Sandbox / Scream Ghostface New Generation

MAJOR UNMARKED SPOILERS AHEAD. You have been warned.

Scream 4

General

The Woodsboro Massacre Reboot Killers (2011)

Charlie: Have you figured it out yet, Sidney? In keeping with our remake theme, Trevor's this generation's Billy Loomis, and we're the innocent victims: Sidney and Randy.

Jill: See, with you, the world just heard about what happened, but with us, they're gonna see it. It's gonna be a worldwide sensation. I mean, people gotta see this shit. It's not like anyone reads anymore.

The Ghostface killers of 2011, and the second to have their murder spree take place in Woodsboro.

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• Brains and Brawn: Jill is the mastermind while Charlie does most of the legwork and commits most of the murders in the film.
• Camera Fiend: Jill and Charlie use cameras to record their murders and upload the footage to the Internet for public viewing, ensuring that their notoriety reaches a larger audience.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: Unlike Roman, who at least pretended to have a tragic motivation, Jill and Charlie (the former, especially) just want to get famous. Also, Jill and Charlie are high school students, whereas Roman was an adult with a career.
• Dramatic Unmask: Played straight with Jill and subverted with Charlie, who betrays his true nature by stabbing Kirby.
• Fall Guy: Played with. Charlie and Trevor are the two patsies, but while Trevor is innocent, Charlie is one of the two Ghostfaces, with Jill betraying Charlie shortly after The Reveal.
• Not His Sled: In-Universe example. Sidney initially sees Jill and Charlie as the next-generation Sidney and Randy respectively and thus believes Jill's ex Trevor is the new Billy Loomis (and the new Ghostface) because History Repeats. As a result, Sidney is somewhat surprised after Charlie reveals himself as Ghostface (especially since she last saw him tied up by Ghostface) and is visibly distraught when Jill reveals herself to be the second killer.
  Charlie: The unexpected is the new cliché.
• Older Hero vs. Younger Villain: Jill and Charlie are in their late teens in contrast to Sidney in her thirties and Dewey and Gale in their forties.
• Outlaw Couple: Charlie and Jill are a couple, but this is later subverted when Jill backstabs Charlie and reveals that he was one of the fall guys all along.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni: Jill is the hammy Prima Donna Red Oni to Charlie's mellow Soft-Spoken Sadist Blue Oni.
• Superior Successor: They kill more people than the original murder spree they wish to emulate, at nine.^note Ten, if you count Jill's betrayal of Charlie.
• Two Dun It: As with the first two movies, the Ghostface identity is donned by two people.
• Vile Villain, Laughable Lackey: Jill is cold and ruthless and her henchman Charlie is a Laughably Evil nerd.

Jill Roberts

Jill Roberts

"I was so believable today, wasn't I? I mean, I told so many lies that I actually started to believe them."

Played By: Emma Roberts

"My friends? What world are you living in? I don't need friends. I need fans. Don't you get it? This has never been about killing you, it's about... becoming you. I mean, for fuck's sake, my own mother had to die, no great loss there, so I could stay true to the original. It's sick, right? Well, sick is the new sane. You had your 15 minutes, now I WANT MINE! I mean, what am I supposed to do? Go to college? Grad school? Work? Look around. We all live in public now, we're all on the Internet. How do you think people get famous anymore? You don't have to achieve anything, you just gotta have fucked-up shit happen to you. So you do have to die, Sid. Those are the rules. New movie, new franchise. There's only room for one lead, and let's face it, your ingenue days, they're over."

First introduced as the seemingly innocent victim of the latest Ghostface killings, she is eventually revealed to be far from the Final Girl she's presented as. In fact, Jill Roberts is the mastermind of the fourth film's murders. The younger cousin of Sidney, she's a fame-hungry sociopath who is envious of her cousin's fame. Jill planned on framing her ex-boyfriend Trevor Sheldon for the murders and emerging as the "final girl" in the eyes of the media, riding it to celebrity status as Sidney had done. Tricking Charlie Walker into helping her, she intends to kill and frame him as Trevor's accomplice when she no longer needs him. She also had her "survival" filmed so that she could upload it to social media.

