Tatum Riley is a supporting character in Scream.
Biography[]
Tatum Riley is first introduced at Woodsboro High, when she informs her best friend, Sidney, of Casey Becker and Steven Orth's deaths the night before. After lunch, Tatum is sitting with her boyfriend Stu Macher, Sidney, Billy, and Randy by the school's water fountain. During a discussion about Casey's murder, Tatum discovers, that Casey dumped Stu for Steve after thinking Stu dumped Casey for her. After some gender discrimination against women by Stu, who declares only a man could do, what the killer did to Casey, Tatum defended females in saying, that women could do whatever men do. Stu continues to be insensitive about the deaths and Sidney, disgusted by this, leaves. Billy along with Tatum rebuke him. Billy hitting him on the shoulder, while Tatum rolls her eyes and shakes her head in disgust.
That night Tatum has practice for some unspecified sport and was meant to go to Sidney's house afterwards to
pick her up, so she could sleep at her house. After being held up and going into the video store, Tatum is far from reaching Sidney, when Ghostface attacks Sidney at her house. Sidney survives and Tatum quickly arrives at the scene to take her to the police station along with Deputy Dewey Riley, Tatum's older brother. Tatum stays with Sidney to comfort her, but grows impatient at the precinct asking her brother Dewey, if they can go home. She impatiently replies to Dewey's request, "Goddamn it, Dewey!" Right in front of his fellow officers. She pulls Sidney and demands Dewey saying "I'm sorry Deputy Dewey Boy, but we are ready to go! Now! OK?". She tries to protect Sidney from the media circus forming outside while waiting for Dewey to get the car. Gale Weathers, who both Sidney and Tatum publicly hate, tries to get answers from Sidney. Tatum rebukes her on sight and pushes the microphone from away Sidney saying, "She's not answering any questions, Alright? Just leave us alone." Sidney then tells Tatum, "No, No Tatum, it's okay. She is just doing her job, aren't you Gale?" at which she gives her a fake smile and Tatum glares at Gale with rebuke. Sidney asks her, "How's the book?" which Gale replies, "It'll be out later this year." Sidney replies in hidden discontent, "I'll look for it." and attempts to walk away. Gale replies thinking Sidney was genuinely concerned, "I'll send you a copy." Sidney ends up punching her, because she resents her disbelief in Sidney, the opinions she posed on her mother's death through her book and because of her lack of consideration towards her after her attempted murder.
Tatum is impressed and calls Sidney a "Super Bitch" later at their sleepover at Tatum's house. Sidney soon gets a call from Ghostface and after hearing Sidney in distress, Tatum is quick to reach her side and tells her to hang up.
The next day at school Tatum begs Sidney to accompany her to Stu's house for his party. Reluctant at first, Sidney agrees and the pair go shopping. Before shopping at Tatum's house, the pair also have a moment at Sidney's house before the party, where they discuss Sidney's mother, Maureen Prescott, which Tatum posed in a compassionate way, that her mother may have been unhappy and got into those affairs. Sidney begins to rethink Cotton being the murderer and that whomever did murder her mother, is still out there. During their conversation, Tatum begs her not to freak herself out, because they had a "long night" ahead of them. Before they depart, Ghostface is seen lurking in the bushes nearby having heard their entire conversation. While shopping at the convenience store for the party, Tatum comments on Sidney's recently-arrested boyfriend Billy Loomis, saying "he and his penis don't deserve Sidney", which a stalking Ghostface possibly overhears in the background (This was probably Billy or Sydney's unknown half-brother at the time Roman).
Death[]
At the party that night, Stu asks Tatum to go to the garage to get some more beer and, after initially saying no, she goes anyway to avoid the commotion of Gale's arrival. Tatum is annoyed by Dewey's unexpected appearance with Gale. She enters the garage and heads straight for the fridge, not realizing the door slowly closing and locking behind her. A cat hiding in the garage get frightened by something and escapes through the cat flap. This startles Tatum, but she calms herself down and heads back to the door. She finds it's now locked then the lights also turn off.
She turns the lights back on by opening the garage door, but it stops halfway up just as Tatum was about to exit then closes. Tatum turns back to see Ghostface standing there with a hand on the garage door activator. Thinking it's Randy, she decides to play along with the whole killer/victim scenario. When Ghostface grabs Tatum’s left arm and pulls out a knife, she realizes it isn't a game. Ghostface slices her arm and she drops the beers shattering most of them. Tatum, in shock, walks backwards, until she lands in a lounge chair. Getting straight back up, Tatum runs past the fridge and opens the freezer door behind her, which hits Ghostface in the face knocking him to the floor.
She runs back to the garage door leading into the house and just as she's about to press the button to lift the garage door, she panics, when she sees Ghostface getting back up. Defending herself, she picks up the bottles from the floor, that were not smashed and begins throwing them at Ghostface, striking him in the stomach and in the head. She runs out of bottles and he runs towards her. She ducks down, causing him to spiral over her and land on the stairs. Seeing the cat flap as her only exit, she tries to escape.
After getting halfway through, she realizes she's stuck and tries to pull herself back in but her breasts prevent her from pulling free. Ghostface gets back up and sees her struggle so he starts the garage door. It begins to go up and while it rises, Tatum screams in pain as the cat flap digs into her rib cage and begs to live. In seconds, she is brought to the top; she is killed instantly when her head is flattened and her neck is snapped. Ghostface admires his work before leaving.
Tatum's Death
In the next scene Sidney is shouting for Tatum. Billy suddenly appears at the front door scaring both Stu and Sidney.Sidney even remarks, "If Tatum sees you here, she will draw blood." Later on, when Sidney is trying to escape Ghostface, who is now Stu after pretending to kill Billy, Sidney falls from the roof and lands on a speedboat at the back of the house where the garage is. She looks up after the fall to find Tatum's dead body hanging from the garage door, which she holds her hand over her mouth in disbelief, tears in her eyes, and continues to run. Stu also tries to blame Randy for Tatum's death later on when Sidney holds them both at gunpoint, not knowing which one to trust.
Trivia[]
- She is one of the many kills to be censored a little by the MPAA.