In the season 2 premiere of Scream Queens, “Scream Again,” Dean Munsch recruits Zayday and the Chanels to help her with her latest project, the Chanels try to revamp their image and a new killer strikes.
On October 31, 1985, a raging Halloween party is underway. A pregnant woman approaches one of the revelers, frantic that something is wrong with her husband. Nothing screams party pooper like someone in distress, even if the rager is taking place at the Our Lady of Perpetual Suffering Hospital and all the attendees are the staff.
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Malpractice
Dr. Mike (Jerry O’Connell), dressed as some green demon, is high on crushed quaaludes but reluctantly agrees to see the patient, a man suffering from COPD. (The dude can’t breath.) He needs surgery to drain his lungs, but Dr. Mike and his cheese-puff munching nurse suggest holding off until morning. The man’s wife threatens to sue the hospital if Dr. Mike doesn’t perform the procedure, so he agrees.
But Dr. Mike has other plans. There is no saving the patient, Bill. He’ll be dead within the hour, so Dr. Mike and the nurse wheel his body out to the rancid swamp that is adjacent to the hospital. Between the bugs and the bacteria, his body will disappear within a matter of days. This way, Dr. Mike doesn’t get the blame. He plans to fake the paperwork, saying they did the procedure and that Bill checked himself out. It’s the wife’s word against theirs. Then it’s back to the party.
The nurse advises Dr. Mike to abandon his garish and distinctive costume just in case there are any witnesses lurking about, so he dumps it along with poor Mr. Bill into the murky swamp waters.
Whatever Happened To…?
Dean Munsch is now Dr. Dean Cathy Munsch. She’s technically not an MD, but she did receive an honorary doctorate from the University of Pittsburgh when she gave the commencement address. After enjoying worldwide fame as a feminist icon, Munsch decided she wanted to reform America’s healthcare system. She founded the Caregivers United in Restorative Ideology (C.U.R.E.), funded entirely by her own personal fortune. Her mission statement is to cure diseases that have been deemed incurable.
But what about the Kappas, more specifically the Chanels? Thanks to a Netflix documentary series, they became a national obsession, and the cracker jack police work of one Special Agent Denise Hemphill — formerly of Secure Enforcement Solutions — who caught Hester’s confession on videotape, they’re free. It seems Hester didn’t quite grasp the concept of double jeopardy. She believed she was immune from prosecution because the case had already been tried, just not with her as the defendant.
The Chanels were exonerated and disappeared, but Munsch has had a lingering interest in one of the surviving sorority girls, Zayday Williams. She finished her undergrad degree in a year and a half. Motivated by all of the death she’d seen, Zayday decided to become a doctor. Munsch offered to pay Zayday’s tuition.
Believing Zayday to have tremendous potential, Munsch recruits her to come work at her teaching hospital. Munsch has deep-seated reasons to see this hospital succeed, and she sees Zayday as being an integral part of that success.
Zayday joins Dr. Brock Holt (John Stamos), a Harvard-educated hottie who Munsch spotted in Playgirl, and Dr. Cassidy Cascade (Taylor Lautner) self-proclaimed female Viagra.
Dr. Brock is the first recipient of a hand transplant, after losing his in a freak garbage disposal accident. Prior to the transplant, Brock was a prodigy but afterwards, he couldn’t get a job for two years, forced to sit by and watch lesser doctors perform surgeries he should have been doing. But Munsch gave him a second chance.
Werewolf Girl Meets the Chanels
The C.U.R.E. Institute has its first patient, Catherine Hobart. She suffers from Werewolf Syndrome, a rare and, of course, incurable disease. Unfortunately, her condition is a genetic disorder, and Dr. Cascade says curing her would be akin to changing someone’s eye color. Zayday asks that Catherine give them a week to find an answer.
Munsch is regretting her decision to make Hobart her hospital’s flagship case, but Zayday has another issue. There aren’t enough women working at the hospital. It’s just her, male doctors and an incredibly upbeat and offensive candy striper named Chamberlain. Munsch has an idea of where to dig up some additional female help.
In spite of being exonerated, things haven’t improved for the Chanels. Even though they were found innocent of murder, they were still guilty of being awful human beings. They have a serious public-image problem. America hates them, and they were disowned by their families. They finished college, majoring in Communications because it was by far the easiest.
Number One decided that the best way to rehabilitate their images was to start giving back. Number Five got a job at a low-cost dental clinic. She said she did it because it helped the poor, but Number One is convinced that it was so she could get free braces for her “vagina teeth.”
Number Three got a job mopping up at the local men’s fertility clinic, and Number One became a phlebotomist after discovering her love of blood. Still, they were poor and exhausted, living together in a crappy apartment, subsisting on Pop-Tarts and fruit pies.
