Scream Directors Confirm They Shot a Scene Teasing SPOILER's Survival

01/24/2022 03:21 pm EST

As with any installment in the series, the latest Scream offered up a number of surprising twists, turns, and deaths, due to the nature of the concept centering around Ghostface's crimes in the town of Woodsboro. One such kill, in particular, was especially difficult to grapple with for the studio, resulting in filmmakers Tyler Gillett and Matt Bettnielli-Olpin crafting one specific shot that could allow them to alter the film in the edit. Ultimately, they were able to stick to their initial intentions and scrapped the shot entirely. The new Scream is in theaters now.

WARNING: Spoilers below for the new Scream

Throughout the entire series, Neve Campbell's Sidney Prescott, Courteney Cox's Gale Weathers, and David Arquette's Dewey Riley have managed to survive, even if they suffer somewhat serious injuries. That all changed with this latest installment, as Ghostface killed Dewey definitively. The directors did note, however, that they crafted one specific shot that could have potentially allowed for the reveal of his survival.

"We very begrudgingly got one shot that you could put some voiceover over, like, 'He woke up from surgery, he's gonna be fine,'" Gillett revealed to Variety. "With no intention of ever f-cking using it."

What would have made the sequence especially redundant is that fans have already seen multiple instances of Dewey seemingly suffering fatal injuries, only to witness in a finale that he was able to survive the trauma. The directors joked about how poorly constructed the sequence was, had it ever seen the light of day.

"Just to describe the shot, it was it was an over-the-shoulder from behind Gale and Sid of a doctor's legs," Bettinelli-Olpin admitted. "It was absolutely not really a usable shot. 'Shot' is very generous."

If there were to be a sixth film, the only surviving legacy cast members would be Campbell and Cox, with the events of this film largely shifting focus away from those original characters. Campbell wouldn't rule out a return for another outing, however, depending on the script.

"Yes, absolutely," Campbell recently confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter of a possible follow-up. "It's down to the strength of the story. I wouldn't want to do it unless the script is good. It would be hard. But these guys did really well on this one, so I'm curious to see what would come next. So, we'll see."

The new Scream is in theaters now.

Do you wish Dewey had survived the film? Let us know in the comments below or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things Star Wars and horror!

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