The slasher sequel Scream 7 took a bumpy road to production, losing some cast members and directors along the way, but it has now made its way out into the world. The reaction is split (you can read a 5/10 review from Tyler Nichols HERE and an 8/10 second opinion review from Mike Conway at THIS LINK), but the box office is good, with the film setting the record for the highest opening weekend of the franchise.
Kevin Williamson, who wrote the screenplay for the original Scream, directs the film from a screenplay by 2022’s Scream and Scream VI writer Guy Busick, who crafted the story with his co-writer on the fifth and sixth films, James Vanderbilt. (Vanderbilt is also a producer on the most recent sequels.) Williamson also did enough work on the script to earn a “screenplay by” credit alongside Busick. He recently sat down for a SPOILER-filled interview with Esquire – and during that interview, he revealed that there was a deleted coda that would have confirmed that a character who is said to be dead was actually alive. So watch out, there will be SPOILERS below.
Cast and Synopsis
Returning franchise heroine Neve Campbell is joined in the cast by Isabel May of the Yellowstone prequel 1883, who has signed on to play Sidney’s daughter Tatum; Mckenna Grace of the Ghostbusters franchise, Grace’s Ghostbusters co-star Celeste O’Connor, Gen V‘s Asa Germann, The Fabelmans‘ Sam Rechner, Pitch Perfect‘s Anna Camp, Riverdale‘s Mark Consuelos, fellow franchise star Courteney Cox, who reprises the role of reporter / author Gale Weathers, Joel McHale (Community) as Sidney’s husband Mark Evans, and Ethan Embry (The Devil’s Candy). Although two of the “core four” characters established in the previous two movies are no longer around, Mason Gooding and Jasmin Savoy Brown are back as Chad Meeks-Martin and Mindy Meeks-Martin.
Also in the cast are Matthew Lillard and Scott Foley, who played Ghostface killers in the original Scream and Scream 3, respectively, and did not appear to make it out of those movies alive. David Arquette is back as the dearly departed Dewey, who exited the world of the living in the fifth movie.
Here’s the film’s official synopsis: When a new Ghostface killer emerges in the quiet town where Sidney Prescott (Neve Campbell) has built a new life, her darkest fears are realized as her daughter (Isabel May) becomes the next target. Determined to protect her family, Sidney must face the horrors of her past to put an end to the bloodshed once and for all.
Scream 7 earned an R rating with strong bloody violence, gore, and language.
SPOILERS
The mystery at the heart of the film is whether or not Matthew Lillard’s character Stu Macher really died at the end of the original film or if he somehow survived and is now coming after Sidney again. In the end, it’s said that the video calls Sidney was receiving from Stu were just AI deepfakes created by another maniac. Stu is dead.
But, during his Esquire interview, Williamson said they did shoot a coda that would have revealed that Stu actually was alive all along.
Williamson told Esquire, “I went to game night at Mike Flanagan’s house and Lillard was there. I’m like, ‘Oh shit, he’s going to ask me.’ And the whole evening he was just like, ‘You’ve got to bring Stu back, man. You got to bring Stu back.’ And I’m like, ‘What do I tell him?’ My husband goes, ‘Just tell him.’ I was like, ‘No, I’m not.’ And he kept going on and on about it. Finally I said, ‘Listen, Stu’s dead. It will make no sense whatsoever if he’s alive. And I do not want to do that to this franchise. I do not want to jump the shark in that big a way. I’ll jump one shark, but I’m not going to jump ten sharks.’ He goes, ‘All right, bro, forgive me.’ And in my head I’m going, ‘Oh shit, I lied to him.’ But then I realized I didn’t lie to him because … he’s not alive.“
He went on to say, “Guy Busick had that in his script. He wrote all the AI stuff. The first time I read it I was like, ‘How is this going to work? How is he going to be alive?’ Furthermore, if it is AI, will part of the audience be disappointed that he’s not real? We were playing that game. And I’d be lying if I said we didn’t shoot it both ways. … We shot a little coda at the end that we had in our back pocket. But oddly enough, the decision was that the audience wanted him dead.“
So if you’re disappointed that we didn’t get a “Stu is alive” coda, blame the test screening audiences. “It makes more sense. It’s more real. If he’s alive, that’s a big stretch. We live in a world now where with fake AI, we know that’s possible.“
What do you think of the ending of Scream 7? Do you wish a coda would have revealed that Stu is alive, or were you satisfied that he was just an AI deepfake? Let us know by leaving a comment below.
The post Scream 7 deleted coda would have shown (SPOILER) was alive appeared first on JoBlo.

