Panic 2 (1997) | See what the movie would look like with Kevin Williamson’s ORIGINAL SCRIPT

Scream, the fifth film in the fan-beloved horror franchise, releases in January 2022. And if you’re wondering why the hell Scream 5 will just be called Scream, thank a marketing strategy that’s going mainstream for Hollywood franchises. The reason may be to attract new fans who are not necessarily familiar with or have not necessarily seen the previous films. The same thing happened with the Halloween reboot (2018), which became known with the same title as the 1978 original. Although the Fifth Scream does not remove previous films from the timeline.

To heat up the engines for the new copy of this beloved seventh-art franchise, CinePOP offers articles that never stop at previous films. Everything you want to know about the previous four films and a little more time here – just watch the site. We recently brought you an article on the most interesting behind-the-scenes anecdotes from the second film, Scream 2 (1997), the only one left to do. Here we’ll continue to focus on the first sequel the movie received, this time to release a completely different version than the movie would have. It turns out that Scream 2 was one of the first big movies (or maybe the first) to suffer from the advent of the internet. I explain. The horror film had its script leaked online by an extra, and this at a time when we were still living in the early days of the virtual world. Pioneer even in defeats.

In the original Scream 2 script, protagonist Sidney (Neve Campbell) has passed away!

That way, with the story in the hands of anyone who wanted to read it, the mystery was revealed. And as we know, the movies in this franchise depend a lot on twists and turns, who dies and who stays alive and, most importantly, who the current killers are. As a result of this clueless act, screenwriter Kevin Williamson had to essentially rewrite the story, altering several facts, including the identity of the killers. Find out what Panic 2 would look like before the leak below. Oh yeah, there are plenty of plot spoilers in the text below, so move on if you’re bored of knowing it all. Or at your own risk.

The original assassins

Only Ms. Loomis, aka Debbi Salt (Laurie Metcalf) was chosen as one of the identities of Ghostface.

As we know, Scream 2 contains two Ghostfaces just like the original. And their identities are: Mickey, the film student who is always with a camera in hand filming everything (played by Timothy Olyphant) and journalist Debbie Salt (Laurie Metcalf) who sees another reporter tormented for the film Gale Weathers. (Courteney Cox). Debbie, of course, turns out to be Mrs. Loomis, the mother of Billy Loomis, the original assassin, who is cited in the first Scream as having left her husband after discovering a betrayal. Apparently, the family was not well on her mind, as the mother decided to orchestrate her own murder, following in her son’s footsteps. Mrs. Loomis finds Mickey on a website and hires him for her bloody plot.

But it was not always so. In the first leaked script, Kevin Williamson programmed the killers to be Derek and Hallie; besides Mrs. Loomis, the only one left from the original script. In other words, in the second movie we would have three Ghostfaces: two women and a man. While we don’t know the dynamics of the three in the movie, we can imagine Billy’s mother would once again be in charge, orchestrating the plans and using the youngsters as her pawns in the murder. This revelation would come like a double knife in the back of the protagonist Sidney (Neve Campbell). That’s because Hallie, playing Elise Neal, is her best friend in the second movie. And Derek (Jerry O’Connell), her new boyfriend. This explains why in one version – which was part of the trailer – Ghostface calls Sidney “girlfriend” on the phone. At first we might think you’re impersonating Billy, but with the conclusion originally thought out, it makes perfect sense. This version was changed in the movie. In other words, Sidney would again have a boyfriend who turns out to be a psychopath. It’s the rotten finger.

Dewey, campus security

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The “goofy” cop Dewey (David Arquette) should have died at the end of the original. But director Wes Craven enjoyed Arquette’s performance in the role so much that he recorded two endings, one in which he died and one that remained alive. In the end, he ended up opting for the second. So, in the sequel, Dewey reappears and appears on his friend Sidney’s college campus when new murders begin to occur. In this second film, Dewey is no longer a cop and bears the imprint of his injury, with a lame leg and an almost useless arm. But if we stop there, the character has no job and not much to do there, other than keeping an eye on his colleague.

In the original text, Dewey is said to be one of the university’s campus security guards. The character would on purpose request a transfer from Woodsboro Police to the college campus in order to be close to Sydney. This work makes more sense and would give a greater function to the character.

Randy the cameraman

Everyone’s favorite nerd Randy (Jamie Kennedy) is said to be Gale’s cameraman in the original version.

Randy (Jamie Kennedy) was a fan favorite character in the first film. The horror-movie nerd is sadly killed in this second feature film, a move Wes Craven says he made to demonstrate that no one was safe this time around. The director, however, said many years later that he regretted killing the beloved character. Anyway, Randy is another film student at the same Sydney University. In the original script, it wouldn’t be like that, and Randy would actually be Gale Weathers’ cameraman. This dynamic would be a lot of fun.