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• 15 Minutes of Fame: As she is taken from Kirby's home, Jill achieves this with the media describing her as a survivor of the new murder spree. When it comes out that she was behind the killings, presumably shortly after her death, the positive attention to her evaporates.
• All for Nothing: In the end, she not only doesn't get away with her scheme, but one of her planned victims, Kirby, survives and gets the attention Jill wanted.
• Allegorical Character: Jill is essentially a cynic's interpretation of a movie remake. Jill may be a modern, updated version of Sidney, but she will never live up to Sidney.
• Alpha Bitch: Especially as a murderous girl who only desires a huge amount of fame as a fake sole survivor (like her cousin Sidney).
• Ambiguously Absent Parent: She seems to only have her mother, and no father, but what happened to him isn't clear.
• Antagonistic Offspring: She is this to her mother, who is oblivious to how little her daughter cares for her.
• Arch-Enemy: She views Sidney as hers since she grew up in the wake of the latter's notoriety for surviving previous Ghostface murder sprees and grew to resent her for this. Jill even saves Sidney for last in her planned murders, which further solidifies the special enmity that she holds for her.
• Attack on the Heart: She dies when Sidney shoots her in the heart.
• Attack the Injury: She stabs Sidney in the stomach during her reveal at Kirby's house, and later punches that same wound when she attacks Sidney in the hospital.
  Jill: How're those stitches?
• Attention Whore: To the point of convincing Charlie to help her kill all of her friends and her mother, just for a few minutes of fame. She steps it up even more when she needlessly kills Charlie simply because she wants all the attention to herself as the Sole Survivor.
• Ax-Crazy: When she's revealed to be Ghostface. She's arguably the most overtly insane of all of the Ghostface killers — even Stu wasn't as crazy as her.
• Bad Boss: She kills her own underling, Charlie.
• Bad Influencer: Her motivation is social media stardom, and she films and stages everything in order to achieve that.
• Barbaric Bully: Her savagery that tops the previous killers, her disposing of Charlie much to his devastation, the way she inflicts wounds on herself to better look like an authentic survivor of a bloodbath, her being emotionally and verbally abusive, and a bad temper to boot definitely qualify her as such.
• Beauty Is Bad: She's attractive, attention-seeking, and murderous.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: She wanted fifteen minutes of fame, and she got them, literally. She's hailed as a heroic survivor for a very brief period of time, until Sidney kills her and presumably exposes her as a murderer and a liar.
• Beneath the Mask: Pretends to be a normal, nice schoolgirl being targeted by killers when she in fact is the killer targeting innocent people.
• Berserk Button: Being told what to do, as she only shoots Officer Hicks after the latter gives her what she wants (her gun) and tries to calmly defuse the situation by giving her an order.
• Beyond Redemption: Made very clear from Jill rebuffing Sidney telling her that she's not going to get out of her predicament and Jill later ignoring an attempt by Officer Hicks to defuse the situation by shooting her.
• Big Bad: Of the fourth film. Her desire to reach Sidney's fame is what drives her to massacre her friends, and she quickly turns on her partner to frame him for the killing scheme.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Like most Ghostfaces, she is seemily very kind before The Reveal that is a cold blooded murder.
• Blatant Lies: She is constantly telling lies. She even is amused by the amount of them.
  Jill: I told so many lies today, that I actually started to believe them.
• Boom, Headshot!: She murders Trevor this way and threatens to do the same to Dewey if Judy doesn't give her gun to her.
• Breaking Old Trends: Jill is the first Ghostface that is shown putting their facade back up after being revealed as a killer.
• The Bully: Towards Sidney and anyone around her, as she's prone to insulting and unleashing her bad temper against others in her way.
• Bully Brutality: Jill is prone to lashing out, kicks Trevor in a rage, even shooting him in the crotch before killing him, and verbally abuses Sidney and later her friends when they find out the truth, before trying to off them too to tie up loose ends.
• By the Hair: She has Trevor's corpse rip some of her hair out to falsely convince detectives that he had grabbed her there while alive and trying to kill her.
• Cain and Abel: She's Sidney's younger cousin and is trying to kill her.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Jill is revealed to love being, proudly proclaiming that "Sick is the new sane."
• The Chessmaster: She is able to use Charlie as a means of misdirecting her role as one of the killers by having him cut her and appearing terrified when he's murdering someone or trying to attack her.
• Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: Literally everyone in Scream 4 who has any kind of relationship with Jill is someone she betrays; her friends are either killed or left for dead either by her or with her as an accessory, her own mother is murdered as part of her plan, her cousin Sidney is her final intended victim, and even Charlie, her accomplice, is betrayed and murdered by Jill, who refuses to share the limelight with anyone.
• Clashing Cousins: She's out for Sidney's blood, but not before she kills everyone else to make herself the Sole Survivor in the spotlight.
• Combat Pragmatist: Jill knows she can't defeat Dewey in a fair fight so she knocks him unconscious with a sneak attack.
• Composite Character: While Jill tries to invoke being an Expy of Sidney in a "reboot" of the original killings, she obviously subverts that while incorporating traits of all the Ghostface killers before her.
  • Like Billy, she's a wrathful bully who killed all her friends including both her love interests.
  • Like Stu, she is the more insane of the duo who killed her ex because he dumped her for someone else.
  • Like Mickey, her main motive is fame.
  • Like Mrs. Loomis, she betrays her accomplice and intends to pin all the murders on them after killing them.
  • Like Roman, she is a matricidal, envious relative of Sidney.
• Consummate Liar: With the exception of Charlie, she lies to everyone by framing herself as a normal teenager who is being gone after by the new Ghostface. Her lies extend to Charlie, as she fakes a romantic interest and desire in being his partner so that he will assist her in the murders.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist
  • To the original film's main Ghostface, Billy. While Billy and Jill are both acquainted with Sidney before the events of their respective films, Sidney feels intimacy with Billy while being much more distant with Jill. Sidney has suspicions about Billy being the killer, but never suspects Jill until the latter makes her murderous identity known. Although Billy and Jill both enjoy horror films, the former's love for movies plays into his speech to Sidney whereas Jill just finds them enjoyable. Both corner Sidney and reveal their plans to her, but Jill stabs Sidney and kills Trevor in front of her, in contrast to Billy only threatening her with a gun and having already killed all of his victims before the reveal. Although both inflict harm on their partner, Billy never tries to kill Stu (only wounding him to go along with their plot to pose as victims) whereas Jill kills Charlie.
  • To Scream 2's main Ghostface, Nancy Loomis. Mrs. Loomis is one of the oldest Ghostfaces while Jill is one of the youngest. Both assault Dewey, though Mrs. Loomis attempts to kill him (and fails) while Jill only renders him unconscious and uses him as leverage over Judy and Gale. Although both kill (or attempt to kill) their male partners, Mrs. Loomis takes on a mother-son relationship with Mickey that sees the latter helped with his college funding while Jill pretends to be romantically interested in Charlie. While Mrs. Loomis was motivated by the death of her son and wanted to avenge him before retreating to a life of anonymity, Jill has no sympathetic motivation and wants to achieve fame after posing as a victim. Both are defeated by the combined efforts of Sidney and her friends, but Mrs. Loomis is killed after trying to make a compromise with Cotton while Jill shows no interest in getting anything less than what she wants.
  • To the third film's Ghostface Roman Bridger. Roman is an established film director with fame whereas Jill seeks notoriety. Roman works alone and kills all of his cast while Jill works with Charlie and only directly kills some of her friends. Both played a role in causing the death of their own mother, but Roman only did the planning for Billy to commit the act while Jill murdered her mother. Although both are related to Sidney, the latter has never met Roman before the film whereas she's already acquainted with Jill. While both hold Dewey hostage, Roman attacks him head-on (causing him to lose consciousness after a fall) while Jill renders him in a similar state through a sneak attack. Roman appears to reconcile with Sidney (when faking his death) and is killed by an associate of hers (Dewey) while Jill never expresses remorse for her actions towards her cousin and is directly killed by Sidney.
• Cop Killer: Subverted. Jill seemingly shoots Judy dead, but Judy is able to stand back up and disclose that she was wearing a Bulletproof Vest.
• Corrupted Character Copy: Of Sidney: a dark-haired Final Girl whose cheating boyfriend turned on her and killed everyone around her. Unlike Sidney, who is an innocent victim and a badass Action Girl, Jill is the primary Ghostface, and sadistic and petty.
• The Corrupter: Considering how well her lies of wanting a romance with Charlie worked on him, she's heavily implied to be the reason he's a participant in the murder spree.
• Crazy-Prepared: Jill seems to be able to come up with solutions anytime parts of her plan do not go the way she intended. After the initial shock of Sidney still being alive wears off, she leaves her room and sneaks to Sidney's with the intent of finally killing her.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: She easily gets the better of Sidney by stabbing her when she is running from Charlie and has her pinned until delivering (what she thinks is) a fatal wound later on.
• Dark Action Girl: This is best exemplified at the hospital, where she takes on Sidney, Gale, Dewey, and Judy by herself, and comes close to killing them off.
• Death by Irony: While Jill was able to defeat Sidney at Kirby's house after a sneak attack gave the former the upper hand, Jill is killed via gunshot to the chest after a sneak attack from Sidney gave her the upper hand.
• Decoy Protagonist: A blatant Expy of Sidney, and was even heavily hinted as her possible successor as The Hero of the franchise, only to be revealed as Evil All Along and the fourth film's Big Bad.
• Deliberate Injury Gambit: Allows Charlie to slash her arm in order to make herself look like a Ghostface target.
• Determinator: She is really driven when it comes to killing her intended victims, just because she wants Sidney's fame and to be the center of attention.
• Devil in Plain Sight: Especially after her revelation as one of the Ghostfaces, combined with her small chances of redeeming herself.
• Didn't See That Coming: She is shocked to find out Sidney survived the stabbing she gave her at Kirby's house.
• Didn't Think This Through: Jill assumed that a couple of stab wounds would be enough to keep the famously hard to kill Sidney down for good, despite having access to a gun that could have finished Sidney in an instant. Once she realizes that Sidney did indeed survive, Jill is left scrambling to silence the witness she blabbed all of her plans to.
• Dies Wide Open: After she finally goes down for good, Jill's eyes are left open, staring lifelessly. Sidney takes a moment to look into her dead cousin's eyes just as Jill had done after stabbing her.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Jill murders Trevor and frames him for her murders as revenge for cheating on her (which includes shooting him in the groin and shouting, "I am NOT the girl you cheat on!"). While Trevor's infidelity was not her motivation for becoming the new Ghostface, she specifically targets him as a patsy because of it. Her reason for targeting Sidney, on the other hand, is simply because, like Roman, she's jealous of her fame and wants it for herself, despising her cousin for all the attention she got and feeling overshadowed as a result.
• Distaff Counterpart: To her immediate Ghostface predecessor Roman Bridger, due to their status as evil, jealous relatives to Sidney.
• Dramatically Missing the Point: Jill complains to Sidney that Trevor was a worse boyfriend than Billy because Trevor didn't make her famous, never mind the fact that Billy was a killer.
• Driven by Envy: Her jealousy of how much attention Sidney was getting drove her to wanting to replicate it, by killing others and making herself appear to be the survivor.
• Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: She not only fits the physical description, but is also a terrifying serial killer.
• Engineered Heroics: The 2011 Woodsboro killings are the result of Jill wanting to be recognized as The Hero like Sidney, to the point of starting another Ghostface spree for her to play the role of the Final Girl survivor.
• Establishing Character Moment: When Jill stabs Sidney in a sneak attack and then smiles after she pulls off her mask, which reveals her as one of the killers, it establishes Jill as sadistic and taking joy in hurting others.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Before killing Gale, she consents to allowing her a last word. Though, this is mostly due to her feeling like she is guaranteed rather an actual standard on her part.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: She is bitterly jealous of Sidney's fame and seems to believe Sidney enjoyed it, despite it only coming about due to the death of her mother and her friends. The idea that Sidney might absolutely hate her notoriety and having such traumatic events define her life is something Jill can't seem to fathom.
• Evil Counterpart: To Sidney. She is set up to be a Sidney expy, and has a lot in common with her as a young woman...until she's revealed to be Ghostface. One might argue that she's also a Distaff Counterpart to her cousin, Roman.
• Evil Has a Bad Sense of Humor: She takes joy in hurting others and is visibly happy to admit how sick what she's doing is.
