8 Horror Movies That Give Away Their Own Endings
6. Scream - Billy Is Obviously The Killer
Scream is one of the most quintessential horrors of the nineties, beloved for its contribution to the slasher subgenre and the endless inspiration it provides for Halloween costumes every year.
Another cool thing about Scream is that it drops a million hints to let us know who is behind the murders before the big reveal.
Once instance of this is in the beginning, when Sid and Billy are getting together as some quiet music plays in the background. If you weren’t too distracted by what was going on in the foreground, you might recognise the track.
It’s the Blue Oyster Cult classic, ‘Don’t Fear the Reaper’.
This is a sneaky bit of foreshadowing for Sidney as, at the time, she has no reason to fear Billy or suspect him at all. Only a short time after this, however, she catches a glimpse of his phone and begins to suspect he may be to blame for the recent goings-on.
It has been widely discussed that Billy is characterised in a way that makes it almost too obvious that he is a killer, especially when Wes Craven throws in a few red herrings which eventually lead some viewers to say, “nah, it couldn’t be him - that would be too simple.”
All the signs are there: he’s a psychopath who guilts his mourning girlfriend into sleeping with him, he always knows where Sindey is just before she gets attacked, and he is even identified by Randy (who knows his horror tropes inside out) as most likely being the killer.
He’s heartless and self-driven, so it’s really no surprise in the end when we find out for real that he is one of the men behind the masks, and the leading one at that.