How Stu Macher – and Matthew Lillard

Stu Macher should’ve come back as the new Ghostface. That’s the hill I’m willing to die on following Scream (2022), the disappointingly Stu-less but still fun “re-quel” from Ready or Not co-directors Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett. 

I know what you’re thinking: “But Stu Macher is dead! Sidney Prescott dropped a TV on his head at the end of Scream (1996), and he died.” To that I say: If Billy Loomis can return as a guiding ghost-dad, then there’s a lot that’s fair game in modern-day Woodsboro — and the reprisal of iconic co-conspirator Stu was well within reach.

How could Stu have survived his brush with home-entertainment head trauma? Well, in the final faceoff between Sidney (Neve Campbell) and the two original Ghostfaces, Billy (Skeet Ulrich) succumbs to a rash of chest wounds before being shot point-blank. The death of his best bud, however, is never confirmed. 

It was just a TV? Right? You’d think he’d SURVIVE.

Yes, Stu (Matthew Lillard) suffers from a gnarly stabbing in addition to the aforementioned television blow, complete with electrocution. But as the fiercely funny actor who played him once tweeted, “It was just a TV? Right? You’d think he’d SURVIVE.”

Horror heavyweight and franchise creator Wes Craven reportedly had plans to take advantage of that possibility in Scream 3 (2000), but a tortured production kept the story from happening. Lillard revealed that behind-the-scenes tidbit via The Bob Bendick Podcast in 2010 (h/t Screen Rant): “The idea was that from jail, [Stu] was masterminding this attack against Sidney [and Woodsboro].”

Credit: Paramount Pictures

But three weeks before filming was set to start, the Columbine High School shootings urged Scream 3‘s makers to switch directions. Instead of returning to Woodsboro High School, the first Scream film not written by Kevin Williamson would focus on the in-universe horror franchise Stab and a murder spree in Hollywood.

“They changed everything,” Lillard recalled for the podcast. “Took the script, threw it to the side, bought me out, and I never did the third one.” 

Bringing Stu back to mentor a couple of crazed superfans is the sort of full-circle moment ‘Scream 5’ needed to really stick the landing.

Knowing this early-stages Stu sequel got shelved, I was primed to see it finally play out in Scream 5. And for roughly 90% of the movie, I thought I was right. Because even if you’re not watching to confirm your own Stu-centric suspicions, the character’s involvement makes sense. For starters, the dude perfectly captures the toxic fandom Scream 5‘s screenwriters James Vanderbilt and Guy Busick send up in the final act. 

As it stands, newcomers Amber Freeman (Mikey Madison) and Richie Kirsch (Jack Quaid) explain their motives for carrying out the Scream 5 slayings as an attempt to revitalize the Stab movie franchise. By framing Billy Loomis’ daughter Sam Carpenter (Melissa Barrera) as the new killer and luring the “original” victims back to Woodsboro, the pair argue that they’re helping bring the upcoming Stab 9 “back to its roots.” They just love these films, and want to offer their writers fresh yet loyal “source material.”

Credit: Paramount Pictures

It’s a clever enough conceit that decently capitalizes on the forces that drove Stu and Billy to kill in the first film (Scream 3 retconning notwithstanding). Recall that in the original’s big reveal scene, Stu frames his and Billy’s ascension into slasher villainy as an exercise in pop culture education: “Watch a few films, take a few notes…It was fun!” Like Amber and Richie, Stu is a horror movie nerd. That this famed serial killer would still be heavily invested in the Stab franchise —  a zeitgeisty memorialization of his heinous crimes — checks out. 

What’s more, bringing Stu back to mentor a couple of crazed superfans is the sort of full-circle moment Scream 5 needed to really stick the landing. Depending on your taste for ghosts in the Scream universe, phantom Billy sort of gets us there with the whole “Never fuck with a serial killer’s daughter” moment from Sam. But it’s muddled by the fact that Billy isn’t a “good” guy. His protecting a daughter he may not have even known existed borders on illogical.

Stu, on the other hand, has only a tenuous connection to Scream 5 through his nephew Vince Schneider (Kyle Gallner). So, he could have easily been repositioned as the movie’s biggest bad. Seriously, just imagine it. Stu emerging from behind a third Ghostface mask — revealing not only that he’d survived his fight with Sid back in 1996, but that the same reign of terror he’d begun in the very first film was still continuing? The movie’s body count would skyrocket; we’d all be dead!

Credit: Paramount Pictures

By reducing Stu to a footnote, Scream 5 fails to honor the deadly duo that kicked off this smartly scary story we all love so much. Still, I’m holding out hope the powers that be will greenlight Scream 6 and give Stu his shot at revenge. Gale Weathers (Courteney Cox) may not be writing the Scream 5-based book set to ignite another generation of Woodsboro suspects, but someone should.

Plus, if you go by Randy’s rules, we’re owed a second Stu sighting. The killer always comes back for one last scare — and Stu never got his.

Scream (1996) is now streaming on Peacock; Scream (2022) is in theaters.