• Evil Is Hammy: Especially in the scene where she's self-harming to make herself look like a victim of the killer, and when she behaves like a stuck-up Fun Personified Alpha Bitch diva after The Reveal.
• Evil Is Petty:
  • Goes batshit insane and kills her friends and mother because she wants to be famous.
  • She decided to frame Trevor for the Ghostface killings because he cheated on her. Jill even goes the extra mile of shooting Trevor in the genitals to torture him before putting a fatal bullet in his head.
• Eye Scream: Sidney pokes her in the eye to escape from being strangled.
• Face of an Angel, Mind of a Demon: She's played by then-family film and television genre actress Emma Roberts.
• Fake Relationship: She has one with Charlie as she clearly doesn't reciprocate his feelings given that she kills him.
• Fake Ultimate Hero: Jill plans to stage herself as the heroic Final Girl of the new murders. She nearly gets away with it, but is killed in the hospital and presumably exposed as a fraud afterwards.
• Fame Through Infamy: Though unlike Mickey, she wants recognition not as a killer, but as the hero who stopped a massacre, having seen her cousin Sidney become famous for her ordeal and ride that to appearances in movies, talk shows, and books.
• Faux Affably Evil: Puts up a nice girl façade to hide her true monstrous colors, and then brags to Sidney after The Reveal like some fun-loving party girl having the time of her life, just before she stabs her to put the final touches on her murderous con.
• Femme Fatale: Jill is an attractive girl who does not take cheating well nor has an issue with taking a life. Both of the boys that she at first shows romantic interest in, her former boyfriend Trevor and her fellow Ghostface Charlie, end up dying by her hand.
• Final Girl: Subverted. Her goal is to usurp Sidney's position as the new Final Girl of the Ghostface massacres and ride it as her claim to fame... by donning the mask herself.
• Foil:
  • To Dewey Riley. Dewey is an older friend of Sidney who has a close relationship with her and has risked his life to save her while Jill is the younger cousin of Sidney who is distant to her and wants to kill her. Dewey is an officer who cares about his subordinates while Jill is a law-breaker who only cares for herself and is fine with the deaths of her friends. Dewey is in love with Gale and cares greatly for her well-being while Jill pretends to be romantically attracted to Charlie and cares so little for him that she ends his life herself.
  • To Gale Weathers. Both are dark-haired residents of Woodsboro, although Jill was raised there while Gale became a resident only after marrying Dewey. Both aspire to write, though Gale struggles with finding a topic to write about while Jill wants to falsify a tale of her survival in the new Woodsboro murder spree. Both set up methods to record, though Gale does this to catch footage of the happenings and possibly the killers as a means of stopping them while Jill wants recordings so she can watch her murders repeatedly. While both have had friction with Sidney at various points, Gale at her worst still tried to help Sidney against Ghostface (particularly Billy and Stu in the original spree) whereas Jill at her best simply wants her dead.
  • To Kirby Reed. Both are high-schoolers and interested in horror movies. Kirby is an ardent driver while Jill is never shown operating a vehicle. Both display a dislike of Trevor, although Kirby's distaste is limited to her rhetoric whereas Jill plots a revenge scheme to frame and murder him. Both arouse the attraction of Charlie, though the latter feels that Kirby took too long to reciprocate an attraction to him, and has no problem stabbing her, while being completely smitten with Jill and being stabbed by her. They also differ in their fates, as Jill dies while Kirby survives.
• Foreshadowing:
  "You think it's all about you."
• For the Evulz: While the main Ghostfaces before her had Freudian Excuses, flimsy as they were, Jill has none, and openly admits she's evil, committing multiple murders purely to get 15 Minutes of Fame.
  Jill: That's sick, right? Well, sick is the new sane.
• Glory Seeker: Resenting Sidney's fame and being in her shadow, Jill's plan for her and Charlie's killings is to usurp Sid's place as a famous survivor so that she can bask in the adoration of the media. When she gets a taste of this, with reporters bombarding her with questions and cameras flashing in her face, Jill has to fight to keep from smiling, clearly adoring the attention.
• Green-Eyed Monster: It's quite clear that she's envious of the attention and fame her cousin got for surviving the previous Ghostface killings when she was a young girl, despite Sidney never wanting it in the first place.
  Jill: Do you know what it was like growing up in this family? Related to you? I mean, all I ever heard was Sidney this, and Sidney that, and Sidney, Sidney, Sidney. You were always just so fucking special! Well, now I'm the special one.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: As Trevor finds out the hard way, do not make her angry.
• Hate Sink: Her sole motivation for planning a killing spree (with the help of her former accomplice Charlie) was just for her to garner as much media attention as her cousin Sidney did, making her reason behind such crime of hers a very petty one.
• He Knows Too Much: After finding out that Sidney survived her initial stabbing, she attempts to do away with her in the hospital in order to finally tie up loose ends and prevent her from revealing what really happened. She also attempts to off Dewey, Gale, and Judy to desperately cover up her tracks when they realize the truth and come to Sidney's defense.
• Hero Killer: After unmasking herself, Jill murders her ex-boyfriend Trevor before admitting that she was the Ghostface who killed her own mother Kate Roberts. She also comes close to killing Sidney, Dewey, Gale, and Judy by herself at the hospital.
• High-Voltage Death: Subverted. Jill appears to die when she is shocked from behind by Sidney with a defibrillator, but gets back up a short time later.
• Hoist by Their Own Petard: At her final moments, she was eventually killed with the gun she took from Dewey by Sidney.
• I Did What I Had to Do: She sees her killing of her friends and other innocent people as justified given it will help make her look more sympathetic as the only person who was not killed.
• I Have No Son!: A cousin variant: it's implied by Sidney's words after she kills her that she no longer sees Jill as her cousin, but as a murderer who got what was coming to her.
• I Just Want to Be Loved: A twisted example. She's already loved by, or close to those who knew her personally (including her accomplice Charlie), but she actually wants the public's admiration for her as a fake Sole Survivor more than any of her interpersonal relationships.
• I Just Want to Be Special: Her reason for being a Ghostface is to stage a murder spree where she can portray the sole survivor and become famous for her supposed trauma. She even tells Sidney "now I'm the special one" to show her resentment towards her cousin for overshadowing her.
• I Just Want to Have Friends: Subverted. While she has people like Kirby who seemed to genuinely like spending time with her, Jill couldn't care less about this and would rather have fans.
  Jill: "My friends? What world are you living in? I don't need friends; I need fans."
• I Never Said It Was Poison: She unknowingly reveals herself as the killer by mentioning that she and Gale have "matching wounds". Considering that the details about Ghostface's assault on Gale were never released to the public, the only way Jill could know this was if she attacked Gale herself.
• Idiot Ball: For someone who was able to pull off such a well-thought-out and intricate plot, blowing her facade by claiming she and Gale had "matching wounds" was pretty boneheaded. Justified since her plan had succeeded much farther than any Ghostface prior, so she probably got too overconfident.
• Improvised Weapon: Jill takes the cake among the Ghostfaces when she successfully takes out an armed Dewey with a bedpan before taking his gun.
• In the Back: Jill is initially incapacitated when Sidney hits her with a defibrillator from behind.
• Irony:
  • The seemingly wholesome new Final Girl turns out to be the killer this time.
  • Killing Sidney's publicist Rebecca was Jill's envious way of impeding Sidney's fame, but Jill didn't know that Sidney just fired Rebecca minutes before the attack, rendering Jill's murder of Rebecca mostly pointless.
  • She shot Sheriff Judy Hicks with Dewey's gun, expecting the latter to be dead. Later, Sidney finally manages to kill Jill with that same gun of his. What's even more ironic about Jill's last attack is that Judy was able to survive it with a Bulletproof Vest.
  • The ending of Scream 4 has Jill get her much-desired fifteen minutes of fame... immediately after she's dead and set to be exposed as a murdering psychopath.
  • Jill claims that Trevor's infidelity makes him a worse boyfriend than the murderous Billy Loomis; the fifth film reveals that Billy cheated on Sidney as well, gutting Jill's already hollow argument.
• It's All About Me: Jill is willing to kill all her friends and her mother in a twisted attempt to become famous like her cousin Sidney.
• Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: Although she initially appears to be critical towards Sidney, she does try to bond with her. After The Reveal, however, it all turns out to be an act. She even goes as far to kill Charlie, who was her accomplice, so that she can claim all the fame to herself, which subverts Even Evil Has Loved Ones.
• Just One Little Mistake: If she had not made a remark about Gale's wounds, which only her attacker would know, Dewey would have not caught on to her being the killer and its very likely she could have killed Sidney before anyone arrived to aid her.
• Karmic Death: Gets electrocuted and shot by Sidney after spending the whole night trying to kill her, as well as murdering her own mother, who was also Sidney's aunt.
• Kick the Dog: Her brutal murder of Trevor, who only wanted to make up with her, and confessed that he really did love her before she shot him.
• Kick Them While They Are Down: After learning that Sidney is still alive in the hospital, Jill attempts to kill Sidney in her ICU room, after she's already critically injured her. Unfortunately for her, Sidney refuses to go down that easily.
• The Killer in Me: Jill is the secretive version of this trope. Scream 4 seemingly sets her up as the new Final Girl to replace Sidney, only to reveal that she was one of the killers all along.
• Kinslaying Is a Special Kind of Evil: Jill isn't too far behind Roman in this department. She commits matricide, and tries to kill Sidney, her own cousin.
• Lack of Empathy: Being a Ghostface, this is a given, but Jill takes it to another level; previous Ghostfaces, while all detestable people, managed to show at least some concern for or camaraderie with (if no one else) their partners, and even Jill's immediate predecessor, Roman, had a backstory where he wanted to reconnect with his mother. Jill, by contrast, has no attachment to or regard for anyone, not her friends ("I don't need friends; I need fans"), not her own mother ("no great loss there"), or her partner Charlie ("what the media really loves, baby, is a sole survivor; just ask you-know-who"), and she casually throws away all the love and affection shown to her as part of her sick desire for fame. Even while keeping up the facade of an innocent victim, she lets her true self slip through by bringing up possibly writing a book about her "ordeal" mere hours after she supposedly survived a bloodbath.
• Laser-Guided Karma: A retroactive example. Jill's end goal was to gain fame for being the Final Girl of a massacre she herself had planned from the start. The fifth film reveals instead that Kirby, whom Jill intended to kill as part of this plan, survived her wounds, and is implied to have gained fame from her survival, further emphasizing that Jill's plan amounted to nothing in the end.
• Legacy Character: Invoked; she wants to be seen as Sidney's successor as the sole survivor of Woodsboro killings to bask in fame and adoration.
• Like Mother, Like Daughter: Downplayed. While both she and her mother Kate have issues with Sidney overshadowing them, Kate isn't a murderous psychopath like her daughter.
• Light Is Not Good: She wears light shirts that are usually white or some variation of blue but is anything but heroic.
• Love-Interest Traitor: Jill had previously dated Trevor, who spends the movie trying to reconcile their relationship. Jill manages to also be this for Charlie, as she planned to betray him and take all the fame for herself.
• Made of Iron: The girl scratches herself, pulls out her hair, stabs herself in the shoulder, runs her face into a glass picture frame, and then throws herself through a glass coffee table in order to give herself convincing wounds. At the hospital, she's still able to start up another rampage, nearly killing Sidney and Dewey. A defibrillator to the head only momentarily slows her down. It isn't until she's shot directly in the heart that she stops. She's probably the toughest killer yet, and she's just a teenage girl!
• Manipulative Bitch: She fools almost everyone into thinking she was an innocent victim targeted by Ghostface, when the truth couldn't be further from that.
• Mask of Sanity: As her appearances up to The Reveal show, Jill is adept at appearing and acting completely normal, barring occasional, brief lapses in composure. However, when she finally drops the act, she proves to be completely and utterly insane, and a danger to everyone around her.
• Matricide: While it's unclear whether Jill or Charlie stabbed Kate while wearing the Ghostface costume, the fact remains that Jill deliberately orchestrated her mother's death.
• Meaningful Echo: When she finishes inflicting injuries on herself, Jill lays down next to the seemingly deceased Sidney with their faces turned toward each other. After finally being killed by the latter at the hospital, and falling to the floor, her corpse is on the side of Sidney with their faces turned toward each other again.
• Meaningful Name:
  • Her name is similar to "Billy," which hints at her true nature.
  • Her first name is a Shout-Out to Jill Johnson, the protagonist of When a Stranger Calls. In fact, she shares many similarities with the 2006 remake version of Jill Johnson, which plays into Scream 4's remake theme. Like Johnson, Roberts is a high schooler who just broke up with her boyfriend for cheating on her and receives threatening phone calls from a serial killer. This double as an Ironic Name though since Roberts is one of the killers herself rather than the hero.
