Original Scream Writer Reveals Character He Wished He Hadn’t Killed Off

The Scream franchise has been known as one of those properties in which no character ever seems truly safe from ol’ Ghostface. In this year’s Scream 5, the film killed off one of the most popular characters in the franchise, except that was far from the first time. Randy Meeks (Jamie Kennedy) quickly became a fan-favorite for his pop culture-infatuated character in the first Scream, only to be killed off halfway through the film’s first sequel.

Franchise creator Kevin Williamson fully recognizes the controversial killing, saying in one recent interview he’d reverse the decision if he could. “I thought if you kill someone really important to the audience in the middle, it just ups the stakes. Everything’s off the table. I knew we weren’t going to kill Sydney, I knew we weren’t going to kill Gale or Dewey. Those three characters, for Scream 2, were safe, and so I had to look to the secondary characters,” the scribe said in a new chat with EW.

He added that he loved the character, but thought the shock value of his death would help propel the follow-up forward.

“I love Randy, I would have given him a much bigger life had I known this franchise was going to live and live,” Williamson added. “I would have loved for him to be a legacy character. At the time, I thought it would just be the punch in the gut the audience needed at that time, to really get mad, and get mad at the killer.”

While Meeks himself is long gone, the family’s legacy lives on thanks to the this year’s introduction of his niece Mindy (Jasmin Savoy-Brown) and nephew Chad (Mason Gooding), who are set to have much bigger roles in Scream 6 next year.

Joining Savoy-Brown, Gooding, and new franchise leads Jenna Ortega and Melissa Barrera in the next film are Courteney Cox, who will return once again as Gale Weathers and actress Hayden Panettiere, reprising her Scream 4 role of Kirby Reed. Some newcomers will also appear including actor Dermot Mulroney and Mission: Impossible star Henry Czerny, plus Jack Champion (Avengers: Endgame, Avatar: The Way of Water), Liana Liberato (Light as a Feather), Devyn Nekoda (Sneakerella), and Josh Segarra (Arrow‘s Adrian Chase).

The new Scream is currently slated to hit theaters on March 20, 2023.