Melissa Barrera’s firing from Scream 7 changed the course of the franchise for the worse. While Barrera has stated in interviews that she was only contracted for two movies, there was a clear 3-movie arc laid out over the course of Scream 5 and 6.
We’re going to deep dive into what Scream 7 could’ve looked like if racism hadn’t ruined it, but first, we have to break down Scream 5 and 6. We’ll talk about Sam and Tara’s arcs over the course of those two movies, and then we’ll explore how it would’ve been wrapped up with the end of their trilogy in Scream 7.
In Scream 5…
Tara was introduced with a phone call from Ghostface, leading to an attack that nearly claimed her life. Sam heard about this through Wes and immediately hauled ass to Woodsboro. Her boyfriend of 6 months, Richie, volunteered to come with her, and Sam was reluctant to even allow Richie to come along. Granted, he easily sways her with his Jack Quaid charm.
Sam and Tara reconnect at the hospital, and she almost immediately confides in her sister. Sam confesses the story of how their father wasn’t really her father, but was instead the infamous serial killer, Billy Loomis. She’s vulnerable and apologetic for abandoning her sister, and at first, Tara rejects her, understandably pissed at the ill-timed trauma dump.
Later on, we had the suspect round-up at Chad and Mindy’s house, where Mindy outright accused Sam of being the killer. She talked about it making perfect requel sense considering her family history and its connection to the tropes. Understandably upset, Sam storms out and is confronted by a hallucination of her dead serial killer father telling her she needs to cut some fucking throats. In hindsight, this would have been such good foreshadowing if we got an actual conclusion to this character’s arc.
Then we get to the later hospital scene where Amber is on the phone with Sam, trying to force her to choose between Richie and Tara, and there was no competition there. Sam was always going to pick her sister. The relationship between the Carpenter sisters was such a refreshing change compared to the Sidney Dewey characters. Sure, the self-claimed brother-sister duo had very sweet and genuine moments, but they were never given the nuance of these kinds of situations brought up with the sisters.
Sam and Tara, however, had so much to explore about their relationship. Sam, of course, chose to protect Tara until she could stall long enough to shoot at the killer. We won’t talk about how nonsensical that was; instead, we’ll highlight how Sam’s instinct was always to protect her sister.
Skipping ahead to the final act, Sam and Tara slay their antagonists. Sam killed Richie with 22 stabs and a throat slit, and Tara finished Amber off with a gunshot to the head after the Sidney-Gale BBQ tag team. The sisters ride off in an ambulance together, seemingly leaving the nightmare in the past.
Scream 6
A year later, Tara’s film professor, and two of her classmates got murdered in the same night. Sam’s ID was left at the scene to lay the groundwork of framing her for the crime. It’s interesting looking back at the gathering scene, because Anika and Ethan are literally called out for how their roommate statuses could have easily been rigged, yet there is no follow up. It’s just mentioned, and then shrugged off as if every other attempt at applying a red herring in this movie.
We see her taking some medication in the beginning of Scream 5, which was later revealed to be some form of anti-psychotic. We never get a specific diagnosis for Sam, but it’s shown that she was actively taking care of herself by routinely taking her medication.