Scream 7 Casting Sidney’s Daughter Is The Wrong Path After Jenna Ortega & Melissa Barrera Exits

The latest news from the Scream franchise proves that Scream 7 can’t salvage the story of the series. 2026’s upcoming Scream 7 won’t hit cinema screens for a long time, but the slasher sequel has already endured a fairly tortured production. 2022’s Scream reboot was a huge hit financially and critically, while 2023’s Scream VI managed to earn positive reviews and become a massive box office success despite the absence of the franchise’s original final girl, Neve Campbell’s Sidney Prescott. However, the luck of the Scream series soon ran out as Scream 7 entered pre-production.

Scream 2022 and Scream VI star Melissa Barrera was fired from Scream 7 before her co-star Jenna Ortega dropped out of the sequel due to scheduling conflicts. Happy Death Day director Christopher Landon soon followed suit, leading the studio to start over. Now, original Scream screenwriter Kevin Williamson has taken over directing duties and Campbell’s Sidney is back as Scream 7’s heroine, but the production still seems troubled. The Scream movies have a fairly straightforward timeline but, in an attempt to replace Ortega and Barrera’s Tara and Sam, Scream 7 seems doomed to complicate things with one big change.

Sidney’s Daughter Is A Clumsy Tara & Sam Replacement For Scream 7

The Scream Series Already Reinvented Itself With A New Generation Of Stars

According to Variety, 1883 star Isabel May is in talks to play Sidney’s daughter in Scream 7 in what looks like a pretty clear attempt to replace Sam and Tara. Ortega and Barrera’s Carpenter sisters were established as the new protagonists of the series in Scream 2022, a reboot that waited until halfway through its runtime before bringing back Sidney. Replacing Sidney with Sam and Tara allowed Scream VI to work around Campbell’s absence, but the same ploy won’t work in reverse. Adding May as Sidney’s daughter won’t help the troubled sequel, since this requires all manner of logistical leaps.

Abruptly revealing Sydney’s daughter is a transparent attempt to repeat Scream 2022’s trick of introducing a new heroine for a new generation of viewers. Scream 7‘s problem is that Sam and Tara were those heroines and the last two movies in the series hinged on their relationship. The Scream series successfully showed that Sidney’s story was over and her spot as the franchise’s Final Girl had been filled, so Scream 7 will have a hard time proving she remains relevant to the franchise. Moreover, May playing Campbell’s daughter only makes this problem worse due to another problem.

Scream 7 Casting Sidney’s Daughter Makes Her Timeline More Complicated

Sidney’s Daughter Needed To Be Mentioned Before Scream 7

Isabel May’s age doesn’t fit the Scream franchise’s timeline and, while she could play a late teen despite being 24 in real life, even this won’t be enough to explain away a major timeline plot hole. Syd was pushing a stroller in Scream 2022, which is set around 2022. If May’s character is in her late teens, Scream 7 needs to take place in 2040 at the earliest for Sidney’s hitherto-unmentioned daughter to be a teenager. Moreover, Campbell’s character would need to be two decades older than she was in 2022, so the lack of visible aging will almost certainly be weird.

Unless Scream 7 dramatically ages up Campbell’s character, her daughter will have suddenly jumped in age from infancy to young adulthood in the space of around two years. A time jump alone can’t account for this, since this would mean Sidney would age too. Scream 2022’s events canonically took place 25 years after Scream, wherein Sidney was around 18. This means Sidney was around 43 in Scream 2022, played by a then-48-year-old Campbell. Now, she would need to be around 67 in Scream 7, but still played by a now 51-year-old Campbell. This timeline alteration would be plainly ridiculous.

Scream 7’s Casting Highlights The Franchise’s Biggest Story Problem

Scream 7’s Timeline Changes Wouldn’t Add Up

The main issue with Scream 7 casting Sidney’s daughter is the fact that Sidney’s Scream franchise story arc had already reached its natural conclusion years ago. Sidney’s characterization has remained stagnant arguably since Scream 3, wherein she found out the truth about her mother, uncovered the true mastermind of the original trilogy’s killings, and defeated him. Scream 4 was a fun victory lap, but Sidney literally pointed out that the killers were only tangentially connected to her and mostly looking for fame and attention. Scream 7 needed to be the final movie because Sidney’s story ended a long time ago.

It was already weird that Scream 4 never mentioned Sidney’s partner, but Scream 2022 then revealed that she had been with Scream 3’s Mark Kincaid off-screen all along. Scream 7 suddenly revealing she has a daughter in her 20s would further underline the reality that Sidney hasn’t been the franchise’s primary focus for over a decade, which is something Scream 2022 and Scream VI pointedly leaned into with Tara and Sam. This plot might have made sense if those sequels never happened, but it doesn’t add up now. Instead, Scream 7’s Sidney-centric storyline feels like a weak redirection.

What Scream 7 Should Be About New Characters, Not Sidney & Her Family

Scream 7’s Casting News Highlights The Franchise’s Biggest Story Problem

If there must be another addition to the series, Scream 7 should focus on new characters instead of Sidney’s story. The franchise may have been able to make Sidney’s arc compelling again after Scream 4, when she had only been out of the spotlight for one movie. However, it is too late for this gambit to work. Scream 7’s opening kill problem alone is indicative of this. The sequel can’t kill off a returning character like Mark, Gale, or Kirby in its first scene, since there are precious few remaining legacy characters. However, a new character’s death has no stakes.

The Scream series is stuck in a catch-22 wherein Sidney’s story is no longer compelling, but the exits of Ortega and Barrera make it impossible for the series to continue with her replacements. Jumping ahead to give Sidney a teenage daughter means setting the movie in the 2040s and convincing audiences that Sidney is in her late ‘60s, or outright ignoring the events of Scream 2022 and what they established about Sidney’s personal life. Ultimately, this could have been solved by centering on new characters, but the series didn’t take this route as Scream 7 focused on the Scream franchise’s original heroine.

Source: Variety