“Scary Movie” teaser poster key art.
Paramount Pictures
Scary Movie is taking a not-so-subtle jab at Michael Jackson’s child abuse allegations as the King of Pop’s biopic Michael opens in theaters.
Starring Michael Jackson’s nephew/Jermaine Jackson’s son Jaafar Jackson, in the title role, Michael chronicles the singer in his youth (Juliano Krue Valdi) with his brothers in The Jackson 5, as well as his blockbuster solo career in adulthood that produced the multi-platinum albums Off the Wall and Thriller.
Michael, however, went through reshoots after scenes involving the child abuse allegations leveled against the pop star in the third act were cut from the film, which led to 22 days of reshoots for a new ending, according to Variety.
While reviews of the Lionsgate film this week have made mention about the omission of the darker aspects of Michael Jackson’s life, rival studio Paramount Pictures is piling on criticism by alluding to the child abuse allegations with the release of a new teaser poster of the Wayans Brothers’ upcoming horror movie reboot of their Scary Movie franchise.
“Scary Movie” teaser poster key art.
Paramount Pictures
In the poster, which Paramount released on Wednesday, the Ghostface Killer from Paramount’s Scream franchise — which Scary Movie has long-mocked — is shown wearing an obvious take on Jackson. In addition to wearing a red leather jacket akin to Jackson’s Thriller wardrobe, Ghostface is also holding his knife in his right hand, wearing a sequined glove. Also, while Ghostface is wearing a hoodie, a bit of Jackson’s hairstyle is visible and the character is wearing Jackson-style sunglasses.
As if the visible references aren’t enough, the Scary Movie teaser poster goes for the jugular with the taglines “Prepare to Hee-Hee” and “Touching Fans Everywhere June 5.”
As of this publication, neither Lionsgate nor anybody from the film or Jackson family has responded to the Paramount poster parody.
Jackson was acquitted by a jury of all 14 child molestation charges against him in June 2005. The singer died on June 25, 2009, at age 50.
Disclaimer: The trailer below includes gory content.
Kenan Thompson Also Spoofs ‘Michael’ Trailer In New ‘Scary Movie’ Teaser
Scary Movie — which is the sixth movie in the Wayans’ Brothers franchise — also released a new teaser trailer on Wednesday that lampoons the Michael teaser trailer.
The minute-long trailer begins with footage interspersed with the words “Only One Artist” and “Has Truly Touched His Fans” while shots of note cards with the song titles “Thriller” and “Billie Jean” appear, pinned to a corkboard.
The footage then reveals Saturday Night Live star Kenan Thompson in a recording studio, dressed up as a Michael Jackson-like singer.
The Scary Movie franchise — which lampoons horror films with pop culture reference mixed with — originated in 2000. Starring Damon Wayans Jr., Marlon Wayans and Anna Faris, the first Scary Movie trailer targets such horror franchises as Scream, naturally, along with spoofs of Get Out, Weapons, Terrifier, M3GAN, Wednesday, The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Friday the 13th.
Scary Movie opens in theaters nationwide on June 5, while Michael will play in Thursday previews and opens everywhere on Friday.
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/timlammers/2026/04/23/new-scary-movie-poster-and-trailer-mocks-michael-jackson-allegations/
