A lot of Scream franchise fans were hoping Melissa Barrera would reprise the role of Samantha Carpenter from Scream (2022) and Scream VI in a third Scream movie, and it has been said that the directors of those films, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett, wanted to return for a Scream 7 that would wrap up the Sam Carpenter story as a trilogy. But that’s not how it worked out. The directors went off to make Abigail, and Paramount Pictures and Spyglass Media weren’t willing to wait for them to circle back to Scream 7. So Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillett were, as they put it, “exited” from the project and it started moving forward without them… only to hit a series of speed bumps. Including the day when Barrera was fired after comments she made about the Israel-Hamas war didn’t go over well with executives at Spyglass. So there will be no Barrera or Samantha Carpenter in Scream 7 – and Barrera is okay with that, because she’s satisfied with where the ending of Scream VI left her character.
Barrera told Collider, “I feel like the ending of Scream VI was a very good ending, and so I don’t feel like ‘Ugh, I got left in the middle.’ No, I think people, the fans, were wanting a third movie to continue that arc, and apparently, the plan was a trilogy, even though I was only contracted for two movies . So, I did my two movies, and I’m fine. I’m good with that. I got two – that’s more than most people get. When you’re on a TV show, and it gets canceled, you can’t harp on things, you gotta move on. That’s the nature of this industry too, I get excited for the next job, I get excited for the next skin I get to put on. It’s exciting to create a different character. So yeah, I feel good. I did what I set out to do. It was always meant to be two movies for me, ’cause that was my contract, and so everything is perfect.“
Also not returning for Scream 7 is Jenna Ortega, who played Samantha’s sister Tara. Ortega allegedly asked for a substantial pay raise – and as we saw when Neve Campbell dropped out of Scream VI due to a pay dispute, these pay issues don’t tend to work out. Spyglass and Paramount had hired Freaky and Happy Death Day director Christopher Landon to direct the sequel, but he dropped out as everything crumbled around him.
Scream 7 had to be reworked after the Carpenter sisters were out of the story. It was recently announced that Neve Campbell is returning to the lead as franchise heroine Sidney Prescott, and it’s rumored that her franchise co-star Courteney Cox and Scream 3 cast member Patrick Dempsey may be returning as well. Original Scream screenwriter Kevin Williamson will be directing 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.)
Do you agree with Melissa Barrera that Scream VI was a satisfactory ending for Samantha Carpenter? Let us know by leaving a comment below.