Summary
Scream 7is edging closer to going into production, with the direction of the upcoming sequel set to embrace the legacy of the franchise, with the return of Neve Campbell as the iconic final girl, Sidney Prescott. The sequel is also likely to see the return of Courteney Cox as Gale Weathers, and Patrick Dempsey as Mark Kincaid.Scream 7is set for a significant time jump of at least five years, which has some fans concerned.If the movie is successful, and another sequel is announced, the events ofScream 8should take place very soon after the events ofScream 7, to avoid more time jumps, and to keep the current story flowing coherently.
IfScream 7is set five years afterScream 6’sending, it’ll be 2028 in the franchise timeline, but the movie will probably be released in 2025. IfScream 8was announced, it wouldn’t work if there was another big time jump. However, it would also be quite jarring if the movie was set in the actual time that passes between the release ofScream 7and its sequel, which will most likely be one to two years.If the events ofScream 8took place immediately after the ending ofScream 7, the timeline would be able to catch up with itself to the present day.
Directed By
Kevin Williamson
The initial plan forScream 7was to complete Sam and Tara Carpenter’s story, but everything changed when Melissa Barrera was fired, and Jenna Ortega also exited the project. Guy Busick began rewriting the script forScream 7, and it was announced that Neve Campbell had signed on to play Sidney Prescott, after she skippedScream 6due to a pay dispute with Spyglass Media.
It emerged thatSidney’s familywould form the basis ofScream 7’s story, with a rumored time jump of five years to age Sidney’s two eldest daughters to their teenage years, to allow them to play a bigger part in the Ghostface killings. Somefans don’t want aScream 7time jumpas it goes against the real time passage of time in the previous six movies. Having said that,it would be impossible to involve Sidney’s daughters in the story, if they were still young children. There is now a strong chanceSidney will mentor new final girls inScream 7, if her teenage daughters are under threat from a new iteration of Ghostface, and this could raise the stake significantly, justifying the time jump.
If another sequel is announced, it would make sense to directly follow the events of Scream 7
If the rumors are true, it looks likeScream 7will feature a time jump, heaping pressure on Kevin Williamson to execute it effectively in order to keep the fans on side.One way of achieving this, would be to set up the inevitable sequel toScream 7in the closing stages of the movie, and follow on immediately after it.This would avoid any further time jumps inScream 8, and bring the events closer to the actual real life passage of time. It would also work well to have a continuation of the story set up inScream 7, with aGhostface surviving to change the format.
Also, if another one or two years pass by in the timeline, beforeScream 8is released, it would really start to stretch the credibility that another separate attack would take place. There is a theory that has been doing the rounds for a while now, that there could be acult of Ghostface killerstargeting Sidney and her family, and this could be the focus ofScream 7and its sequel.
Halloween (2018)andHalloween Killswere both set on the same night, and it worked well in order to connect the two movies together, despite them being released three years apart.Scream 7andScream 8should do the same thing, to maintain the connective tissue in the series, and it would also soften the impact of the time jump.Rumors have suggestedScream 7could be the start of a new trilogy, and if this is the case, all three movies should be set close together.
A Scream movie set immediately after the events of the previous entry would also bedifferent from previous sequels, and it would keep things fresh and interesting moving forward. There is afan movement to bring Stu Macher back, and that could also be the focus ofScream 7and its potential sequel, as it adopts a more serialized plot. It would also make sense to give the franchise a chance to catch up with the current real life timeline, so it can effectively providehorror commentarythat links to the current state of the genre.
