Headscratchers / Scream (1996)

As a Headcratchers subpage, all spoilers are unmarked as per policy. You Have Been Warned.

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• Why did Sidney lock Randy outside? Sidney watches the killer behind Randy while she is in the news van. Not five minutes later, Sidney escapes a chase from Ghostface and while going back into the house, she encounters both Stu and Randy and tells them to basically go fuck themselves and locks them out. Nobody suspects two killers at this point so why lock Randy outside?
  • Paranoia got the better of her.
  • Perhaps Sidney was also starting to suspect that there could be two killers. Billy did conveniently show up minutes after she was attacked and, even if Ghostface were approaching Randy from behind, he's somehow left alive. So Sidney might have subconsciously started thinking about things that didn't add up.
• The day after the first murders, Tatum claims that Stu was with her that night. But considering that he really is one of the killers, how is that possible? Is she lying to cover for him, did he wait until she was asleep or gone before going with Billy, or, while unlikely, did Billy somehow do all of that himself?
  • Randy notes that Stu could have been with Tatum before or after killing Casey and Steve, and Tatum has no real counter to Randy's response, which implies that while Stu did go to Tatum's home, he wasn't there all night. Also, Billy shows up at Sidney's house after the opening murders, so Stu's alibi means very little.
  • It also wouldn't be public knowledge exactly what time Casey was murdered, just that it happened last night, so Tatum might not have had any reason to be suspicious. Possibly they even set Billy up as a Red Herring to avoid the police looking too far into Stu's movements, which gives them enough time to set Neil Prescott up as the fall guy. Maybe they would have put it together once they'd collected all the evidence, but it all unfolded too fast for them to do so.
• Why does Ghostface say that Casey got the second question on the phone wrong? He asked who the killer of Friday the 13th was, she said Jason.
  • I think they meant the killer from the first movie not the entire series. The killer from that movie was Jason's mom.
  • It was a trick question. Ghostface never specified which Friday the 13th, which was the whole point. In the 1st one Jason's mom's the killer, but Alice also kills her, thus she's a "killer" too. Then there's the copycat in Part 5, then there's Jason.
  • Yeah, it was definitely a trick question. Casey was screwed no matter what she said. I'm paraphrasing here, but at the end Stu and Billy say something like "Oh, this is the fun part. We ask you the questions, you get it wrong, BOOKAW! You die!" "You get it right...and you die."
• Does Ghostface ever ask quizzes about horror movies in any of the other movies?
  • Yes, in the fourth one. Also, logically speaking, none of the other killers could actually know about the trivia. All 4 people involved are dead.
  • They could know about it because Billy and Stu told Sidney about the trivia part
• Was there ever any reason for Ghostface to kill Casey? The other characters he killed were linked to his motive or were in his way. It just seems to be a random kill.
  • Stu and Casey dated at one point. It probably ended badly and he wanted revenge.
  • Since Casey's boyfriend whom she apparently dumped Stu for is involved as well, this supports that theory.
  • And Fridge Brilliance - since they dated, maybe Stu had a better knowledge and understanding of her house and how best to trap her. Billy likewise would know Sidney's house quite well, and Principal Himbry's murder happened on school property which they of course would know. And the rest of the murders happen at Stu's house, which gives him a home turf advantage.
• Why did the police not do some tests on the mask, once they go it? There could have been some fingerprints on it or there might have been some DNA on the inside where it touched the killer's face.
  • The traces would have been very faint, and a lot of small-town police departments don't have very big forensics budgets, especially back then.
  • Since we don't know how Billy or Stu wore the masks, they might have had balaclavas on underneath them to account for that. Or maybe the mask Dewey found was there as a Red Herring that neither of them wore, so there wouldn't be any traces on it.
  • Scream VI indicates there would have been DNA traces on the mask if they wore it, but DNA evidence was still very new at the time and it's unlikely the Woodsboro PD had access to it. They would have had to send the mask out for testing, and by the time results came back everything was already settled.
• How did Stu modify his voice from prison for his one phone call? They let him into jail with that voice modifying box? Nobody found that suspicious?
