Scream 7 Can’t Afford I Know What You Did Last Summer’s Mistakes
Scream 7 looks sharp, but it must dodge the clumsy twists, hollow nostalgia, and lore bloat that gutted the new I Know What You Did Last Summer.
New Scream incoming. The trailer just landed, the vibes are strong, and yes, Sidney Prescott is back. Before we pop the confetti, though, there’s a very recent cautionary tale that’s hard to ignore.
Scream 7: What we know so far
- Release date: February 27, 2026
- Trailer: out now, and it actually looks good
- Director: Kevin Williamson, who wrote the original Scream, Scream 2, and part of Scream 4, is in the chair this time
- Script: screenplay by Guy Busick (he co-wrote the 2022 Scream and Scream VI), from a story he developed with his co-writer on those films, James Vanderbilt
- Cast: Neve Campbell returns as Sidney Prescott; Courteney Cox is back as Gale Weathers and still the only cast member who has appeared in every single movie
- Quick trailer read: nothing hints at a wild "Sidney is the killer now" turn. Gale barely shows up in the footage, which… naturally has some fans side-eyeing it
Why some fans are nervous
The fresh worry is not about Ghostface’s knives. It’s about legacy characters and what filmmakers do to them. Exhibit A: the new I Know What You Did Last Summer sequel. On paper, that one had a promising setup: Jennifer Love Hewitt and Freddie Prinze Jr. returned as Julie James and Ray Bronson nearly three decades after the original. Behind the camera, Jennifer Kaytin Robinson directed, working off a script by Leah McKendrick with rewrites by Robinson and journalist Sam Lansky.
In execution? Not great. The movie got dinged for clunky dialogue, grating characters, and cringe comedy. And then it dropped a twist that felt like it was designed to start a fight in the theater lobby: Ray Bronson, who survived two films by battling hook-wielding murderers, turns into a hook-wielding murderer himself. For a lot of long-time viewers, that was a hard no.
"Dumpster fire." — critic Tyler Nichols, who gave it a 4/10
One extra wrinkle that stings: the original I Know What You Did Last Summer was written by Kevin Williamson. Different team, different movie, but the shared DNA makes the comparison unavoidable.
The big worry for Scream 7
Scream lives and dies on the unmasking game, and I’ll be honest, the ritual can feel a little stale after six rounds. But there’s a line you don’t cross: taking the heroes we’ve followed for decades and flipping them into killers just for shock value. The trailer makes it look like Sidney is safe from that kind of twist. Gale, however, is barely present in the footage, and you can feel the fandom bracing itself.
Turning someone we’ve watched survive multiple Ghostface runs across six movies into Ghostface would make the Ray Bronson pivot look subtle. Gale has always been complicated, opportunistic, sometimes reckless — but that’s not the same thing as being a masked slasher. If you want to shake up the formula, fine. Just don’t burn the characters the franchise is built on.
Where I land
There’s a lot to be optimistic about: Williamson directing, Busick and Vanderbilt steering the story, Sidney and Gale back in play. Scream 7 looks like it could sing. It just needs to resist the urge to swing for a twist that cheapens the legacy.
How did that I Know What You Did Last Summer twist sit with you, and what would you do if Scream tried the same with Sidney or Gale? Drop your take below.