  • Interestingly, when considering her surname Roberts, in its etymologyical sense, it means "bright fame," reflecting her desire to have a substantial amount of widespread attention as a fake Sole Survivor (even though she's really the mastermind behind the 2011 Woodsboro killing spree).
• Meaningless Villain Victory: Although Jill was able to either kill or incapacitate everyone at Kirby's home and briefly get the attention she wanted, she still failed to kill Sidney, was later found out for her misdeeds, and wound up dying before the night was even over.
• More Deadly Than the Male: She blatantly killed both her ex-boyfriend Trevor and her ex-accomplice Charlie, and has managed to pragmatically knock out Dewey after he finds out about her true nature.
• The Napoleon: Emma Roberts is 5'2" and portrays a psychopathic killer.
• Narcissist: You know how people think they are the main character of their own story? Well Jill realized early on that she isn't, and that drove her batshit insane. So she decided to try and actualize herself as the main character of her own story by killing her friends to "reboot" her cousin's survival story with her as the new Sidney. Her Evil Gloating is also so self-congratulatory on her own performance as the "good girl", it was as if she won an Oscar and was giving the least humble acceptance speech ever.
• Near-Villain Victory: Out of all the Ghostfaces so far, Jill comes the closest to nearly killing Sidney and getting away with her murders. It's only due to not finishing the job properly, unwittingly revealing she knew about Gale's stab wound despite it never being revealed to anyone, and grossly underestimating how much of a fighter Sidney is that she's ultimately thwarted at the endgame.
• Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Her telling Dewey that she and Gale can write a book with their matching scars causes Dewey to realize a short time later that she is the killer and thereby bring about the sequence of events that cause her defeat.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Between kneeing Sidney in her stab wound, hitting Dewey in the head, and shooting Judy, Gale ends up being the only person able to stand when Jill is finally killed.
• No-Nonsense Nemesis: With the exception of Sidney, Jill always tries to kill her targets as quickly as possible, and only may stop to make a deal or command.
• Not Quite Dead: With Gale stalling for time, Sidney is able to sneak up to Jill and electrocute her with a defibrillator to the head, briefly knocking her out. As Sidney and Gale are checking on Dewey, Jill grabs a glass shard and tries to sneak up behind Sidney. Sidney grabs Dewey's gun and turns around to shoot Jill in the heart, finally killing her.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: She pretends to not understand why Ghostface has returned when speaking to Sidney when she secretly is fully aware as one of the two killers.
• Offing the Annoyance: After becoming annoyed with Trevor, she finally kills him after stating her intent to frame him for the murders.
• Oh, Crap!: Her reaction when Dewey tells her there's a chance Sidney might survive her injuries; she manages not to let it show, but the implications of Sidney surviving clearly hit Jill like an anvil to the head, and as soon as she's alone, she gets up and rushes to make sure Sidney won't recover.
• The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: She seems to have this attitude toward Sidney, as her stabbing of the latter causes Charlie to back off from trying to attack Sidney further, and she only tries inflicting a fatal wound after she has already killed Charlie.
• Only Sane Woman: Compared to Billy and Stu, whose plan she copies as part of the "remake" killings, Jill's plan is much more carefully thought out and better executed; she makes sure to wound Sidney before exposing herself as the killer, kills Trevor and Charlie before she's done monologuing, and stabs Sidney a second time to seemingly kill her before beating herself up to look like an innocent victim, never taking unnecessary risks that might make her lose control of the situation, like Billy and Stu did. As a result, Jill's plans come very close to success, with only Sidney's unexpected survival and an unwise remark being Jill's undoing.
• Parental Issues: Implied given we never see her mention her father and she had no problem killing her mother.
• Pay Evil unto Evil:
  • Her Bad Boss murder of Charlie, who was her partner in her killing spree.
  • There's also her kill of Rebecca Walters, who was behaving very callously about the murders.
• Pintsized Powerhouse: She's able to lift and throw Sidney, and then beat Dewey senseless with a bedpan.
• Playing the Victim Card: One of the most pathetic of the Ghostfaces in regards to her attempts at doing this. Jill clearly believes her life was far worse than Sidney's because she isn't famous. At one point, she claims that Trevor was a far worse boyfriend than Billy because his cheating on her didn't thrust Jill into the limelight. She is blissfully unaware of the obvious cognitive dissonance.
• The Prima Donna: While Jill's scheme to become famous ultimately failed, her behavior during her reveal scene evokes this, between gloating about how perfect she was in her role as the Girl Next Door, killing Charlie so she can hoard all the attention as the Sole Survivor, and making it clear to Sidney that she intends to take the spotlight away from her.
• Psycho Ex-Girlfriend: To Trevor. She personally kills him (after shooting him in the balls), and planned to frame him for her crimes.
• Psychopathic Womanchild: She's basically a sadistic 7-year-old child all grown-up whose plan amounts to is starting another massacre so she can get so much as a second of fame, a hopelessly banal and childish motivation for so much carnage.
• Pull the I.V.: As soon as Dewey leaves her hospital room, she pulls out her IV and gets up from her bed in a final bid to kill Sidney.
• Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: She makes a point of shouting that she wants her turn at fame when describing her motive to Sidney.
• Sadist: She films all her murders to watch over and over again. She also clearly enjoys watching Sidney crumble after she stabs her with a look of sheer satisfaction coming over her.
• Sadistic Choice: Presents Gale and Judy with the choice of either giving them Judy's gun or she shoots the unconscious Dewey.
• Saying Too Much: Jill's idle remark about her and Gale's "matching stab wounds" turns out to be her undoing, as it clues Dewey and Gale onto the fact that Jill knows where Gale was stabbed, something only one of the killers would know.
• Secret Relationship: She convinces Charlie that they have this, only revealing her true intentions to Sidney shortly before Charlie's death.
• Self-Disposing Villain: Between killing the other Ghostface (Charlie), and stabbing Sidney non-fatally which allows her to relocate to a hospital and around others who can help her fight back against Jill, Jill causes more damage to her own cause than the protagonists. Justified as her scheme is incredibly high-risk and requires taking a lot of chances.
• Self-Harm: Does this to authenticate her role as the survivor of a murder spree committed by Trevor and Charlie.
• Self-Made Orphan: She kills her mother Kate, simply so she can emulate Sidney's own loss of Maureen.
• Seven Deadly Sins: Her desire for attention, mainly as a fake Sole Survivor, via serial killing has every single one of them being applicable to her.
  • Envy: The primary motivation behind her killing spree. She's so unnecessarily jealous of Sidney's legacy as a sole survivor that she'll try to emulate that status by planning such crime with Charlie.
  • Pride: She doesn't care about anyone but herself, even when she gets the attention she wanted as a fabricated sole survivor.
  • Wrath: If her plans as a fake sole survivor don't go as expected, she'll definitely loose her temper in front of anyone.
  • Sloth: She mocks the concept of working for fame and prefers to manufacture an image for herself.
    Jill: "How do you think people become famous anymore?! You don't have to achieve anything!"
  • Greed: All she ever wanted was to garner fame in front of the media to her self, especially so that she could be seen as a sole survivor in front of others.
  • Gluttony: She hungers for a huge amount of attention from others more than what's humanly edible.
  • Lust: She gets turned on from the public attention more than from her previous romances of both Trevor and Charlie.
• Sickbed Slaying: She tries to do this to Sidney when she realizes she has survived her injuries and can tell everyone the truth of Jill's role in the murders.
• The Sociopath: Even more so than any of the previous Ghostfaces, and a worse Bad Boss then the previous Big Bads towards their right-hand man. Even Roman wasn't as diabolical as her. Think about it for a second.
  Jill: I mean, for fuck's sake, my own mother had to die, no great loss there, so I could stay true to the original.
• Sole Survivor: Subverted. She wanted to be the only one who survived the assault at Kirby's house but Sidney and Kirby both survive too.
• Spotlight-Stealing Squad: Invoked by Jill when she kills Charlie to take the spotlight as the Sole Survivor for herself. Jill also has twice as much screen time post-reveal as Charlie, who dies within five minutes of announcing himself as a killer.
• Stealth Insult: Jill consoles Sidney for Rebecca's death, but in reality, she is actually taunting Sidney for getting someone else killed.
  Sidney: I'm so sorry about Olivia.
  Jill: [beat] I'm sorry about your publicist.
• Suddenly Shouting: She has this during her exchange with Trevor after her true nature is revealed, and when she explains her motive to Sidney.
• Superior Successor: She gets further in her plans than anyone else before her. She even stabs Sidney! Just not fatally.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute:
  • While she initially looks like an Expy of Sidney, she actually turns out to be this to Sidney's half-brother Roman, especially with her motivation for wanting Sidney's fame for herself.
  • She can also be regarded as one to Billy, since her scapegoat plan is more or less the same as his, and she betrays both of her lovers.
• Tap on the Head: Delivers one to knock out Dewey after the latter runs into Sidney's room to stop Jill from killing her.
• Teens Are Monsters: And quite possibly the most monstrous of them all in the series.
• Third Act Stupidity: Jill rants about her plot to Sidney instead of killing her and making sure she stays dead. She decides that one stab to the gut is enough and doesn't bother with performing a Double Tap on Sidney, which allows her to be transported to a hospital and receive medical attention that ends up saving her life.
• Tranquil Fury: She speaks calmly before stabbing Sidney with the intent of killing her. She repeats this tone of voice when confronting her in her hospital room.
• Ungrateful Bastard:
  • Sidney wanted to protect Jill from Ghostface and even stayed around to make sure she and her friends were safe. She was rewarded by being stabbed by her cousin.
  • Both Dewey and Judy were the leading officers to find the injured Jill after she made injuries to herself and she likely could have died if her injuries went untreated. She later attacks both of them that night when they arrive to protect Sidney from Jill.
• Unholy Matrimony: With Charlie, until she kills him too.
• Victory by Endurance: She only wins the confrontation at Kirby's house because the latter and Sidney pass out and she assumes them to be deceased.
• Villain Protagonist: Played with. Scream 4 gives Jill plenty of screen time and narrates a good portion of the story from her perspective, but the Woodsboro survivors still get a good amount of focus too.
• Villain Respect: Jill seems to have this for Sidney. While she shoots Judy for giving her orders, and inflicts pain on both Dewey and Gale with no concern for their understanding of her, she takes the time to tell Sidney of her plot while the two are alone together in Kirby's home and never calls her out of her name like she does with Gale.
• Villain with Good Publicity: If only very briefly. The ending of Scream 4 shows several reporters praising Jill for surviving the "Woodsboro Massacre Reboot" but it can be inferred that the truth of her being Ghostface all along came out not too long after, considering that four people witnessed Jill's true colors and survived her attempts to silence them.
• Villainous Breakdown: In the end, after her plan falls apart, it turns into a desperate He Knows Too Much, with implications of Taking You with Me.
  Jill: Is this how it's gonna be, Sid? The ending of the movie was supposed to be at the house. I mean, this is just silly.
  Sidney: Consider this an alternate ending. You're never gonna get out of this, Jill.
  Jill: Of course I will!
• Villainous Valour: A thoroughly unsympathetic case. Like the previous killers, she doesn't know when to give up, hunting down Sidney just for her 15 Minutes of Fame to satisfy her selfish Greed, even if she has to endure an enormous amount of physical punishment. Rather than making her a badass however, the intention is more to show her as snarling and bloodthirsty rabid dog at heart, well beyond any possibility of redemption.
• Viler New Villain: Compared to the Ghostfaces of the original trilogy, she lacks a desire for revenge for a loved one like Billy and Mrs. Loomis, being content with being known for her crimes like Mickey, or frustration over not having a meaningful relationship with someone like Roman.
• Virtue Is Weakness: She invokes this when threatening to shoot Dewey to get Judy to give her the latter's gun, as she knows how much his wife Gale cares for him and would do anything to keep him safe.
• We Can Rule Together: Jill sells a version of this to Charlie to make him complicit with her killing spree, though she had no intention of following through.
• Why Won't You Die?: Has this response when she confronts Sidney in her hospital room.
  Jill: You just won't die, will you? Who are you? Michael fucking Myers?
• With Friends Like These...: She even lampshades this after mercilessly killing Charlie, stating to Sidney that she doesn't need friends, but fans (which is a strong indicator for her Lack of Empathy and being an Attention Whore).
• The Woman Behind the Man: She is behind Charlie's actions as Ghostface.
• Woman Scorned: Tells Trevor that she's not the girl one should cheat on before killing him.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Jill mutilates herself in order to make people think she was a victim.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Tries to kill Sidney after using her in a plot to mimic the latter's encounters with Ghostface so she can become famous.

