Another Star Could Be Returning To The 'Scream' Franchise

Legacy sequels are a fun part of horror franchises and are not new. Yes, they’ve hit a fever pitch in the last few years. But actors from prior sequels returning later in the franchise are a genre feature, not a bug. Marilyn Burns returned to The Texas Chain Saw Massacre franchise nearly twenty years after she escaped in the back of a truck (albeit in an unnamed role, but *Dennis Reynolds Voice* the implication is there). Freddy Krueger menaced Heather Langenkamp over a decade after the original A Nightmare On Elm Street. Jamie Lee Curtis returned to the Halloween franchise twenty years after the first, and then again, twenty years later!

Returning cast members dusting off their characters can be fun and exciting, but it can also land with a thud. In recent years, it’s been done (arguably) too much, as algorithms convince studio executives that audience members only want nods to the past. Curtis’s initial return to Halloween in 2018 was great. It was all downhill from there. Exorcist Believer saw Ellen Burstyn and Linda Blair return and the results were so disastrous a planned trilogy was scrapped. Another franchise pushing its legacy with mixed results involves Ghostface.

Scream is no stranger to legacy sequels. Scream 4 gives the middle finger to the idea, introducing a new cast of characters and not only killing most of them off but making the remaining ones the killers. Scream 5 (or Scream 2022) saw even more new characters, this time having the torch more firmly passed to them. It’s a legacy sequel that, in my opinion, works very well. Scream 6, not so much. Not only did the newest sequel not feel inventive in the way the franchise usually does, it failed one of its legacy characters both on screen and off.

Neve Campbell was not offered the money she deserved for Scream 6. So she chose not to participate. An older Scream movie would have referred to her being screwed over in some way. The new one went with some BS line about her deserving a happy ending. Luckily, she’s now returning to the franchise in a way she feels happy about, and she may be bringing another character with her.

Patrick Dempsey only appeared in Scream 3 as Mark Kincaid, but his role was important and has been made more important since. His character fell in love with Sidney and they eventually started a family. Despite being mentioned, he did not appear in Scream 4 or 5. But the actor says that may change with the seventh installment. “I’m waiting on the script,” Dempsey explained on the Today Show. “There has been a conversation about it. I haven’t seen anything yet, so, we’ll see what happens.”

If Sidney is getting pulled back into the world, there’s a decent chance Kincaid may be at risk. He could return for an opening scene and nothing more. Still, Dempsey finishes with one of my favorite answers to the question of his return. “Yeah, I mean, you know, it’s always good to have a job,” Dempsey noted. That answer should be the answer every time an actor is asked if they will return to a role, but that wouldn’t make for a good article, would it?