  • Stu wasn't in jail,Billy was. It's assumed that Stu made the call to Sidney to throw her/the audience off about Billy.
• At the end, why didn't Stu and Billy give each other those stab wounds after polishing off Sidney and her father? It would have been a lot easier and less risky.
  • They wanted Sidney to watch? Billy was angry at her because her mother broke up his parents' marriage, maybe he wanted to make her suffer by drawing out the process and show her exactly how he was going to get away with it before he killed her.
    • So, Bond Villain Stupidity, then?
    • Billy had basically fallen to the point of Ax-Crazy at this point and Stu was never the sharpest tool in the shed to begin with. It probably wasn't a well thought out plan.
• How, exactly, could the killers expect to get away with their plan? Billy would have a lot of explaining to do - like why was his shirt covered in red tinted corn syrup and why was the corn syrup also all over the master bedroom in a way that would make it obvious that somebody faked a killing. With semen and other samples on the bed, it goes without saying that the police would very quickly figure out that Sydney had sex with him that night in that bed and that shortly after, he pretended to be killed. To top it off, he also had gunshot residue on his hands, and Sydney's father - the man supposed to be framed for the murders - would show obvious signs of being tied up for a couple days not the least of which would be the unmistakable marring of his face and wrists from the duct tape.
  • Don't mean to be condescending with the list format but it helps me organize my response

  • A) The cops likely wouldn't have tested the red stains in the room and the stains on Billy, they would assume it's blood since Billy and the rest of the house are already covered in blood.

  • B) Semen at a wild teen party is nothing new, they would have figured someone got laid before the murder broke out.

  • C) Billy and Stu have been badly wounded, the first priority wouldn't have been to accuse them of a crime but to get them to a hospital. They would be cleaned up at said hospital, so there goes the gun residue.
  • Furthermore, wasn't the plan to kill Sydney's dad (with the gun) and pin the murders on him? Presumably they'd claim they wrestled the knife off him and then shot him to stop his "mad rampage". They might not get away with it, but it wasn't inherently stupid.

  • D) This is the only one that really could have screwed them but they're badly wounded and the only people left to tell the story (if everything went according to plan) so the cops would have to choose to investigate the markings on him and believe that Billy and Stu stabbed each other and made up the story or excuse the marks as something that happened during the massacre and forget about it.
  • Even if they had initially gotten away with it, Gale's hidden cam probably would have been found. Unless, they somehow found it first? I suppose it's possible they could have known about it when they killed the camera man - seeing the footage on the monitors in the van.
    • They might actually have been okay on that end, since Gale's camera only filmed the room with the TV in it, and most of the stuff happened in the kitchen. Billy shooting Randy did happen at the front door, but it's possible the camera didn't pick it up. Obviously once Sidney starts fighting back, it's a different story.
  • Also as far as semen goes, condoms do exist.
• In the same vein as above, the sheriff of the town isn't stupid, and he and the police force will be wondering why Neil Prescott decided to off some teens and a high school principal when some rudimentary police work will show that Billy and Stu had much more personal ties to the victims. Not to mention the overkill of the victims and the fact that a knife was used, meaning they had to get all up on their victims, show those personal ties. So with that, Billy and Stu survive with extremely superficial stab wounds without at least some massive defensive wounds or bruising to show that there was at least a good fight to prevent said overkill? That would raise a lot of questions. As an aside, re: small-town police forces not having the forensic team, they wouldn't, but for something like this, they would bring in a forensic team from a larger town or city (and when a bunch of teens are slaughtered like this, they would receive a lot of offers from sympathetic comrades who want to see the killers behind bars and not getting off on technicalities or lack of evidence).
  • Well they're teenagers. They probably didn't think it through.
  • Also, Stu puts the cell phone and voice-changer in Neil's pocket with his bare hands. Fingerprints, anyone?
    • Fingerprints and DNA from the saliva. everyone expels saliva and dead cells when breathing.
• What's the point of Ghostface asking Casey horror-related questions? We find out later that Casey dumped Stu for Steven. Even if she guessed all of the questions right, she and Steven still would have been screwed.
