Courteney Cox in Talks to Return for Scream 7

Movies

Scream 7 is putting the band back together… what’s left of it, anyway. Variety exclusively reports that Courteney Cox is in talks to return for the next Scream movie. Cox plays Gale Weathers, a publicity-hungry news reporter who always tries to solve the new Ghostface murder spree. Gale is also the only character who’s been in every entry in the series. Cox would join Neve Campbell, who is back as Sidney Prescott, the heroine of the Scream movies who was replaced by Melissa Barrera in Scream 5 and absent from Scream 6 because of a pay dispute. Scream 7 has undergone significant creative retooling following Barrera’s firing over comments about the Gaza war, co-star Jenna Ortega’s exit due to scheduling conflicts, and director Christopher Landon departing the project. Now, Kevin Williamson, the writer of Scream, Scream 2, and Scream 4 (the best Scream movies), will direct from a script by Guy Busick and James Vanderbilt (the guys who wrote the last two might-as-well-have-been-parodies).

I think it’s safe to assume Courteney Cox will be back. She’s been in all of them, she seems to enjoy playing Gale, and not to be mean, but she doesn’t seem to have much else going on. She was the best part of Scream 6 by a country mile, but that’s like saying the candy you accidentally dropped in the garbage is the best part of the garbage. Still, it proved that she can play Gale Weathers in her sleep at this point, and it’ll be good to have her back with Sidney. It’s unfortunate that she can’t reunite with David Arquette’s Dewey, her love interest who was unceremoniously disposed of in Scream 5 after the reveal that he and Gail had split up and he was a pathetic loser. (Would modern cinema have it any other way?) I’d love it if Scream 7 pulled a Halloween and forgot the last two happened, but I don’t think it will; despite sucking and turning Scream into the junky movies it used to mock, they were very successful. I’m not sure how they’re going to dance around the absence of all the new main characters, but unless we’re told they were all killed, I’d prefer it if Scream 7 doesn’t even mention them. Just jump right in with Sidney and Gale, and give us a good movie so I can pretend the last two didn’t happen and Dewey is on vacation or something. (And for the love of God, please let Kevin Williamson rewrite the script.)