Wes Craven Talks About Changing the Ghostface Mask and His Lack of Involvement in the Scream Series

The Hollywood Reporter may have single handedly deflated any interest I had in the upcoming “Scream” series set to premiere on MTV.  In a recent article they spoke to several different people involved with the upcoming “Scream” series and who have had some connection to “Scream” in the past.  Through this article they revealed that the new series really doesn’t have much of a connection to the films.

Probably the most damning thing revealed in the article is that Wes Craven won’t be too heavily involved in the series.  Despite having his name featured on the most recent trailer and being credited as an executive producer, Wes was too busy to really be involved in the production of the show.  Here’s what he had to say about his involvement:

“I just put my name on it,” Craven explains, referencing his executive producer credit. “I was too busy to do much else.”

Depending on how much stock you place on the Wes Craven name these days, that could be a powerful statement regarding the potential of the show.  And since Wes Craven didn’t have too much direct involvement with the series that means he didn’t have a say on whether or not the Ghostface mask should be used. If you hadn’t heard by now the iconic Ghostface masked featured in the “Scream” films won’t be making an appearance in the new series.  Instead a new mask will take it’s place.  Here’s what Wes Craven had to say on the appearance change:

In general we didn’t mess with the mask at all. It’s something we didn’t try to change. With Freddy [Krueger] and the New Nightmare, I felt that I probably should have stuck with the original face. [With Scream,] we just let Ghostface be Ghostface.

It would have been safer.  I’m not going to speculate in public, probably shouldn’t have even mentioned it, but you know, sometimes you realize that something’s not broken, so don’t fix it. And that was the course we took on all the Scream films: Don’t mess with that, it’s just perfect.

If Craven had played a more active role in the development of the series I wonder if that’s something that would’ve been protected. It’s possible we could get a better looking mask, but opting to change the status quo is always a huge risk since the result might wind up alienating the fanbase that would otherwise support the show.

Another big change fans of the “Scream” franchise can expect is the lack of Roger Jackson’s infamous voice.  Ever since Drew Barrymore picked up the phone in the first “Scream”, Roger’s voice has been deeply connected to the film series.  For the show it would seem that they’re dropping his voice.  Whether or not it’ll be replaced by a different voice remains to be seen, but for now he has no involvement with the series.

I understand trying to make the series feel like it’s own thing so that it can stand on it’s own, but at a certain point all these changes only serve to make the new thing feel like an inferior copy of the original.  Hopefully there’s enough going on in this new series to make the glaring omissions seem trivial, but for now, I’m starting to worry about whether or not the new series can live up to the quality established by the films.