  • To torture her even more, by giving her a Hope Spot. She thinks there's a chance she might live if she gets the question right. That makes it even scarier for her.
• This is a minor point, but why did Casey lie to Ghostface about not having a boyfriend? I really don't see what she would have to gain from that.
  • It's probably just that she wanted the satisfaction of flirting around with the guy on the other end. Look at her face when she's talking to him (at first). Until he starts dropping hints that she should be scared, she seems to be having fun, and the guy on the other end has a pretty sexy voice. Maybe she was considering cheating on her bf or (more likely) she liked the attention that he was giving her, and wanted to let it play a little longer. Odds are, had it evolved into something more substantial than just a call on the phone, she probably would have shut it down.
  • The other guy also keeps calling, so maybe Casey is just one of those people who's too polite to say "get lost".
  • And in the initial phone calls, Casey keeps hanging up. When the guy says "I want to talk", she hangs up. So she may have guessed that this person was very persistent and it might be best to humour him for the time being - and giving him a conversation until Steve gets there would be enough to stop him from calling again.
• What would have happened if Casey had actually guessed all the questions right? Would Ghostface really just let her go or what?
  • Billy and Stu mentioned that they kill their victims even if they got the questions right, so Casey was screwed either way.
  • The point of "who was the killer in Friday the 13th?" is that it's impossible to get right without an extremely specific answer, which Casey was in no frame of mind to provide. Answer "Jason," and as happened in the movie, she gets it wrong because Mrs. Voorhees was the killer in the first film. Answer Mrs. Voorhees, and she gets it wrong because while she was the original killer, Jason is the killer through most of the franchise. Even answering both Mrs. Voorhees and Jason is incorrect because of Roy Burns in Part V, and arguably the body-surfing plot in Jason Goes To Hell. Without clearly stating something like "Mrs. Voorhees in the first, Jason in all others except V which was Roy Burns," there is no way to correctly answer the question.
• Why exactly did Sidney not get in any trouble for punching Gale even though there were dozens of witnesses? Ok, maybe they went easy on her given the circumstances, but I would think she would still get community service or probation or something.
  • Sidney probably completed her punishment off-screen.
  • Doesn't Gale have to press charges for that to be an issue? And press were forbidden from going past the station entrance, and Gale snuck in around the back to try and doorstop Sidney — the very thing she was forbidden from doing. So Gale wouldn't have got punched if she wasn't disobeying police orders. And Dewey was the supervising cop (and not a very good one), so he could have ruled that Sidney's reasons for the assault were a grey area - moments after being attacked in her house and being confronted by a reporter working on a book slandering a family member who was murdered last year. And as the town was dealing with two nasty murders in one night, with a third narrowly averted, that was the police's priority instead of slapping the wrists of an assault victim.
  • And not sure how the American legal system works, but in Ireland the UK, people under eighteen involved in crimes can't be identified publicly. I believe this mainly refers to suspects, but the situation was still too soon to get a handle on who was responsible - so neither Sidney nor Billy could have their identities legally given to the press. Gale is breaking the law by trying to catch Sidney for an interview, so she's lucky she got away with a tap in the face as opposed to a lawsuit from Neil Prescott when everything was over.
  • Yep. Unless Sidney is 18, then she can't be identified on camera (and neither can Tatum for that matter). Gale was breaking the law by trying to doorstop her.
• How and when did Stu and Billy get the chance to kidnap Steve so they could tie him up and proceed with their game? Did they kidnap him from school during football practice, because he was still wearing his letterman jacket when he was tied up.
  • Casey tells Ghostface that Steve was going to be at her house, so one can assume that it was a date night for Casey and Steve. Billy and Stu probably overheard her plans at school and ambushed Steve on the way to Casey's house.
  • Maybe they had no idea about Steve and just lucked out when they were lying in wait at Casey's house. They saw his car driving up and saw the perfect opportunity to add to their scheme?
