MovieChat Forums > Scream 2 (1997) Discussion > Was Mickey a good choice for the killer?

Was Mickey a good choice for the killer?

posted 9 years ago by Fearing-To-Be-Split
14 replies | jump to latest

Looking back, he was one of the only legitimate suspects to be the killer. Mrs. Loomis was great, but I feel like Mickey was an underwhelming choice for the killer. The reveal fell slightly flat.

Knew it wouldn't be Sidney, Dewey, or Gale.

Randy was killed, so obviously wasn't going to be him.

That left Derek, Cotton, Hallie, and Mickey. Guess you could count Joel, but if you consider him a suspect, you had to consider Kenny a suspect in S1.

I know "Mickey was the braun, Mrs. Loomis was the brain", Mrs. Loomis was the Billy, Mickey was the Stu.

But....

- Mickey was never attacked by the killer
- Disappeared throughout the second act making it even more apparent he was involved.
- The only characters we saw interact with CeCe were Randy and Mickey, so logic would tell you her killer was someone who knew her.
- Carried around a video camera, and the killer had been filming the victims before they were killed.

All the clues were there, and by the point in the movie where Dewey and Gale see the killers footage, of the few choices remaining to be the killer, Mickey is pretty obvious.

The "it's all about the trial" motive worked, but it didn't work well.

Perhaps it would have been different if the deleted scenes weren't cut, but with the Mickey reveal it felt like "Oh, it's that guy...". Aside from the police station scene, he didn't interact with Sidney much. Didn't get enough screen time probably.

[–] ShallowAl69 9 years ago

You're overthinking it

[–] Klockard23 9 years ago

That left Derek, Cotton, Hallie, and Mickey. Guess you could count Joel, but if you consider him a suspect, you had to consider Kenny a suspect in S1.

lol No you don't. It was obvious a fat guy wasn't running around in a costume killing people, same couldn't be said about Joel. He suspiciously went missing right before the killer called Gale (when Randy picked up) and then conveniently re-appeared only after Randy was dead. He also was missing during the entire finale (he claimed that he was leaving, but we couldn't know for sure that he did.) He should have rightfully been considered a suspect until the reveal.

Anyway, the only 'flaw' in Mickey being the killer was that he didn't have a whole lot of screen time beforehand. Otherwise, he was an excellent choice. Charismatic, funny, menacing, believable, etc... He was like the perfect hybrid of Billy and Stu. His motive was unique and believable too, and also made for excellent social commentary considering people were trying to blame real-life violence on violent movies at the time.

[–] cinemalover1994 9 years ago

My thoughts exactly. Such a shame they cut out so much of his character he was one of my favorite new characters of this movie. If they had kept the scene with him walking sid to class and the dorm scene it would have been better but more scenes with him would have been even better.

[–] Movie_Buff_Brad 9 years ago

He's probably the least inspired choice of the series (but not the worst). "The guy with the camera who likes sequels and is rarely around" is not much of a brain twister, and he felt very derivative of Stu.

But I also don't think any of the other male characters would have been much better. I didn't like the idea of Derek. Cotton is more interesting as wrongfully accused. The actor who played Joel was creepy in The Faculty so he could have pulled it off, but I liked Joel.

I probably would have just left it at Mrs. Loomis and Hallie.

Arya vs T-1000: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yFaSNe691h0

[–] joe2002 9 years ago

IMHO this was a thoroughly unsatsifying reveal. Mickey was just some random psycho. The other killer was a mom who got a makeover. There just was no buildup, no clues, just somebody killing people people then all of a sudden it's revealed who it was.

[–] 9 years ago

[deleted]

[–] Stenian 8 years ago

Yeah, Mickey was a poor choice for the killer. He was way too obvious. He just looked evil and acted rather fishy all throughout.

I think that Gale's cameraman (Joel) would've been a much more "surprising" killer. And it's not like he won't be appropriate per se - Mickey was just a psycho with no motives who was found on the internet. Joel could easily fit that bill too.

And it would've been interesting to see two people in the media being the killers as opposed to students.

[–] harrison487 8 years ago

the only reason he was a killer was because of script leaks of hallie, dereke, debbie salt, and cotton being killers

[–] dancingcoop 8 years ago

well that version would have been good. they didn't need four killers. Mrs. Loomis and Hallie would have been great.

[–] imstillmatic 8 years ago

In the original script Derek and haille were the killers and lovers who were hired by Mrs Loomis to get revenge .. Cotton wasnt part of it but did flip at the end and try to kill Sidney .. After it was leaked they changed the killers and Mickey was probably the best choice left ... His reveal was amazing but yeah he just wasn't in it enough and have Derek as the boyfriend killer saying don't you know history repeats itself would have been awesome

[–] Lucia2016 (646) 3 years ago

I remember being underwhelmed when Mickey was revealed at the time and even now it still bugs me because he is not much more than an extra throughout the rest of the film, bar the Film class scene he just sits with them a few times and we never get to know him so there doesn't feel like a huge betrayal when he's finally revealed.

[–] cyberbob (3488) 3 years ago

Yup, the killers were always Scream 2's biggest flaw. Billy and Stu worked so well in the first one, so the sequel fell flat by comparison Billy because the character is genuinely creepy and Stu because Matthew Lillard has so much charisma

Mickey would have been a good villain if he had gotten more screen time, since Olyphant is arguably the most gifted actor to have portrayed a killer in the whole franchise. I think the script leak played a big part

Mrs. Loomis was a great idea, but I did not like how Laurie Metcalf portrayed her. She is not menacing at all. Which I guess ought to make sense since she's just a vengeful mom and not a true psycho, but she's wearing a freaking pant suit and looking bug-eyed throughout the finale

[–] Mister Babadook (2708) 3 years ago

As others have said the only flaw with Mickey is he didn't have alot of screen time, they didn't give him anything to do in the movie besides popping up for a few seconds then going away occasionally in the 1st act, like at the party he appeared for 5 seconds to say to Randy "Empire Strikes Back" to continue the debate from film class and that was it. He was barely above an extra in the movie tbh.

He never had any significant screen time with any of the characters other than Randy in film class, and he disappeared in the middle of the 2nd act and wasn't seen again till the reveal at the end. Had there been more scenes with him being buddies with Derek, being a good friend to Sidney it would've worked better. But with the few scenes we got of him as someone else said it didn't feel like that big of a betrayal when he was revealed, when you first saw it you probably didn't even remember his name when he was revealed as the killer.

He was charismatic and delivered a great performance in the monologue at the end, so it was a shame they failed to give him more screen time to make it mean more.

[–] Biggs111Mr (258) 2 years ago

Mickey wasn't shown much probably because they didn't want us audience to think much on him in the movie I think. Gotta mix things up u know. We don't always want the killers to be a close friend all the time or the reveal will be a little too obvious.