Scream
Season 2 Episode 4 “Happy Birthday To Me”
Directed by Daniel Stamm
Written by Brian Sieve
Created by Jill E. Blotevogel, Jay Beattie, Dan Dworkin
Starring Willa Fitzgerald, Bex Taylor-Klaus, John Karna, Amadeus Serafini, Carlson Young, Tracy Middendorf, Tom Maden
MTV
Air date: Monday, June 20th, 2015, 11pm

Three episodes into the second season of MTV’s Scream and there’s been a lot of time spent on introducing new characters, and re-establishing the holdovers. Unfortunately, not much has been done to establish a new plot. Season 1 had the whole Brandon James storyline and the 20-year Lakewood mystery. This season all we have so far is a new killer continuing where Piper Shay left off, only this time focusing their text-torture on Audrey (Bex Taylor-Klaus) rather than Emma (Willa Fitzgerald). Audrey had some connection to Piper for the killer to hold over her, and she is running around Lakewood trying to clean up her tracks before her secrets get exposed. Emma meanwhile, is dealing with the reemergence of her father (Tom Everett Scott), whose hotel room is the scene of the killer’s latest murder. This week, it’s Kieran’s (Amadeus Serafini) birthday and the killer plans on crashing the party.

Spoilers for this week’s Scream:

Audrey takes the bloody corkscrew and tries to bury it in a field. Unfortunately, she wakes up and it’s in her bed Godfather style. It’s Kieran’s birthday and Emma plans a romantic night alone, but creepy cousin Eli (Sean Grandillo) convinces her to throw a massive house party for him. The show tries really hard to convince you he’s the killer, so obviously he’s not. Speaking of people being set up as the killer, Audrey finds Gustavo’s tablet and it’s filled with comic-style drawing of her and her friends, including one of Emma with a knife through the head. When she asks for Noah (John Karna) to chime in with his two cents, he says he likes the guy, but then compares his “brooding loner” personality to Mark Wahlberg in Fear and Jennifer Jason Leigh in Single White Female. Not the best references there.

It’s time for Kieran’s birthday party and wouldn’t you know it, Jake sends a huge expensive tequila bottle from Mexico… except Jake is dead and gutted. So when everyone decides to celebrate Kieran’s arrival with a shot, people start getting sick. I’m guessing the killer saw Stand By Me and is trying to repeat the “Barf-o-rama” scene. Question for the readers: Would any of you know if tequila went bad or tasted “off”? It’s tequila… I’ve tried tequila and it ALWAYS tastes off. That’s why I don’t drink it anymore.

Gustavo (Santiago Segura) thinks the tequila was laced with a hallucinogen, and the party might become a huge group trip. Brooke (Carlson Young) begins to see it first and is tormented by visions of Jake. Emma follows a small blonde girl in a scene reminiscent of the Nightmare on Elm Street series, perhaps another nod to Wes Craven. Meanwhile Audrey sees the ghost of Rachel (Sosie Bacon), whose murder kickstarted the show last season. As they kiss we morph out of the drug-induced state to real life where Audrey is kissing… Noah! EW!!! Bi-Curious and the Virgin DO NOT make out! Things get kinkier when Zoe (Kiana Lede) feels their vibe, and they all start making out… if you followed these characters since last season, that season comes across as awkward and weird as hell, and if that’s what they were going for, it worked.

Emma’s hallucination takes her out into the woods surrounding the house where the killer attacks, and luckily her father shows up right in time to save her. Was the killer really there? We think so… maybe. When Audrey calls out Gustavo for his bloody drawings, his dad checks out his room and finds more sketches as well as a fresh, in the box, Brandon James mask.

We arrive at the big moment where they announce the finalists for Lakewood Lady of Lake. As Brooke takes her spot on stage, the banner reveal turns into Carrie, as blood rains down on her followed by Jake’s corpse. Great, if not predictable ending to the best episode of the season so far. This hour flew by, the high school drama was kept to minimum, and we had some seriously fun and weird moments. I do question the whole point of the killer… I mean, they’ve got an entire household high and hallucinating, and despite that failed to kill anyone. And why go after Emma again when they’ve spent the whole season torturing Audrey. Hopefully, we find out next week and they go a good episode streak!

Scream returns next Tuesday night at 11:00 PM on MTV.