were left on the cutting room floor? The fourth Scream was released in
2011, a decade after Scream 3. While the newly intro
duced characters are mostly
disconnected from the legacy characters, Randy’s influence continues with new
characters designating themselves as “The Randy” over their “expert” horror knowledge.
And, of course, this lasting impression. – [CHARLIE] Cinema Club thanks you for coming
out for our third annual Stab-a-Thon. (cheers erupt) – Robbie Mercer, VP of the Woodsboro High
Cinema Club, wears a bright green shirt under a light blue button-up; it’s a straight
cosplay of Randy’s look in Scream
and Scream 2, which was immortalized in-universe in the
Stab films. It’s an oddly fitting tribute that Robbie isn’t dressed as Randy but
the fictional character of Randy played by an extra from “Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman”.
Randy at least would get a kick out of it. The fifth film, Scream (2022), would feature
Randy’s niece and nephew, the twin children of his sister Martha, Mindy and Chad Meeks. Mindy takes
up the mantle of “Randy” in the Scream requel, evidence that his character is still
just as
loved and missed in-movie as he is by fans. Kevin Williamson and Jamie Kennedy
have been clear that Randy is DEAD, and not coming back. But his influence
is immortal. Though Randy died, a concept inspired by him became its own trope in
the series. With the establishment of The Rules, throughout the original trilogy, Randy evolved
from “horror geek” to “horror expert”. Since his death, another character takes up this
responsibility, in the subsequent sequels. Should Randy have survi
ved long enough to at least
anchor a full trilogy? Maybe. But the heartbreak of his loss gave weight to a satirical horror
series that was making it up as it went along. Scream is a movie that acknowledges reality
while existing within its own. Randy isn’t “us”, the audience. He’s who the audience feels
they could be. But would we, the audience, were in the movie… are we sure we’d
survive to even the first sequel? (cell phone rings) Because the franchise rule now seems to dictate… (cell pho
ne rings) … that the Expert becomes the target. (cell phone rings) – [GHOSTFACE] What’s your favorite scary movie? – This could take awhile.
For more details on the Scream universe, check out these videos on Things You Missed. Remember to subscribe to CZsWorld for new horrors every week, ring the deathbell for all
notifications and I’ll see you in the next one. – [RANDY] So in closing, let me say, Good luck,
Godspeed, and for some of you… I’ll see you soon. – [ZAC] Assuming we both survive.
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