In contrast, Joël (Duane Martin), the guy who is actually Gale’s cameraman, and who skillfully “gets by” when the bodies start to pile up, eventually managing to survive, is said to be a similar medical student. University. Joel would be one of Sidney’s best friends in this version. It remains to be seen whether he too would survive this way, or with the change of profession, he would face a worse fate.

Debbie Salt more aggressive

Laurie Metcalf played the psychopath Ms. Loomis, aka Debbie Salt. Twenty years later, she would be nominated for an Oscar for Lady Bird.

Ms. Loomis, aka Debbie Salt, is a character that doesn’t appear much in the film, but her incisions are accurate. Her “disguise” in the film is that of a “busy” reporter who is always in the right place at the right time. Of course, by studying a lot not only the progress of the police in relation to the murders, but also the scene of their murders. There’s a meme on the internet that says if Sidney ever saw her he would recognize her and the movie would end pretty quickly. True, but for this very reason, the woman made sure she never crossed paths with her ex-stepdaughter.

In the original version of the script, Debbie Salt was more aggressive and sour, tackling her journalistic questions. Maybe this trait was changed so that people weren’t suspicious of her as one of the killers. In a scene from the original script, she asked Sidney if she had “finally panicked and if she was committing all the murders”. At the end of the scene, she would be punched in the face by Gale, mimicking the scene in the original where Sidney punches Gale after the reporter made a sarcastic comment on the protagonist’s accusation. We just don’t know how Sidney wouldn’t recognize Ms Loomis. Maybe that’s why the scene has changed. Or maybe the explanation would come with many plastic surgeries.

Derek the documentary filmmaker

“He copies, but he does it differently.” Jerry O’Connell as Derek would be Sidney’s second boyfriend to be revealed as the killer.

It makes sense that the killer from the second film now has a camera filming the crimes and their victims. Well, that was before the days of smartphones and cell phone cameras, which would make life a lot easier for Ghostface. In any case, at some point in the film, this fact comes into play when the protagonists find out that they are being filmed by the murderer. Well, only one character walks a camera up and down in the movie: Mickey. And guess what: he’s the killer. However, in the original version of the script, Derek would be the killer. And not only that, but he would also be the film student who would live with a camera documenting everything around him.

mickey the singer

At the start of his career, Timothy Olyphant was always the bad guy.

Basically, we would have reversed the roles of Derek and Mickey. Other than the fact that Derek would still be Sidney’s boyfriend. This original version of the script would also more effusively address Mickey’s crush on Sidney’s best friend Hallie – the two possibly indulging in a romance. The fact is brushed off slightly in the version we got on the big screen. In the original, Mickey is the one singing in the cafeteria, just like Derek did for Sidney. The boy, however, would sing for Hallie and the song would also be different, instead of ‘I Think I Love You’ the song chosen would be ‘I Will Always Love You’, by Whitney Houston.

Sidney and Gale would die

Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber) is said to be Gale and Sidney’s killer in the original version.

In the original version of this script, the result would end with a very bad ending, where in a murder all the main characters would be killed. Besides Randy, Gale and Sidney would also die, and maybe Dewey too. This makes us think that Kevin Williamson had planned to end the franchise with this second film. The third hadn’t been planned and it would take three years to finally hit theaters – and without a Williamson script.

In the writer’s first story for Scream 2, just like the original, Ms. Loomis ends up killing her henchmen – here Derek and Hallie. In the film, Ms. Loomis tries to convince Cotton Weary (Liev Schreiber), who arrives armed at the scene, to let her kill Sidney, as the protagonist accuses her of murder and keeps him in jail for a year. For a few moments, we think the guy will accept the offer, but eventually he shoots the assassin killing her. In the original version of the script, Cotton would stab Ms. Loomis, but it wouldn’t end there. Considering that Sidney and Gale were responsible for ruining his life, Cotton would panic and stab Gale to death as well. In the end, Cotton would chase Sidney and the movie would end with the two stabbing each other to death and falling side by side. A morbid end to hell.

Door open to three

Scream (1996) and Scream 2 (1997) both end in a way that does not necessarily require continuations. Kevin Williamson said he thought of the idea for the two while he was still writing the first one. Even so, nothing in the end of the original indicated that the feature could have a sequel. After all, it’s a closed story in itself. What drove the sequel, one can think that it was only the success and, of course, the money. The same thing happens with Panic 2. But it wasn’t always like this. In Williamson’s original screenplay, the second film would end up revealing another Ghostface, which would watch everything from a distance, from the top of the campus steeple. This ending would indicate the existence of a fourth killer in the plot, or simply a new psychopath about to jump into action in all three.

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