I Know What You Did Last Summer Trailer Brings the Hook Back to Southport

I Know What You Did Last Summer is one of the most iconic horror movie franchises of the 1990s, and now it’s set to continue into a new era, with a legacy sequel/reboot film that’s hitting theaters this summer. Today brings the official full trailer for this new installment of the franchise, which you can watch below. Diehard fans will surely rejoice at seeing franchise stars Jennifer Love Hewitt and Freddie Prinze Jr. back again, while newer fans will probably enjoy seeing young stars like Madelyn Cline (Outer Banks), Chase Sui Wonders (The Studio), Jonah Hauer-King (Disney’s The Little Mermaid), Tyriq Withers (Him), Sarah Pidgeon (Tiny Beautiful Things) and others stepping into the franchise.

The full trailer for I Know What You Did Last Summer (2025) starts with a pretty picture of some of the principal characters (Cline and Hauer-King) happily headed toward their wedding day, only to have the infamous “I Know What You Did Last Summer” note infiltrate their engagement party. After that, the bodies start to drop, as the fisherman killer attacks the circle of friends, one-by-one. With nowhere left to turn, the group reaches out to the only ones to survive the Southport Massacre(s) of the ’90s: Julie James (Love Hewitt) and Ray Bronson (Prize Jr.).

As the tagline for the movie teases: “karma is a killer.” The question is whether or not this reboot will be able to throw a smart twist on the original YA horror story by author Lois Duncan, in terms of both how the legacy characters are used in this reboot, and who the killer (or killers?) turns out to be. That “karma” bit opens a window for some other legacy character to make a surprise reappearance, tying the reboot back to the original in some kind of unexpected way.

Amazon’s I Know What You Did Last Summer TV series (2021) already found a novel way to re-tell the story, but that didn’t save it from cancellation after one season. This new movie reboot is hoping for a result similar to Scream’s when the latter franchise successfully relaunched itself via legacy sequel/reboot in 2022 (aka Scream V). To its credit, even though July 2025 will be one of the most crowded months at the cinema in years (Jurassic World Rebirth, Superman, Fantastic Four: First Steps), I Know What You Did Last Summer will be distinctly different horror counter-programming to the blockbuster franchise offerings.

I Know What You Did Last Summer will be released in theaters on July 18th.