Scream 6 Co-Directors Reveal If Stu Macher Is Actually Alive After Movie Reference

Scream 6 is out in the world, featuring the latest in a long line of Ghostface killers slicing and dicing their way through New York City. Still, though, there are plenty of ties back to the original film, including a line of dialogue that suggests Stu Macher (Matthew Lillard) somehow survived the climax of the original film and is secretly out there somewhere, living.

Warning: the following contains light spoilers from Scream 6. If you haven’t watched yet and want to remain unspoiled, stop reading now.

Midway through the movie, Mindy (Jasmin Savoy Brown), the equally geeky niece of Randy (Jamie Kennedy) from the first two Scream films, mentions a long-time real-life fan theory that Stu actually survived being killed by Sidney (Neve Campbell) in the first film and is now living somewhere in hiding.

This is a theory fans of the franchise have had since Scream 2, in which Lillard very briefly appeared in a cameo role. He was not referenced, and there’s nothing confirming that character was Stu. However, the plot thickens a bit as, according to Lillard, he was actually supposed to return for Scream 3. “I got paid for 3,” the actor previously told Vulture. “Not really well, but I ended up getting paid for something I didn’t do because the idea was that I’d be running high-school killers from jail.”

Of course, the plot of Scream 3 was ultimately changed, and the location was moved to Hollywood. Based on Mindy’s comment in Scream 6, though, are the creative team behind the franchise looking to reintroduce the character moving forward? No, they’re not.

“Mistakes were made,” co-director Matt Bettinelli-Olpin told GameSpot. “That was an on-set joke. That was in the moment, where we were like, ‘We should just have her say it. Let’s just have her say it.’ And we ran out to talk to Jasmine and she’s like, ‘Oh, great.’ That’s why it’s not on camera, too because we’d already moved on from Jasmine’s coverage.”

So if Scream 6 got you pumped for the return of Stu, it sadly isn’t in the cards. Or is it? After all, it wouldn’t be shocking for the co-directors to give a faux answer to keep secrets for the next movie under wraps.

If we had to guess, though, it’s safe to say Stu is very dead and won’t be miraculously returning from beyond the grave. That is, unless he also had a secret kid he haunts, much like Billy (Skeet Ulrich) and his daughter Sam (Melissa Barrera).

Scream 6 is in theaters now.