That’s how Dean Munsch finds them, sitting on their front porch because they can’t get anyone to give them their HBO Go password.
Munsch wants them to enroll as medical students and come work at her hospital. They do have some experience in the medical field. Munsch feels that the girls have a lot to learn, and she can help.
Zayday is actually happy to be reunited with her former sorority sisters. The Chanels are more excited by the sight of Dr. Brock Holt naked and wet in the shower.
The Chanels are under strict instructions to follow the doctors around and say nothing. After spotting Hobart, their silence is short-lived, asking how she looks in the mirror and doesn’t freak out every single time?
Zayday has done some research and she thinks she’s found a way to treat, and possibly cure, Catherine’s disease. The procedure is experimental and involves drilling a hole in her brain. Desperate to not look like Sasquatch, Catherine agrees.
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I.M. Hoffel
There are a few other employees lurking around, and the Chanels encounter Ingrid Marie Hoffel (Kirstie Alley), a registered nurse and the head of administration. Number One asks if the woman is aware that her name is I.M. Hoffel.
Hoffel has no idea why Munsch hired the Chanels, unless it was to kill them since they’re unqualified to practice medicine in any way, shape or form. Hoffel makes it clear to Number One that she doesn’t like her, and if Chanel crosses her, she’ll eat her for lunch.
A Phoenix from the Ashes
The Chanels are called to Munsch’s office. Zayday is horrified at how they treated Catherine Hobart, insulting the poor, disfigured woman instead of showing compassion. Munsch puts the girls on academic probation and confines them to their dormitories until further notice. They also learn that they were mistaken to think they were getting paid. Free room, board and tuition is the deal.
Chanel Number One is despondent until she realizes that their current situation could be a golden opportunity. She might not be able to become the next Diane Sawyer, but they could become medical correspondents for FOX News. They can be “TV doctors,” just like Dr. Drew, Dr. Phil or The Doctors. Okay, maybe not Number Five since Number One thinks her face is what they call a “channel changer.”
So the new plan is to get back into Munsch’s good graces, and the best way to do that is to figure out a cure for “Wolf Girl.”
Number One finds Dr. Holt, who just happens to be reading Catherine’s file. He’s not big on Zayday’s lobotomy idea, and he and Number One begin to brainstorm. There are also apparent sparks flying, although Brock’s intense gaze and stroking of Chanel’s neck could be also interpreted as creepy.
Dr. Holt has an epiphany, and they barge into the operating room just as Dr. Cascade is about to begin. They discovered that Catherine’s diet is incredibly high in Vitamin D, boosting her testosterone. The solution is to change her eating habits and prescribe some medication that should cause her to lose the hair naturally.
The cure works too well. All of Catherine’s hair falls out, and she complains that she looks like a cancer patient. Number One announces that she spent a full hour flirting with Dr. Brock to try and find a cure, and she’s not giving up now. This problem is easily fixable — makeover time!
The end result is impressive, and Catherine totters off to take a picture for her Tinder profile. She may be 15 pounds too heavy to even be a Jersey 6, but Dr. Dean Munsch is thrilled that their first patient is a success story. She lifts the Chanels’ probation.
It Gives a Whole New Meaning to the Graveyard Shift
Number Five is on the graveyard shift, aka the “dateless shift,” while Number One goes out with Dr. Brock Holt, and Number Three explores relationship potential with Dr. Cassidy Cascade.
Number Five puts Catherine into a hydrotherapy tub and locks herself into one too. After all, she’s had a super stressful day.
While the girls are trapped and completely vulnerable, Scream Queen‘s season 2 villain makes his/her entrance. Clad in Dr. Mike’s costume from 1985 and dripping radioactive goo, he puts on “Be My Baby” by The Ronettes (a nod to that baby boy who lost his father all those years ago?)
The season 2 killer is likely to have the moniker of the “Green Meanie,” a creature thought to have inhabited the swamp where Dr. Mike dumped Mr. Bill’s body.
Catherine begs for her life, urging the killer to murder Number Five instead, but he decapitates her anyway. He turns his attention to Number Five, but her fate will have to remain a mystery.
Until next time, bitches. Aren’t you glad to be back?
What did you think of the season 2 premiere of Scream Queens? Are you happy to see the Chanels? Who’s the hotter doc, Cascade or Holt?
Scream Queens airs Tuesdays at 9/8c on FOX. Want more news? Like our Scream Queens Facebook page.
(Image courtesy of FOX)
Contributing Writer, BuddyTV
Jennifer has worked as a freelance writer in the entertainment field since 2012. In addition to currently writing feature articles for Screen Rant, Jennifer has contributed content ranging from recaps to listicles to reviews for BuddyTV, PopMatters, TVRage, TVOvermind, and Tell-Tale TV. Links to some of Jennifer’s reviews can be found on Rotten Tomatoes.
