New ‘Scream’ Movie in the Works

Eight years after Ghostface took their last victim, the Scream franchise is set to return to the big screen with Scream 5. According to Bloody Disgusting, Gary Barber’s Spyglass Media Group has acquired the rights to the franchise and is currently developing a fifth film. The news comes after the Wes Craven-created franchise was transformed for the small screen in MTV’s TV series of the same name.

Spyglass, who is also remaking Hellraiser, acquired the rights to the franchise, including all of the characters, after it re-launched as a content company earlier this year.

“Spyglass Media Group was re-launched as a content company in March by former MGM topper Barber, Lantern Entertainment co-presidents Andy Mitchell and Milos Brajovic and strategic investors Eagle Pictures and Cineworld Group,” Variety reported in March.

Although details for the potential film remain unclear, including whether it will continue in Craven’s universe or be a complete remake, it is believed that writer Kevin Williamson will not be writing the screenplay.

News of the potential upcoming film is already generating plenty of talk online.

“OMG! We are finally getting a Scream 5,” one wrote. “Spyglass Entertainment is in the works on making a Scream 5 or Reboot. Which i have to say in my opinion i don’t want a Scream reboot i think thats disrespectful to Wes Craven and the whole franchise. I want and need Scream 5.”

“Scream 5 has been confirmed!” another tweeted. “I’m not gonna get my hopes up, but being my favourite horror franchise of all-time (well, just the first and second), this makes me happy! Gonna be weird without Wes Craven tho.”

Redefining the expectations of the horror genre with a tongue-in-cheek plot in which characters had vast knowledge of horror films and their tropes, the franchise kicked off with Craven’s original 1996 classic, which was a surprise box office smash at the time of its release. Scream 2 followed in 1997, with Craven directing again. Craven also returned to Scream 3 in 2000 and Scream 4 in 2011, the latter of which was the horror movie master’s last film before his death in 2015.

“Scream was an absolute blast. We shot in Santa Rosa, California, outside of San Francisco, for a summer,” Neve Campbell, who portrayed Sydney Prescott in Scream 4, told Entertainment Weekly of the franchise’s lingering success.

“None of us really thought it’d be huge. We had no idea. We knew the script was good, but we would literally sit together at night after long days, covered in blood, and we’d say, ‘Do you think that maybe there might be a Halloween costume?’ Twenty years later, I still see them.”