Charlie Walker

Charlie Walker

"This is making a move."

Played By: Rory Culkin

"You know, you learn a lot when you watch movies over and over. All the plots are about trying to kill you!"

Charlie was secretly dating Jill, and planned on becoming the Randy of the killings to Jill's Sidney, the geeky guy who makes it out alive.

---

• Alas, Poor Villain: While he was a sadistic murderer, his death is almost pitiable. He is visibly devastated at Jill's betrayal and dies a slow, agonizing death as he bleeds out on the floor. Even Sidney seems horrified, calling Jill out afterwards on becoming so fame-hungry that even her only ally is disposable to her.
• All Abusers Are Male: More than half of confirmed victims he attacked as Ghostface are female, including both Gale and Kirby (who survived from being completely slayed by him).
  • Ironically, he was soon killed by his own accomplice Jill Roberts, who is proven to be far more twisted than he ever was.
• All for Nothing: His desire to become one half of a power couple with Jill ends up being for naught as she ruthlessly kills him to take the spotlight for herself. He spends his final moments realizing he killed his friends and threw his life away for absolutely nothing.
• Asshole Victim: A particularly unique example of this trope, since he's one of the killers!
• Ax-Crazy: Revels in brutal killings including his disembowlment of Olivia.
• Beware the Nice Ones: He's really not nice. At all.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: He's not the nerdy timid guy he appears to be.
• Blaming the Victim: After stabbing Kirby (immediately after she desperately tried to save his life), he blames it on her for not reciprocating his crush sooner.
• Blank Stare: He gives one to Perkins when Perkins somehow survives a stab to the forehead and has enough strength to walk around for a bit.
• The Bully: He's not as mean-spirited as the other Ghostfaces, though. He even explains the rules of surviving this movie to his potential victims, though of course it doesn't help most of them in the end.
• Bully Brutality: He delivers some of the most vicious deaths in the series. He ends up crippling Jenny and stabbing Perkins deep in the forehead, and that's not even including his disembowelment of Olivia.
• Cop Killer: Charlie murders police officers Hoss and Perkins and takes one of their handguns. He then drives the police car two blocks away to hide their bodies.
• Corrupted Character Copy: As a huge movie buff who's also a little bit of a nerd and has sexual/romantic feelings for Sidney archetype Jill, he closely resembles Randy. But Randy wasn't actually the killer and could usually be counted on to help or save Sidney.
• Death by Irony: Kirby Reed was starting to have romantic feelings for him once she "saved" him, but his response to that was an attack on her with the Ghostface knife as a form of his revelation as a killer right in front of her, showing that he lost all of his feelings for her, just as he expects her to die from those wounds^*which she didn't, as briefly confirmed in the fifth movie. Later on, it's revealed that he and Jill Roberts were dating, indicating that he has feelings for her, but she soon backstabbed him by killing him with that same kind of knife, showchasing her lack of actual feelings for him as he was left to die.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype: A movie fanboy Dogged Nice Guy like Randy... who, in fact, is not nice at all, and is every bit as self-absorbed and Entitled to Have You as you'd expect.
• Double Tap: Implied. On screen, Charlie seemingly kills Deputy Hoss and Deputy Perkins each with a single knife stab; however, when Judy and the other cops find the bodies, they report that both deputies were stabbed multiple times.
• The Dragon: He is Jill's accomplice.
• Entitled to Have You: His actual attitude towards Kirby, whom he feels should've noticed him in the four years they had classes together, instead of just as a killing spree committed by him had started. He tells her this as he is stabbing her.
• Et Tu, Brute?: He does seem to have loved Jill, judging by his visibly devastated reaction to her betrayal.
• Evil Counterpart: To Randy, the Meta Guy and horror film geek. Unlike Randy, who was just a harmless Plucky Comic Relief and a Dogged Nice Guy, Charlie is (to loosely quote Billy in the first film) a "movie freak whose mind lost its reality button" and who feels entitled to Kirby's affections.
• Evil Is Petty: As he stabs Kirby, Charlie takes a moment to criticize her for only taking an interest in him recently, as opposed to a few years earlier when he first developed a crush on her.
• Faux Affably Evil: Even more so than his accomplice Jill and the previous Ghostfaces. To the point where he can be considered the Only Sane Man amongst the killers, as he does seem to feel remorse for stabbing Kirby.
• Foreshadowing: His set-up Ghostface victimization during the climax, where Kirby was there to "save" him, has abruptly hinted his genuine one, where he got completely killed off by his accomplice Jill.
• Hero Killer: After the reveal, Charlie brags about murdering Jenny, Marnie, Olivia, and Robbie and takes credit for the murders of Officer Hoss and Officer Perkins by showing off the handgun he took from them. He also almost kills Gale and Kirby.
• Ironic Echo: His revelation as one of the Ghostfaces in Scream 4 right in front of Kirby has him not only stabbing her twice, but also telling to her face about his now former romantic feelings for her as she started to briefly reciprocate them (since he used to have a crush on her while they were younger). Later in the movie, it's also revealed that he and Jill are dating, but he then gets stabbed twice by her, as well, showcasing that Jill doesn't really love him (since she desires fame more than intimacy); as a result, he felt devastated about it as he slowly dies from his fatal wounds.
• Irony:
  • His attempted murder on Kirby has him stabbing her twice, leaving her to severely bleed out from those wounds. Later, he gets stabbed twice, as well, but it's instead done by his accomplice Jill, and is a lot more dire in comparison. What's even more ironic about this is that unlike Charlie, Kirby manages to survive from her potentially fatal injuries that were given to her by him.
  • Sidney notes that Charlie is similar to Stu in that both of them are the less intelligent lackeys following the plans of Jill and Billy respectively. However, as Jill stabs Charlie to death, she informs him that she intends to frame him as the "ideas man", which would make Charlie the next generation's Billy Loomis (and Trevor the new Stu) if Jill's frame job was successful.
• Karmic Death: He rejects Kirby's love for him and stabs her two times in the stomach before leaving her to die. Five minutes later, his actual girlfriend Jill kills him by stabbing him twice and reveals that she has always intended to betray him. Considering how he was also one of the most violent killers alongside Jill, having how he was taken advantage of rubbed in his face by both Sidney and Jill feels poetic.
• Laughably Evil: While not as much of a Large Ham as his predecessors Stu and Mickey, and more mellow than the other Ghostfaces, he's still much a quirky nerd, especially when he preps himself to get stabbed to appear as a victim by slapping himself in the face, before Jill double-crosses and kills him to take the sole spotlight.
• Love-Interest Traitor: He betrays Kirby, who did return his feelings, but "too late" according to him.
• Meta Guy: Of the Ghostfaces so far, he is the only one to explain the new slasher rules to his victims.
• The Napoleon: At 5'6", he's one of the shortest guys in the film. He's also a psychopathic killer.
• Oh, Crap!: The look on his face when he realizes that Jill's plan wasn't for him to join her in fame and fortune, but for him to be the new Stu Macher, says it all.
• Out of Focus: The official Ghostface with the least amount of screen time post-revelation (especially given that he's immediately killed by Jill just before the height of Scream 4's climax happened).
• Pet the Dog: His apparent genuine remorse at having stabbed Kirby to please Jill.
• Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: Betrays and kills his friends at the behest of Jill, who then betrays and kills him.
• Saying Too Much: Since Charlie is one of the two Randy Expies explaining the rules, he pretty much gives away his plan of recording the murders and publishing them online. That said, Charlie is able to avoid the usual consequences because Robbie, the other Randy expy, is a livestreaming vlogger with an apparently sizable following, making him the more suspicious one of the two.
• Soft-Spoken Sadist: Even after The Reveal, he doesn't really raise his voice, unlike previous killers and his partner Jill. He's perhaps the only Ghostface to be one until Jason Carvey in the sixth film.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: He states that he's going to be the next Randy to Jill's Sidney during The Reveal. As Sidney notes, however, he is much like Stu (a weak-willed, easily manipulated follower), which leads to his death by Jill. This also makes him a substitute to Mickey, based on his film knowledge and getting offed by the Big Bad, except he doesn't survive for the last scare.
• Sycophantic Servant: Charlie is definitely a follower, as he is willing to kill his friends to serve his master Jill.
• Teens Are Monsters: A willing accomplice in Jill's murderous scheme.
• Unholy Matrimony: With Jill, until she disposes of him.
• Unwitting Pawn: Jill used Charlie as a willing accomplice, but never intended on sharing the spotlight with him; when the moment comes to "fake" their injuries, Jill fatally stabs him in the heart.
• With Friends Like These...: One of the more notable cases, as he seems pretty much inseparable from Robbie due to their shared interests. Not only does Charlie murder Robbie, he also records a video of it and brags about it to Jill. Jill in turn kills him and pretty much does the same.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: How he manages to trick Kirby into coming out of her house to "save" him. Then, he (non-fatally) stabs her.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: As soon as they run out of targets and the final act arrives, Jill kills him so she can come out the other side as the sole survivor. He's the second Ghostface Dragon to get betrayed by their partner, after Mickey Altieri in Scream 2, but he stays dead, unlike Mickey.

