Ariana Grande’s ‘Scream Queens’ Death Remains Peak Comedic Horror (2024)

Some people welcome Spooky Season by gushing over Freeform’s 31 Nights of Halloween lineup, making their own list of new scary shows and movies, or planning creative pop culture Halloween costumes. But me? I kick off the month with the time-honored tradition of watching Ariana Grande’s character die in Ryan Murphy’s 2015 horror series, Scream Queens.

For those who have yet to feast their eyes on the satirical slasher comedy from Murphy and Glee co-creators Brad Falchuk and Ian Brennan, it’s one of television’s greatest Halloween treats. The series follows a group of students at Wallace University who are scared senseless when a serial killer (dressed as the school’s Red Devil mascot) starts terrorizing campus. When the Kappa Kappa Tau sorority is targeted, president Chanel Oberlin (Emma Roberts) and her “minions” — Chanel #2 (Ariana Grande), Chanel #3 (Billie Lourd), and Chanel #5 (Abigail Breslin) — work with the school’s dean (Jamie Lee Curtis), security guard Denise Hemphill (Niecy Nash), and their new sorority pledges to stay alive and unmask the Red Devil.

Now, I’m not a fan of straight horror. Not even a little bit. But Scream Queens features scintillating comedic horror so extra that you can’t help but laugh. With more than 50 gruesome murders over the course of Scream Queens’ two seasons, viewers witness everything from ridiculous death by deep fryer to terrifying chainsaw decapitations. Not every death was comical, but seven years after the series premiered, I still think about one character’s demise on a regular basis: Chanel #2’s.

In the Scream Queens pilot, Chanel #2 (Grande) helps the girls hide the dead body of sorority housekeeper Ms. Bean, who Chanel Oberlin accidentally killed. After the dirty work, Chanel asks her sorority sisters to take a casual blood oath to ensure they won’t spill the beans on Ms. Bean, but Chanel #2 (whose real name is Sonya Herfmann) leaves to confess to police. While Chanel #2 is in her room packing, she gets a texts from an unknown number that reads, “Brave enough to open the door?”

Chanel #2, NOOOOO! There’s a killer on the loose, girlie. Don’t do it! Reader, she does it. Of course she does! And what happens next remains one of the most beautifully unhinged satirical commentaries on Extremely Online society to date.

As her bedroom doorknob jiggles, Chanel #2 whips her high pony around in horror. She silently approaches the door and opens it, revealing the Red Devil. When faced with the literal killer, Chanel #2 doesn’t scream, run, or fight. She subverts typical horror expectations by panting heavily, backing up a bit, and seductively batting her eyelashes at the mysterious mascot. The Red Devil enters, closes her door, and whips out his phone. We hear the comical clacking of iPhone keys, a message send noise, and another message received ding. Chanel #2 looks down at her phone and reads the text: “So you want to dance with the devil?”

The murderer — and I can’t stress this enough — is right in front of Chanel #2. But rather than utter a single sound, she texts back “Maybe,” causing his phone to chime a creepy devil laugh. After exchanging a weird, sexually charged glance, the Red Devil steps forward, scoops Chanel #2 in his arms, and dips her with all the passion of an instructor trying to score straight 10s on Dancing With The Stars. They stand there in silence for another beat, giving Chanel #2 ample time to scream, run, call 911 — anything! But she simply remains, playing with her ponytail and patiently waiting for the killer to send another text. “I’m going to kill you now,” it reads upon arrival. She sends back, “Wait whaaaat???!” and the Red Devil raises a butcher knife and stabs her in the shoulder.

As a dagger pierces Chanel #2’s skin, she finally screams and falls to the floor in a cute metallic silver cropped tank, choker, white skater skirt, tall white knee socks, and platform patten leather shoes. She looks great, but unfortunately she’s dead. Or so we thought! After a few sad seconds, she takes a big breath and kicks the Red Devil so hard that he flies backwards and hits the wall. (LOL.) As he lays on the ground unconscious, Chanel #2 grabs her phone and TEXTS HIM. Yes, TEXTS HIM! She doesn’t hide, escape, or call for help. She uses her thumbs to type, “Stop!!!!! Please stop!!!” and THEN crawls to safety. No, wait! She crawls to HER LAPTOP, which is open to Twitter’s homepage. Does this girl…want to survive?

With blood seeping out of her shoulder and a crazed killer feet away, Chanel #2 starts composing a tweet, which makes me cackle upon every rewatch. “He’s killing me! The Red Devil is killing me! I let him into my room and now I’m being stabbed to death! Somebody please help me! Please!” she types. There are countless other things she could — and crucially should! — be doing in this moment (including exercising brevity on social media). But she has to uphold her online brand, even with mascara streaming down her face and the Red Devil creeping up behind her. Before Grande’s character can hit send, the villain stabs her to death and she collapses with one hand on the keyboard. She’s gone for good, but not before she jolts back to life long enough to smash the send button on her final tweet. A pure masterpiece.

The two characters don’t utter a single word to each other this entire scene, but Grande’s gentle gasps, concerned facial expressions, and subtle physical comedy say so much. In a world filled with articles about how to unplug, take social media breaks, and stop doom scrolling, watching someone text their killer and be so addicted to Twitter that they spend their last moments blasting a PSA to followers instead of trying to stay alive is a well-deserved mockery of our Extremely Online society. We deserved this seemingly evergreen roasting, and seven years later, I still consider it a stunning slice of comedic comedy. I simply wish the iconic scene didn’t cost us the naive Chanel #2 so early in the series. She officially died in the pilot, but thankfully it wasn’t the last time we saw her on the show. And her final words will live on forever thanks to Twitter.com.