• When Casey's parents arrive to the house, Casey tries to yell at them for help, but she can't, either due the pain she is suffering or because Ghostface's stabbing have likely damaged her vocal cords. However, Casey had a phone on her hand, so why she didn't threw the phone towards her parents to alert them? If she had done so, then her parents would have noticed her and maybe defend or even save her from Ghostface...
  • Because she was extremely distressed from being tortured over the phone, seeing her boyfriend murdered right in front of her and having to run for her life. Her first instinct was to call for help and then she realised she couldn't, so before she has time to think of anything else, he caught up to her.
• Why did Billy and Stu kill a bunch of people who had nothing to do with Billy's reason for revenge? Ok, Sidney was Maureen's daughter so it may just be Guilt by Association in her case, and Casey broke up with Stu, so it's pretty obvious that was the motivation, but what about everyone else?
  • Simple: to cover up the real target. By having a series of murders, it makes it easy to hide the intended target, who was Sidney. Let me use an another film as an example of this: Silence of the Lambs. Buffalo Bill's first victim was the third one found due to the fact he weighed her down. Lector left a note for Clarice that points out how some of the later victims that were discovered and the random locations seemed "desperately random", which in turn lead to Clarice to realize that the first victim (third victim found) was someone Buffalo Bill knew, which is why she was weighed down. By killing others before going after Sidney, it helps cover that she was the intended target (as we discover with Billy's motive). Casey was clearly a victim as a motive for Stu (as she dumped him), and everyone else either to help set up the final act (like the Principal, whose dead body help draw whomever was left at the party to the football field) or just got in the way (like Kenny).
  • They're also obsessed with slasher movies, so it's more fun to them if there are loads of victims. Principal Himbry was the most random (and his death was added in later in the script) but it might make more sense if you consider a deleted scene where Sidney told him about her attack in the bathroom, which might tie either of them to it (harder for a grown man who's a non-teacher to go undetected in a public high school than a student). Tatum was Stu's alibi for Casey's death, but her dying means she can't be a character witness for Neil Prescott or potentially give the police clues it's Stu or Billy. Gale, Kenny and Dewey were just in the wrong place at the wrong time (and they left Gale alone when they thought she was out of the way in the van crash). Randy just stuck around at the party too long.
    • Also, Randy had already made it very clear to Billy and Stu that he thought they were suspicious. Tatum might have potentially given clues to the police, but Randy definitely would have.
• Why was Ghostface stalking Sidney and Tatum in full costume at the grocery store? He would've been extremely easy to spot, especially when Dewey was close by at the time.
  • Other than Billy and Stu, multiple teenagers in Woodsboro were wearing the costume for shits and giggles, so the stalker at the store could have easily been a prankster and not the actual Ghostface.
• For an actor question instead of a plot one, is the party guest credited as "Girl on Couch" and played by Angela Miller the blonde girl with pink overalls or the brown-haired girl with the black shirt who sits next to Randy right before he recites the rules ? Both of them repeatedly appear throughout the party scenes but one is uncredited. While the former girl has audible dialogue and the latter girl does not, the girl in the black shirt is usually seen sitting on couches while the other girl is only seen standing or sitting on the floor. Additionally, the girl in the black shirt looks a lot like a girl from the video store scene, the one who wears a purple shirt and a belt with a large buckle and is browsing behind Randy and Stu at the beginning of the scene and reacting to some of their dialogue. If the extra appeared in multiple scenes that would make her more likely to be credited even if she didn’t have dialogue.
  • The rule of thumb, if memory serves, is that if you have a line, you have to be credited, and are by definition not an extra. That's pretty much the dividing line between an extra and actor, extras do not have (and should not be given) lines. Thus, whichever girl speaks is the one who was credited. (These rules are flexible, such as the woman who ad-libbed a response to Chekhov and Uhura in Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, which the filmmakers liked enough to get her a credit and SAG card so they could use the line, but in general, extras are just warm bodies to fill out a scene, and should be seen but not heard.)
  • Several characters with a quick line of dialogue are uncredited (a girl on Sidney's school bus, an obnoxious reporter, a man who Randy bumps into at the video store, a departing party guest or two, a paramedic, etc.), so that may not be conclusive.