The season finale of “Scream: The TV Series” is tomorrow and summer’s greatest murder mystery will be solved! OK, I’m sure you all know that I’m being sarcastic, but I am slightly intrigued to find out who the killer is. Alas, this may not happen anytime soon; since “Scream: The TV Series” was renewed for a second season by MTV despite disastrous ratings. Also, I’d like to dedicate this post to executive producer Mr. Wes Craven, the iconic horror genius who passed away last night after a long battle with brain cancer. He will be missed by millions. I’m going to continue this TV recap in my typical bitchy, better-than-thou attitude, but with a lot of love and respect. We’ve truly lost a legend and this was his final work.
When we return, it’s a flashback sequence one year prior. A skinny, all black, ski mask wearing assailant breaks into Lakewood County’s Municipal Records, specifically to the old evidence chamber. Somehow they know the code to the safe and they just waltz on in there and steal the Brandon James mask. Fast forward, and it’s back to the present time and the town of Lakewood is decorating for Halloween. Mr. Branson is still in custody, but is proclaiming his innocence, especially that he has no idea where the knife with Will’s blood on it came from. Sheriff Clark informs him of all the dirt they have on him – the malware, the name change, the out of towns during the killings – and he drops a bomb that they know about his prized student, Olivia Fenley, who was founded murdered right before he skipped town. Yeah, Mr. Branson wants a lawyer immediately.
Emma and Brooke are driving…somewhere…and Brooke seems determined to convince Emma that Mr. Branson couldn’t be the killer. Emma doesn’t want to hear any of it and begins her little rant about how everyone around her is a liar anyway and that Mr. Branson is literally a completely different person. Meanwhile, Sheriff Clark is holding a press conference and of course Piper is there. He says that trick or treating must be concluded by sun down, no masks are allowed to be worn this year, and that proceeds from the school dance will go towards the families of Nina, Tyler, Rachel, Riley and Will. Piper doesn’t think the dance is a good idea, especially since they don’t know if Mr. Branson is 100% the killer yet, but Sheriff Clark basically tells her to fuck off and goes back inside.
Meanwhile, Brooke is moving in with Jake. With her father in jail and her mother in rehab, people don’t want her living on her own despite the fact that she’s 17-years-old. She and Jake compare their matching scars. How cute. Maggie is working at the morgue, which is weird seeing how no one has been killed recently, and she is awaiting DNA results to see if Mr. Branson is her long lost son from her one night stand with Brandon James. Emma wants to interrogate Mr. Branson, although Maggie and Sheriff Clark are apprehensive, but eventually they relent and in she goes. Emma is surprisingly strong and confident and wants to know why he did this to her and her friends. Mr. Branson is super creepy but continues to maintain his innocence in the whole thing. Finally, Emma asks him, “Is it over?” to which he replies, “I guess you’ll find out soon enough.” Yeah, that’s not foreshadowing or anything…
Back to Brooke – why is she getting so much screen time this episode? she’s useless. – and she’s undressing to take a shower when she sees the webcam come on her laptop. She accuses Jake of being up to his blackmailing schemes again, or just a peeping tom, which causes a huge blow out between them. Looks like they won’t be fucking anytime soon as Brooke throws a tantrum and moves out his guest bedroom. Back to important business now, Emma is finally telling Audrey and Noah that her mother had a child with Brandon James and that he, aka Mr. Branson, may be the one behind this. Noah points out that Branson is the conjoined pairing of Brandon and Son in a very I Still Know What You Did Last Summer kind of way. The trio separate for the hundredth time, giving Piper enough time to appear out of the blue for the hundredth time and tell Emma that she was able to track down Brandon James’ mother.
Together, Emma and Piper drive out to Brandon James’ mother’s home to interrogate her, despite the fact that she’s senile and makes little to no sense. Right off the bat she recognizes Emma as a spawn of Maggie and immediately goes back to when Brandon was shot by the police after committing the murders. She also divulges that Brandon’s son had stopped in yesterday, wanting to know more about his father and his family history. Based on name alone, Brandon’s mother says that Seth (aka Mr. Brandon) was the one who had come knocking and looking for answers, thus giving them the least fair assessment in the show’s history. Piper drops Emma off at home and Kieran shows up and they finally get back together. He stays for dinner and there’s a quick montage of Emma, Kieran, Maggie and Sheriff Clark having a fun, slightly incestuous family dinner. Yeah, I’m sure that’s not foreshadowing, too.
Audrey is still working on her Rachel documentary, which is pointless because no one cared about her enough to actually go see it when she’s done. While going through the footage she discovers a clip of Kieran and Nina leaving a bar one night. This ties Kieran to Nina in a way that he hadn’t yet discussed and that no one saw coming. Is Kieran the killer or even a second killer? Meanwhile, Sheriff Clark is pinging the phone calls made to Emma’s phone in an attempt to find some sort of pattern in the killer’s calls, just incase Mr. Branson really isn’t their guy. The pings are all over the place, so Sheriff Clark decides to venture out to the locations on the map and look for witnesses who saw Branson in the area. He crosses county lines and enters a house without a warrant – which is totally breaking the law by the way, he’s just a town sheriff… – and he succeeds in finding evidence in the form of a laptop computer with hundreds of malware webcams streaming to it. This is clearly the killer’s hideout. He hears a noise and goes to investigate, gun drawn, but Ghostface sneaks up behind him and knocks him out.
Later that night, the kids of George Washington High are getting ready for their Halloween dance. Emma and Kieran are going as Mia and Vincent from Pulp Fiction, Noah is going as Dracula, Audrey is going as a steampunk princess, and Jake is going as the Jolly Green Giant after miraculously recovering from a near fatal chest stab only two episodes prior. Brooke calls everyone up and invites them to an after party at her house, one that’ll be serving alcohol because she needs to bring the old Brooke back. Maggie is a chaperon at the dance and is distraught that Sheriff Clark hasn’t answered her calls. Kieran offers to call him and see if he answers, but not before he and Emma do a reenactment of the dance scene from Pulp Fiction. I appreciate glorifying the film and all, but there’s no way these teens would know the movie, find it favorable and mimic it as such.
After the reenactment, Audrey tells Emma about the video footage of Kieran and Nina and even goes as far as to show her the clip. Emma gets super defensive of Kieran, saying that she couldn’t believe he killed Nina just as much as she didn’t believe Audrey did. This causes a huge blow up and Audrey storms out of the dance, on route to Brooke’s so she can get drunk. Emma confronts Kieran about the footage in a very calm and collected way and he says he just gave her a ride home from the bar because she was white girl wasted. Emma still has questions, but Kieran suddenly gets defensive and says, “He’s in a jail cell and he’s still beat you,” before exiting the dance, too. Well, this is the most realistic part of the series as teens always get into a lot of drama during school dances! Totally Laguna!
Jake is about to get it on with a girl dressed as a Playboy bunny when Piper shows up out of the blue again and tells Emma that she went back to Brandon James’ mom’s house to confirm that Mr. Branson was the one who stopped by. She showed her a year book and she ended up pointing to Kieran instead. Suddenly, the power goes out… When it comes back on, there’s a live feed of Sheriff Clark being tortured on the overhead projector. Everyone screams. At the same time we see Mr. Branson’s jail cell. He murdered the guard – there’s literally blood EVERYWHERE – and has escaped into the night.