Scream (2022)

General

The Woodsboro Requel Killers (2021)

"This time, the fans are gonna be the ones who win."

Sam: This isn't a fucking movie!

Richie: No. But it will be. That's the point, right, Amber?

Amber: Right, hon! Third act bloodbath, check. Killers revealed, check. Time for the big finale!

The Ghostface killers of 2021, and the third to bring their murder spree to Woodsboro.

---

• Affectionate Nickname: This is how it is established to the audience that they are in a relationship, with the two referring to each other as "hon" and "baby" while explaining their plan to Sidney and Sam.
• Big Bad Duumvirate: They are the first Ghostface duo to not turn on each other in any way and are united through their shared goal of making their own Stab requel.
• Birds of a Feather: They realized they had similar ideas about the Stab franchise and what they needed to do to "fix" it.
• Brains and Brawn: Richie is the one who calls the shots between the two. Amber is the muscle who commits the majority of the attacks and murders in the film, including Dewey.
• Breaking Old Trends: In 2 and 4, the female Ghostface was the brains while the male Ghostface was the brawn, but here, Richie takes the mastermind role while Amber is the killer responsible for most of the deaths.
• Connected All Along: Richie and Amber pretend to meet each other for the first time when Sam finally reunites with Tara at the hospital. After the unmaskings, they both disclose that they met up online just like Mrs. Loomis and Mickey did.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist:
  • Unlike nearly every Ghostface killer before them, Richie and Amber have nothing at all against Sidney or her family; their motive, while incredibly petty, is totally impersonal. While Mickey and Charlie had no prior connection to Sidney before donning the mask, they were the partners of Ghostfaces who did have personal connections to her.
  • Billy and Stu seemed tight-knit, but were willing to hurt each other for the plan, and also had different reasons for doing what they did; while it was personal for Billy, Stu got roped in out of a mix of peer pressure and For the Evulz. Richie and Amber are less close, having a vaguely romantic relationship, but are more united by a shared motive, and don't hurt or betray each other.
  • Like Mickey and Mrs. Loomis, Richie and Amber first met online. Unlike that pair of Ghostfaces, they don't have conflicting agendas and are completely loyal to one another.
  • Like Jill and Charlie, they're in a secret relationship. Again, unlike those killers, their feelings for each other are apparently genuine.
• Copycat Killer: They target people with relations to the Woodsboro murder sprees, whether related to the victims or the original killers, and set up their murder scenarios similar to ones in the Stab films.
• Dirty Coward: They act big and tough when they're in control and terrorizing weak, helpless victims, but once the tables are turned, both are shown to be pathetic cowards. They often rely on sneak attacks to get the upper hand over their victims and don't fare nearly as well when faced with an opponent who's fully willing to fight back. Richie is reduced to squealing like a girl when Sam shows him the business end of his own knife, while Amber flip-flops between begging Sidney and Gale for mercy when the odds are against her to smugly gloating when she regains the upper hand.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Their main motivation behind their spree was that they felt that the last Stab movie was so bad that it ruined the franchise forever, and thought that a new killing spree would provide ample "source material" for a new film. They planned to frame Sam (Billy's daughter) as the killer to give the franchise a mascot for new fans to root for. Unlike the previous killers, who had some connection to Sidney and irrationally blamed her for their problems, these two kill people essentially because of a film they didn't like.
• Dramatic Unmask: Subverted. Amber reveals her villainy by randomly shooting Liv through the head while Richie reveals he's the other killer by non-fatally stabbing Sam. Amber also exploits this trope by putting on the Father Death costume to trick Sidney and Sam into believing that she is the second killer before Richie actually reveals himself.
• Evil Is Petty: As Stab fans, they both hated Stab 8, so they decided to create a new copycat murder spree in hopes that it will inspire a more faithful reboot to the Stab franchise.
• Fall Guy: This time, Sam is supposed to be Richie and Amber's fall guy, as she is the daughter of Billy Loomis, and the killers believe that a killing spree "committed" by the child of an infamous serial killer will revive their beloved Stab franchise.
• Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: Richie is One Head Taller than Amber (Jack Quaid is 6'2"/1.85m, and Mikey Madison is 5'3½"/1.61 m).
• Laser-Guided Karma: Scream VI reveals that Gale was unable to sell the movie rights to a movie based on their killings, meaning their goal of inspiring a new Stab sequel was all for naught.
• Laughably Evil: Richie and Amber are a riot due to their Large Ham tendencies after The Reveal. They're notably the first Ghostface duo to be this, as all others had followed the Vile Villain, Laughable Lackey dynamic instead.
• Loony Fan: Their entire motive for the killings. Their favorite movie franchise was ruined forever, so they decided to carry out a murder spree of their own to give the filmmakers some new source material to work with.
• Love-Interest Traitor: Richie had been dating Sam for six months. It turns out that he had only started their relationship as part of the plan. Amber and Tara were also ex-girlfriends in the original script.
• The Movie Buff: A dark version, in that anger over the movies is what drove them to kill.
• Nothing Personal: In a rarity for the franchise, Richie and Amber aren't acting out of hatred toward any of their victims (Sam being the only possible exception, but even then, they're more interested in who her father was than in Sam herself); they just want to inspire a decent Stab movie, which, although petty even by Ghostface standards, is a remarkably impersonal motive. They're also the first killers in the franchise to have no personal grudge against Sidney or her family. Richie is even a bit starstruck to be meeting her during the third act.
• Outlaw Couple: Richie and Amber are implied to be in a relationship, which is later confirmed in the sixth film when Sam refers to Amber as Richie's girlfriend.
• Sadist: They both accuse Liv of being the killer during a tense moment at Amber's house after Mindy gets attacked. Since they had planned their third act killer reveal at the party well in advance, this could only be just to enjoy Liv desperately pleading her innocence. Then, Amber shoots Liv dead only moments later.
• So Last Season: To the legacy survivors. Dewey pegs Richie as one of the killers immediately after meeting him, Sidney and Gale aren't fooled by Amber's attempts at playing a victim, and Sidney mocks their unoriginality to Richie over the phone, namely there being two killers again and even setting their final act in Stu's house like the original.
• Strong Girl, Smart Guy: Richie is ostensibly the mastermind of the duo; Amber is the heavy-hitter who slugs it out with the legacy characters and proves to be more of a physical threat when she goes toe-to-toe with Sidney and Gale in the climax.
• Sucksessor: Zigzagged. While Richie and Amber do rack up quite a body count (at six, equal to the original killers), they are the first ones to fail at the Cold Open kill with Tara surviving to the end^note Although this is intentional on Richie and Amber's part since they needed to lure Sam back to Woodsboro, whereas all their predecessors killed two people in their cold opens. The film also has the highest number of survivors up to this point (Sam, Sidney, Gale, Tara, and the twins). And while they do succeed in killing Dewey where so many have failed, it's also downplayed by Dewey being well past his prime and Amber having caught him off-guard rather than beating him in a fair fight.
• Take That!: To entitled fans whose behavior towards the fandoms they apparently love so much ultimately does more harm than good.
• There's No Kill like Overkill: Their deaths are among the most brutal in the entire series. Also among the most well-deserved.
• Third Act Stupidity: Amber and Richie commit to setting up an entire Scream Call-Back, leaving Tara alive and unharmed, which allows her to fight them.
• Two Dun It: Much like the original movie they wish to emulate.
• Unholy Matrimony: They're all but outright stated to be in a relationship together. Sam brings it up in the sixth film, referring to Amber as Richie's girlfriend on two occassions.
• Villainous Friendship: Unlike the previous Ghostface duos, neither Richie nor Amber ever attack each other out of spite or ulterior motives.

