How "Scream 7" handles Melissa Barrera and Jenna Ortega&x27;s franchise exits Nick RomanoFri, February 27, 2026 at 5:00 PM UTC 0 Jenna Ortega and Melissa Barrera in 'Scream VI'Credit: Philippe Bosse / Paramount Pictures / Courtesy Everett Collection This article contains spoilers from Scream 7. If you're reading this article about specific plot points of the new Scream movie, then you have at least a general awareness of the franchise, including how the seventh entry was once upon a time going to be a very different movie.
How "Scream 7" handles Melissa Barrera and Jenna Ortega's franchise exits
Nick RomanoFri, February 27, 2026 at 5:00 PM UTC
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Jenna Ortega and Melissa Barrera in 'Scream VI'Credit: Philippe Bosse / Paramount Pictures / Courtesy Everett Collection
This article contains spoilers from Scream 7.
If you're reading this article about specific plot points of the new Scream movie, then you have at least a general awareness of the franchise, including how the seventh entry was once upon a time going to be a very different movie.
The original plan for Scream 7 involved director Christopher Landon taking the reins from the Radio Silence filmmaking collective after 2022's Scream (5) and 2023's Scream VI. Melissa Barrera and Jenna Ortega, established as the two primary stars of a new era for the meta slasher franchise, then both left in rapid succession; the former was fired over expressing her views about the Israel-Hamas war on social media, the latter self-ejected because "it was all kind of falling apart." Landon himself followed suit.
The Scream 7 that's now playing in theaters is a wholly new take without the presence of Barrera and Ortega's Carpenter sisters. Original Scream scribe Kevin Williamson crafted a story around Neve Campbell's Sidney Evans (formerly Prescott) and her family, teenage daughter Tatum (Isabel May), and cop husband Mark (Joel McHale), in their new home of Pine Grove. And yet, because this franchise is still very self-aware, it does somewhat deal with the events of the past two movies — or at least comments on them.
In what could be interpreted as a salting-the-earth approach, Scream 7 does not mention the characters of Sam (Barrera) and Tara (Ortega) by name at all. The closest we get is a quip from Jasmin Savoy Brown's Mindy Meeks-Martin. Along with Mason Gooding's Chad, the Meeks-Martin twins are the only new characters from the Barrera era of Scream that return for this sequel.
Ghostface in 'Scream 7'Credit: Jessica Miglio/Paramount
During a bar scene in which the teens theorize who the new Ghostface killer or killers could be, Mindy remarks, "Billy Loomis had a secret love child, so who the f--- knows?" as a nod to Sam, the daughter of the now-deceased Ghostface of the first movie, played by Skeet Ulrich.
There are numerous other mentions to what happened in New York City and the events of Scream VI, like when Asa Germann's Lucas, the son of Anna Camp's Jessica and next-door neighbor to Sidney in Pine Grove, mentions watching both the old Dateline coverage and the Netflix documentary on the NYC attack. Courteney Cox's Gale Weathers, now a reporter for NY's Channel 7, also suffers from nerve damage in her hand caused by the Ghostface attack in her Manhattan apartment in the previous film.
But for the most part, Scream 7's meta commentary seems to poke fun at Scream VI a bit. Gale, in a particularly pointed quip, comments to Sid of past events, "You're lucky you sat this one out. It was brutal." One of the other two Ghostfaces, Jessica, then shouts at Sid in the ending climax, "A Ghostface attack doesn't count if you're not there."
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However, there's the added layer of Campbell sitting out Scream VI because of a pay dispute, when considering the commentary. The actress recently told CBS Mornings of that period in her career, "When I made that decision, I just didn't think I could live with myself walking on set. It just didn't feel right. I just knew that my value to this franchise was bigger than what had been offered."
And yet, both Mindy and Chad are back for Scream 7, so there are some nods to those previous movies. Together with Sam and Tara, the characters make up the "Core Four," the leads of what was supposed to be a trilogy led by Barrera's Sam. At one point, Isabel May's Tatum exclaims to the Meeks-Martins, "Why are you here?" Good question. The twins now work for Gale as part of her camera crew, though Mindy says she has aspirations to surpass her mentor as a newswoman. Chad also acknowledges that they serve as representations of the "Woodsboro legacy."
Mason Good and Jasmin Savoy Brown in 'Scream 7'Credit: Jessica Miglio
Swaths of the fandom still take issue with Barrera's firing. In 2023, the actress's comments on the Israel-Hamas war were seen as "antisemitic" by production company Spyglass, though she later clarified her comments and denounced antisemitism. A "Boycott Scream 7" movement emerged, fueled by a recent show of force by pro-Palestine protestors outside the Paramount Studios lot during the film's global premiere in Los Angeles.
On the flip side, there are also legions of Scream fans who are coming out to support Campbell's return as a lead of the franchise, Williamson's chance to take the director's seat for one of these films, and overall excitement for a new slasher-whodunnit.
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In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Gooding spoke about "taking my time to grieve" the work of Scream and Scream VI while "trying to find a way to relate to the work that had been done."
"The creatives behind it, in this case Kevin and Neve," he said, "finding a way to create their collaborative effort after taking so long away from it, getting their recompense, and having the return of their influence on the franchise, hopefully, is just done in a way that you can support that and be respectful to that."
"Melissa, Jenna, Mason, and I all remain close," Brown told press on the red carpet for the Scream 7 premiere. "We're really good friends. We love each other, we support each other's work. Of course, we miss them because we came up in this franchise together, and I'm just so grateful to be back because Mindy means a lot to me. To play a queer, Black character in a franchise like this, visibility matters, and I'm really proud to play Mindy."
on Entertainment Weekly
Source: "AOL Entertainment"
Source: Entertainment
Published: February 27, 2026 at 12:46PM on Source: PRIME TIME
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