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‘Beware Of Young Girls’: A Focused And Fearful Hour Of Fun

By Joey Click

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Pretty Evil

THE REVIEW:

Barbara Brown directs Beware of Young Girls with little style but furious focus. The script is sharp, while drawing the viewing in more than any other episode, and Brown gives us some decent direction. The filmmaker, appropriately a female given the material, gives her audience a nice ceiling shot (effectively establishing the four Chanel’s playing Ouija), a nice shot, the episode’s second to last shot, pulling away from Grace and Zayday as they eventually walk out of frame while the camera stops and tilts up to reveal the shadows of the Chanel’s looking on. Feather’s horrific discovery is also effective, not in its camera work, but with its atmosphere and lighting. It’s the first time that Scream Queens has truly felt like real horror, and while parody might be the point, I freaking loved it.

‘The movie Quija!? No. No one did.’ -Chanel

While the episode, the seventh entry in Fox’s freshman series, is helmed with incredibly less style than some previous editions of Scream Queens, Beware of Young Girls’ script is very tight and accomplished.
After taking a slight hiatus, due to the 111 edition of The World Series (which Kansas City won), Scream Queens’ newest offering is a lot less skewering of horror and more of an actual “who done it” mystery experience. Instead of taking jabs at sorority horror, which I did enjoy when not presented heavy handedly, the series beings to nurture itself and not pander.

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The episode is still funny though, especially when Chad Radwell needs his goat love, and Chanel gets a few great lines in as well. The difference here is Chanel’s happenings are the B storyline, and not the A, so the co-president of Kapa House doesn’t wear out her welcome (it helps that Roberts is especially good with her delivery in Beware).

Beware of Young Girls is a turning point in quality for Scream Queens. The plot is moved further than in any previous entry, and characters begin to display authentic motivations for their actions. While the Red Devil isn’t seen on screen once in the episode, which is shockingly a good thing, the Devil is involved with a key plot-moving scene. In a show that started out as basically parody, with the Dollar Scholar’s arms getting cut off (and still living armless after) and the ice-cream mascot’s murder standing out, Scream Queens is simply more exciting and engaging in its last entry.

As for Beware of Young Girls’ acting, Jamie Lee Curtis steals the show. An almost 40 year veteran of the business, who’s most known for portraying Laurie Strode in John Carpenter’s immortal Halloween, tears up the screen and scene steals like some mythical thespian theft. Those waiting for the actress to really shine, after the excitement of the actress being cast as Dean Munch, have finally had their wish granted. Not only does the actress get immensely more screen time than in any previous Scream Queens episode, but Curtis is deliciously devilish in her boosted position in the narrative.

Emma Roberts is also great in the episode and her line delivery might be the best it’s been in Fox’s Scream Queens.

THE VERDICT:

Beware of Young Girls is a turning point for Scream Queens. It’s a thrilling experience that loses much of the constant attempts at wit while focusing on plot momentum and college campus mysteriousness. It’s truly the first time I’ve really wanted to see the next episode and I only hope the Fox series continues on this bloody path.

THE GRADE: B+

Join 1428 next week as we take a look at the eighth episode of Scream Queens, titled Mommie Dearest.

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