Richie Kirsch

Richie Kirsch

"Thank God you're okay. Because I really, really wanted to be the one to kill you."

Played By: Jack Quaid

"Because nobody takes the true fans seriously, not really. They just laugh at us, and why? Because we love something? We're just a fucking joke to them! How can fandom be toxic? It's about love! You don't fucking understand, these movies are important to people."

An obsessive fan of the Stab films, Richie was so outraged by the most recent film that, together with Amber Freeman, he concocted a plan to set the series back on track. Believing that the best Stab movies are Based on a True Story, he travels to Woodsboro to commit a new killing spree to provide source material for a new movie to wash away the stench of Stab 8. Richie is also the first Ghostface of the films whose motives aren't tied to Sidney in any way, even though he manages to get her involved.

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• Abhorrent Admirer:
  Richie: Sidney Prescott! Y'know, I'm a really big fan!
  Sidney: Go fuck yourself.
• Ain't Too Proud to Beg: He tries to plead with Sam when she is about to kill him. It doesn't work.
• The Alibi:
  • At the hospital, he states he was watching Netflix in Tara's room while Ghostface attacked Sam. Since Amber was at the police station while Ghostface attacked Sam, Richie was indeed lying about his alibi.
  • In addition, he takes a leaf from Stu's book by later claiming that he was with his girlfriend during Ghostface's first attack. It's implied that this alibi isn't exactly airtight because in the opening, the Ghostface that slipped inside Tara's home stands silently behind Tara while she receives another threatening phone call from "Charlie", suggesting that "Charlie" is outside and isn't the Ghostface inside the house.
• Allegorical Character: Richie is one for the requel. A common criticism of requels is that they are so dedicated to Revisiting the Roots that they come across as unimaginative repeats of the original movies. Likewise, Richie suffers from Creative Sterility and goes out of his way to rip off the plot beats of the first Ghostface rampage, such as dating Sam to repeat the traitorous boyfriend twist and recruiting Amber so that he can reuse Stu's house for the finale. For further unoriginality, Jill already did Richie's Woodsboro idea a decade earlier.
  Sidney: [To Richie on the phone] You might actually be the most derivative one of all. I mean, Christ, the same house?
• All There in the Script: The original script clarifies that Richie killed Wes, since it comments that he tries to kill Sam the same way he did to Wes.
• Ambiguous Situation: Unlike all the other Ghostfaces, it's unexplained why Richie enjoys killing people. But it's clear that he has some mental disorders and is fascinated with violence and murder, and his father encouraging his love of Stab movies probably didn't do favors for his mental stability either.
• Apologetic Attacker: As a big fan of Sidney, Richie apologetically explains to her that she has to die because her survival of yet another Ghostface rampage will break Suspension of Disbelief.
  Richie: I'm so sorry, Sid. We can't let you live, either. I mean, surviving this many times, it'll just be ridiculous.
• Arbitrarily Large Bank Account: Scream VI retroactively establishes that Richie had sufficient funds to acquire a truly staggering amount of memorabilia from both the Stab movies and the various Ghostface rampages, up to and including the actual murder weapons and costumes of all his predecessors, which must’ve cost a pretty penny in bribes to get ahold of.
• Arch-Enemy: His betrayal of Sam makes him this to her. Unlike previous masterminds, he has Nothing Personal against Sidney; he just wants a better Stab movie. Even after Richie is dead, Sam isn't free of him; Richie's family target her for killing him, and they repeatedly use his image and memory to torment her.
• Batman Gambit:
  • After Tara gets a trivia question wrong, he makes the threat to kill Amber, luring Tara to the front of the house where he is standing. After failing to break into the house, he knocks loudly on the front door to divert Tara's attention while Amber prepares to enter the house through an alternative entrance. Once Amber is inside, he calls Tara again, distracting her long enough for Amber to ambush her.
  • He pulls the same trick again by telling Judy that he's about to kill Wes in the shower, but in reality, he's hiding on the front porch, preparing to waylay Judy as she tries to rush into the front door.
  • On a larger scale, his murders of Judy and Wes are supposed to draw the police away from the hospital so that Amber can attack Tara without any interference.
• Beard of Evil: Half of the Big Bad Duumvirate, and sports a chinstrap beard.
• Benevolent Boss: The first in the film franchise to be this towards his cohort, never once mistreated nor disposed of her in the film.
• Big Bad: Of the fifth film. He's attempting to revive the Stab franchise by masterminding another killing spree that will inspire a "re-quel". Being the Billy Loomis Expy, Richie is behind most of the phone calls, manipulates things behind the scenes, and his personal relationship with Sam makes him the more climactic Ghostface in the final act.
• Boom, Headshot!: Though Richie is likely dead after the numerous stab wounds inflicted upon him by Sam, she still shoots him in the head to make sure.
• Bullying a Dragon: It's an integral part of his plan to attack the mentally unstable daughter (and granddaughter) of serial killers and her loved ones, while pinning the murders on her. He didn't consider that this might horribly backfire. He even taunts her. Sam lampshades this before she stabs him in a manner befitting a Ghostface, saying you should "never fuck with the daughter of a serial killer".
• The Cameo: He appears in some behind-the-scenes footage of his own Stab Fan Film that plays during the finale of Scream VI.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: To all of the previous Ghostface killers, as he is the first besides Jill and Mickey to lack any kind of sad backstory or what they see as a justification for their crimes, being motivated solely by his fandom of the franchise inspired by those killings. He is also the first killer to have no association with Sidney or ties to her past prior to the films, only caring about her part of his scheme, in fact going so far as to be fond of her in his own twisted way. Also, he's less mean-spirited than his predecessors and not a true Hate Sink due to him being Laughably Evil and Faux Affably Evil non-stop, even during his Villainous Breakdown, and being the first mastermind who's a Benevolent Boss towards The Dragon.
  • Specifically, he's one to Billy Loomis. Both are psychotic main Ghostfaces and the boyfriend to the main character, each with a plan in mind to frame somebody for the murders. However, their motives and demeanors are different. The irony is that his girlfriend Sam is Billy's daughter, so whilst Sam, an actual relative of Billy's, ends up not being like him, her boyfriend essentially plays the same role he did. Also lampshaded somewhat when Richie says, "I know it's a bummer that it's me, but it's really what's best for the movie." What better choice for a Ghostface wanting to make a real-life "re-quel" than being the traitorous love interest?
    • Billy was already suspicious and arrogant before the final reveal, whereas Richie is much nicer, more supportive, and far more unassuming.
    • Both manipulated their girlfriends, but Richie is far more direct about it. Billy planned to frame Sidney's father Neil as the cherry on top of his revenge scheme to destroy Sidney's family, the same way he blamed Sidney's mother Maureen for destroying his. Richie, meanwhile, planned to frame his girlfriend Sam directly, using her Dark and Troubled Past and familial connection to Billy to make her look like the real killer. Both also get killed by their girlfriends at the end of the film.
    • Billy's motive was personal, predicated upon Sidney's mother cheating with his father and his mother leaving him, leading to Billy killing Maureen and starting the killing spree with Stu as an elaborate revenge ploy. Richie's motives are not nearly so personal, instead being because he hated the eighth Stab film and wanted to provide new real-life inspiration for the series.
    • Billy reveals that he is Ghostface before Stu does. On the other hand, Richie takes Stu's place in the reveal order and uses the voice changer like Stu does to confirm that he is indeed Ghostface.
    • After they're dead, both Billy and Richie had a parent try to avenge them, but in Billy's case, it was his mother, who was heavily implied to be more motivated by being blamed for Billy's murderous tendencies than genuine grief, and who brought in a stranger to both help her and serve as a fall guy, while in Richie's case, it was his father, who is genuinely motivated by grief and was aided by his two surviving children, to whom he was genuinely loyal and vice-versa.
  • To Mickey from Scream 2. Both make a point of seeming like very charming, perfectly nice guys, and their motives are revealed not to be born from any troubled past, but from petty personal gain. However, while Mickey committed murders for his own benefit, Richie did so (in his own mind, at least) for the good of other fans. And while Mickey was far younger than Mrs. Loomis, who led him on and turned on him as soon as she could, Richie is quite a bit older than Amber, is the leader in their dynamic, and the two never turn on one another. And while Mickey planned on getting caught to gain fame, Richie plans to frame Sam for the killings, and expresses no desire for fame.
• Cop Killer: He kills Sheriff Judy by stabbing her multiple times in the torso.
• Corrupted Character Copy: As the dark-haired, apparently kind-hearted boyfriend to the Final Girl protagonist who is new to Woodsboro and ignorant of the Stab movies, he bears a close resemblance to Derek from Scream 2. Unlike Derek, though, Richie is actually the killer the whole time and is faking his attraction to Sam.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Sam stabs him 22 times, including through both of his cheeks, then slits his throat open, causing him to slowly choke on his own blood. Then she pumps him full of lead to finish him off, just to make sure. His father Wayne claims in the sixth film that seeing a photo of his mutilated body is what convinced him that Sam needed to pay for what she did.
• Didn't See That Coming: His murders of Judy and Wes were supposed to draw the police away from the hospital, allowing Amber to kill Tara without much risk and giving him an easy alibi at the motel. However, Sam quickly realizes that the police aren't guarding Tara and calls on Richie to check on Tara, throwing a wrench into this plan and forcing him and Amber to improvise.
• Didn't Think This Through:
  • Richie doesn't think of the potential consequences of driving his girlfriend Sam, who has mental illness and a history of murderers within her paternal family, over the edge at the end of the movie, especially after he threatens the life of her younger sister. Unsurprisingly, Sam gets the upper hand, and stabs and slashes him to death when given the opportunity.
