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Paramount and Spyglass have released a trailer for February’s Scream 7, which features the return of series creator Kevin Williamson as well as Ghostface’s OG nemesis Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell). In the trailer, which you can see below, a new Ghostface finds where Sidney and her daughter live, and sets out to torment the family just like old times.
In the trailer, fans are convinced you can hear audio snippets from Dewey (David Arquette) and Stu (Matthew Lillard). Given the premise — that a Ghostface is aware of Sidney’s past and wants to use it against her — the question will of course be whether those characters actually play a role, or are just being weaponized against her.
Williamson, who wrote three of the first four Scream movies, has not been directly involved in the franchise’s creative direction since 2011. Campbell starred in the first five Scream movies, but departed the franchise ahead of Scream VI due to a pay dispute.
“I just really felt the need to stand up and say that I don’t believe I would’ve been treated that way had I been a man carrying a franchise for 25 years,” she said at the time. By the time Scream 7 entered production, things had changed.
“I honestly don’t believe that if I were a man and had done five installments of a huge blockbuster franchise over 25 years that the number that I was offered would be the number that would be offered to a man,” she told People last year, but added that “When they first approached me [for Scream 7], I thought, ‘I don’t know what respectful looks like to them. We might be in very different places.’ But they started out in a strong place, so that was lovely.”
Of course, it’s possible Campbell was helped by circumstances outside of her control. In Scream (2022), the franchise introduced two new leads — Jenna Ortega and Melissa Barrera. Their characters were poised to take over the franchise when Campbell left, and those actresses led Scream VI. Before the seventh film went into production, though, Paramount cut loose Barrera over public criticism of Israel. Shortly thereafter, Ortega announced that she would not be returning due to scheduling conflicts.
There has been speculation that Ortega actually backed out to stand in solidarity with Barrera, but if that’s true, she has never said so publicly. Given the success of Wednesday, it’s equally likely “scheduling conflicts” were read, and the Netflix series took precedence.
Williamson will direct Scream 7 from a screenplay by Guy Busick, who also co-wrote Scream (2022) and Scream VI. It marks Williamson’s first feature film as a director since the 1999 cult classic Teaching Mrs. Tingle. In addition to the Scream series, Williamson wrote I Know What You Did Last Summer and The Faculty.
English (US)