Matthew Lillard Reveals the Radically Different Scream 7 Ending They Actually Filmed
Matthew Lillard says Scream 7 nearly pulled off the ultimate twist: an alternate ending that confirms Stu Macher is alive — and they even filmed it.
Here we go – yet another twist in the tangled Scream saga, and this one comes direct from Matthew Lillard himself. You think you know Stu Macher’s fate? Well, it turns out Scream 7 nearly gave fans the bombshell they’ve been speculating about for decades: Stu still alive and out there, quietly watching telly like the world’s creepiest houseguest.
The Alternate Ending That Got the Axe
During a FAN EXPO Denver panel, Lillard let slip some inside detail about a post-credits scene that almost made the final cut of Scream 7. The idea was simple but loaded – after an entire film teasing the possibility of Stu’s survival, the credits would roll, and there he’d be, alive and well, staring at his TV in some mysterious location.
According to Lillard, during a conversation with Scream scribe Kevin Williamson, he pushed for this direct nod to fans:
'[I told Kevin Williamson], we spent the entire movie proving that Stu is alive, and then if he doesn't come out that door people are going to be bummed. So, what we should do, is we should shoot a post-credit sequence where it's just Stu watching TV somewhere, alive. Yeah, we shot it. I will say, when they showed it [to test audiences], they showed it without credits. So, they go to the end and then they show me in a reflection watching TV, and it didn't work…So, it didn't work because they didn't test it right, but I think it would have been completely [different with the credits].'
That’s not just your usual deleted scene – it's the sort of moment that would have fuelled fan conspiracy threads for years and sent the internet into meltdown. But thanks to a bit of clumsy test screening (they showed the scene before any credits rolled, which totally killed the vibe), that reveal ended up in the bin. Shame, really – who doesn’t love a good horror villain pulling a Lazarus?
What Actually Happens: Ghosts in the Machine
Instead of Stu’s official resurrection, Scream 7 went down a very different route. The movie's villains cook up an AI deepfake version of Stu, using tech trickery to torment Neve Campbell’s Sidney in what might be one of the franchise’s more bizarre attempts at digital haunting. In other words, the “is he or isn’t he alive” debate is left dangling… but with bonus existential weirdness courtesy of artificial intelligence.
Scream 7 by the Numbers
- Rotten Tomatoes gave it the lowest score in Scream history. Fans and critics seemed split – or maybe just a bit tired?
- Despite the reviews, the box office numbers hardly flinched: over $207 million worldwide, making this the most lucrative Scream yet.
- Jonathan Sim (for ComingSoon) wasn’t exactly bowled over, handing it a 6/10 and branding it a ‘generic slasher’ that’s lost a bit of that sharp, meta edge that Scream used to wield so well.
For those eager (or brave) enough to check it out, Scream 7 is streaming now on Paramount+. Not surprisingly, Scream 8 is already in the pipeline.