Summary
- Matthew Lillard will reprise his role as Stu Macher in Scream 7, which excites longtime horror movie fans.
- Fans ponder the possibility of Stu still being alive despite his electrocution in Scream 7.
- Previous Scream installments, like Scream 6, indicated that Stu Macher met his demise, challenging the character’s potential return.
Stu Macher fans have been on a rollercoaster ride for a while. After Matthew Lillard was unsure he would appear in the new movie, news broke that Lillard is reprising his role of Stu Macher in Scream 7. Some might argue that Stu and his best friend Billy Loomis (Skeet Ulrich) were the two best Ghostface killers. They started it all and they were the perfect combination of silly and entertaining.
Lillard’s return is great news for those who always seek out new horror movies and can’t stop rewatching classic, older ones. However, horror fans are asking one question: is Stu actually alive? While sometimes characters can be brought back from the dead, could that really happen in Scream 7?
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How Could Stu Macher Be Alive In Scream 7?
Matthew Lillard has said in several interviews that his silly and memorable Scream character Stu Macher didn’t die. In a 2021 interview with Bloody Disgusting alongside co-star Skeet Ulrich, Lillard said:
“Yes! I’m alive! Stu is alive! You need to support me in this.”
Lillard continued:
“I’m alive. And I want you to know something. We need to start a writing campaign. We need to petition this.”
Then, in 2024, according to Dread Central, Lillard appeared on The Drew Barrymore Show and said, “Listen, Stu is definitely alive.” But if that is the case, how could Stu possibly still be alive? For one thing, Sidney threw a TV at him, and he was electrocuted. For another, how can Scream 7 explain Stu being alive and well for the past few decades? As one fan wrote on Reddit:
“My issue with this is, where has Stu been all this time? A coma? Does Sidney know he survived? If he’s been lucid all this time, why has it taken him so long to make his move?”
No matter how much horror fans love Matthew Lillard’s hilarious and goofy portrayal of Stu Macher, Sidney seemed to kill Stu, and there doesn’t seem to be a way to get around that. If Stu had died offscreen, then perhaps Scream 7 could pretend that never happened. But since audiences saw him get killed, it seems silly to suggest that wasn’t the case. No Scream character has come back from the dead. When Skeet Ulrich appeared in Scream (2022), he was de-aged, which was one of the worst things Scream has ever done.
This Redditor also made a good point: how would Sidney, one of the most celebrated final girls, not be aware of Stu being out in the world somewhere? She’s smart, resourceful, and has been hunted down by several Ghostfaces since the first movie. Nothing gets past Sidney. Also, wouldn’t Stu come back to find Sidney if he was still alive? He would want to honor his best friend Billy and finish what they started. After all, it was Billy’s idea.
If Stu was still alive in Scream canon, wouldn’t he have appeared in another movie? Since both Stu and Roman Bridger (Scott Foley) are returning, it only seems logical that Sidney will hallucinate them or they will be in a flashback together. It would be truly shocking if Scream 7 revealed that Stu was fine this whole time. It’s hard not to argue that it would distract from the rest of the movie.
Scream 6 Explained That Stu Macher Is Dead
In Scream 6, beloved character Kirby Reed (Hayden Panettiere) and Mindy Meeks-Martin (Jasmin Savoy Brown) share a hilarious scene talking about their love and knowledge of horror movies. Kirby looks at the TV that Sidney Prescott once threw at Stu Macher and says, “The T.V. that killed Stu Macher.” Mindy references fan theories about Stu and says, “If you believe he’s dead.” Then, later on in Scream 6, Kirby kills one of the movie’s three Ghostfaces Ethan Landry (Jack Champion) with a TV set and says, “Saw that in a scary movie once.”
If this Scream 6 scene hadn’t happened, it would still seem like a long shot for Stu to still be alive. But since it did happen, there seems to be no possible way to ignore Stu’s death. Hopefully, Matthew Lillard’s Scream 7 appearance will make sense and make fans happy.
Scream 7
- Release Date
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February 27, 2026
- Director
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Kevin Williamson
- Writers
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Kevin Williamson, Guy Busick, James Vanderbilt
- Producers
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Cathy Konrad, Gary Barber, Marianne Maddalena, Peter Oillataguerre, William Sherak, Chad Villella, Matt Bettinelli-Olpin, Tyler Gillett, Ron Lynch
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Neve Campbell
Sidney Prescott
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Courteney Cox
Gale Weathers
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Mason Gooding
Chad Meeks-Martin
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Jasmin Savoy Brown
Mindy Meeks-Martin
More
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