  • Richie's attempt at sowing seeds of distrust between Sam and Tara falls through, since he fails to realize that Sam's bond with her sister is far stronger than her bond with him. She has only known him for six months, but she has known Tara her whole life.
• Domestic Abuser: Revealed to be a murderer when he stabs his girlfriend Sam. Worse, he then reveals that their relationship was predicated on Sam being Billy Loomis's illegitimate daughter, which was central to his plan to make her the Fall Girl for his and Amber's crimes.
• Double Tap: Even after Sam stabs Richie to death 22 times and slits his throat with his own knife, she makes sure to finish the job by shooting his corpse three times, ending it with a headshot to top it off.
• Ephebophile: It's implied via dialogue that, in addition to his other crimes, he is in a romantic relationship with his partner Amber, as they refer to each other as "baby" during the climax of the movie. Amber is 17, and Richie is in his late 20s. Sam outright calls Amber Richie's girlfriend in Scream VI.
• Even Evil Can Be Loved: Amber is clearly affectionate towards Richie, and after he's dead, his father and younger siblings are hell-bent on utterly ruining Sam for killing him.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: One of his legitimate admirable qualities is not only his Villainous Friendship with Amber is seemingly genuine, but there appears to be Unholy Matrimony Ship Tease between the two.
• Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: What eventually sinks his plans. He tries to manipulate Sam into turning against Tara by believing she could be the killer and was planning to go after her as well. This clues Tara on to the fact that he is really the killer. The idea that Sam would trust her sister over him, her boyfriend of only a few months, seemingly never occurred to him.
• Evil Gloating: Yes, and overly and excessively, since he has highly overestimated the talents he's gloating about.
• Evil Is Not a Toy: While he doesn't actively try to bring out Sam's darkness, he still messes with her, knowing she's mentally unstable, and also tries to set her up as the murderer by invoking nature over nurture for the narrative of his "movie". And when she finally does give in to her nature, she directs it exclusively at him.
• Evil Laugh: Belts one out when he thinks he has the upper hand against Sam.
• Evil Virtues: One of the few admirable things is that his Villainous Friendship with Amber is genuine and is a Benevolent Boss towards her.
• Faux Affably Evil: Even after he reveals himself as one of the killers, Richie retains his friendly and affable demeanor, gently apologizing to Sam, but assuring her it's the best for the "movie", and fanboying over Sidney. His Villainous Friendship with Amber also seems genuine.
• Foreshadowing: In the hospital, he's seen watching a YouTube commentary video bashing Stab 8, indicating his interest in the Stab franchise (and personal dislike of Stab 8), despite professing not to be a horror fan. Additionally, he references Halloween (1978) and Friday the 13th (1980), despite his claims that he doesn't watch those types of films.
• Freudian Excuse:
  • It's revealed in Scream VI that his father, Wayne, is just as much of a psychopath as him, becoming the next Ghostface. He also used to actively encourage Richie in pursuing his obsession for Slasher Films. While his father clearly loved him, it's safe to say he may be to blame for what his son ended up doing.
  • The fact that his father and both of his siblings end up donning the Ghostface mask lends some credence to the idea that becoming a Serial Killer is In the Blood for the Kirsch family.
• Genre Blindness:
  • Subverted when it comes to horror films. Before The Reveal, he's presented as a total newbie to horror who's never seen any of the Stab films. He's actually a very die-hard fan.
  • Played straight when dealing with Sidney and Gale, who have arguably been in worse positions than their situation with Richie and Amber, but always come out on top.
• Giggling Villain: He can barely contain his glee after outing himself as the second killer, and giggles into the voice changer while taunting Sam about how it "really was the best choice for the movie."
• Greater-Scope Villain: Of Scream VI, on account of the Kirsch family (consisting of his father Wayne, brother Ethan, and sister Quinn) targeting Sam in revenge for her killing Richie in self-defense.
• Hero Killer: Richie murders Judy^note Screenwriter James Vanderbilt indirectly confirmed that Judy's killer was male, implying the culprit was Richie. and Wes. He also would have killed Mindy if not for Sam's intervention.
• Hidden Depths: Scream VI reveals that he actually made his own films.
• Hypocritical Humor: Richie angrily exclaims that Hollywood is running out of ideas even though he and Amber are planning to inspire a requel, a new movie trend that is considered by many to be the very definition of "running out of ideas".
• Impromptu Tracheotomy: He kills Wes by shoving his knife into Wes's throat. Averted in the original script, in which Richie instead puts a bullet in Wes's head after winning a Gun Struggle.
• Informed Flaw: In an interview, Radio Silence stated Richie let Amber do most of the grunt work as he was afraid of getting his hands dirty, and that Amber was the real mastermind but was content to let Richie believe it was his idea. However, nothing in the film supports this, as when the time comes for The Reveal, Richie is shown to be equally willing to get personal and violent as Amber and gives the traditional Motive Rant, with no indication that Amber is the one in charge. The climax more or less depicts them on equal footing. On the other hand, the sixth movie credits Richie as the real mastermind with the 2021 Woodsboro murders referred to as "Richie's movie".
• Inspirational Martyr: He's this to his family and the public who thought he was an innocent victim in the sixth film after his death.
• Karmic Death: Richie murders Judy by pinning her to the ground and stabbing her multiple times. Later, Sam returns the favor by killing Richie in a similar fashion. In both instances, there is a closeup shot of Richie's/Sam's knife hand before Richie/Sam delivers the final blow.
• Laughably Evil: He's pretty entertaining for a depraved killer.
• The Loins Sleep Tonight: In his very first scene in the fifth film, Sam implies via joke that Richie has erection problems. Although Richie is a physically healthy man in his late 20s, there's certainly a lot of reasons he could have erection problems (e.g. lifestyle factors, medications, anxiety, stress) — but the biggest one is that he might not actually be attracted to Sam at all, considering that he just wanted to brag about sleeping with a serial killer's daughter and he's revealed to be in a relationship with Amber. In Scream VI, Sam brings this back, taunting Wayne (Richie's dad) about Richie having a "limp dick" (after Wayne claims that Richie was "virile").
• Loony Fan: With heavy emphasis on "loony". He was such a fan of the Stab franchise, he collected various bits of memorabilia from both the films and the real-life killing sprees that inspired them, and directed some fan films of his own. While he already didn't like the direction the franchise took past the original trilogy, Stab 8 was such a betrayal to him, he embarked on a killing spree.
• Love-Interest Traitor: He openly admits he dated and had sex with Sam to break her emotionally later as Billy Loomis's daughter.
  Richie: You know what the best part of fucking Billy Loomis's damaged daughter was? Making her feel loved, just so I could take it away from her. Pretty fucked up, huh?
• Mad Artist: He happily describes the murders as the "movie" he and Amber are writing and treats the events of the movie like mere plot points instead of real, serious murders.
• Manipulative Bastard: He spent six months earning Sam's trust with the endgame of framing her for one of Ghostface's rampages. He also tries to turn her against her own sister to throw suspicion off himself.
• My Death Is Just the Beginning: His death only martyred him, spawning his family to become killers as well in the sixth film.
• Never My Fault: While this is a pretty standard attitude for a Ghostface to have, Richie takes it to pathetic levels. He blames his entire spree on the latest Stab film's negative reception and that people called the fandom's virulent reaction toxic.
• Nothing Personal: How he feels towards Sidney unlike the previous Big Bads, but still needs to kill her to make his Evil Plan work.
• Oblivious to Their Own Description: Richie, without a hint of irony, asks how a fandom can be toxic... while covered in blood after committing or being an accessory to a dozen murders or attempted murders, and while planning to kill the very person he's talking to, all because he didn't like the most recent Stab movie and wants to inspire one more to his liking.
• Older Hero vs. Younger Villain: He's in his late twenties, in contrast to Sidney in her forties and Dewey and Gale in their fifties.
• Playing the Victim Card: During his Motive Rant to Sidney, he tries to cast himself as a victim because he didn't like the latest Stab movie. He also goes off on a long tangent about how angry he is about his section of the fandom being dismissed as toxic for their virulent criticism of the film, blissfully ignorant that he is the epitome of a Loony Fan.
• Politically Incorrect Villain: Apart from being literal serial killers, he and his family are also misogynistic. He also refers to Tara as Sam's "gimpy little sister."
• Posthumous Character: Richie plays a small but significant role in VI, appearing in video footage that he made before his murder. As his family are also avenging his death, his shadow looms large in other ways.
• Psychopathic Manchild: To the point that he even makes Jill Roberts look positively mild by comparison. To put that into perspective, it takes a special level of immaturity to commit numerous brutal murders just because you really didn't like a horror film. Sam calls Richie "pathetic" and a "man-baby" to get a rise out of his vengeful family in VI.
• Ruined FOREVER: invoked His motivation in a nutshell. Richie was a huge Stab fan, and hated the direction the franchise took in its later installments, with Stab 8 being the straw that broke the camel's back and made him decide to take the franchise back to its roots by inspiring his own "re-quel".
• Sadist: The attack on Judy Hicks is particularly brutal and drawn out. It begins with Richie calling Judy and threatening the life of her son Wes to the point where Judy is tearfully pleading for his life. Then when Judy arrives home and tries to save Wes, Richie jumps out and stabs her multiple times until she dies. Richie next proceeds to kill Wes For the Evulz even though Sheriff Judy's death alone would have been a good enough distraction for the cops.
• Screams Like a Little Girl: His screams when Sam gets the upper hand and stabs him repeatedly are unusually high-pitched and effeminate.
• Skewed Priorities: Even after he gets stabbed multiple times and is facing certain death with a pissed-off Sam standing over him, he's still concerned about the narrative he's trying to create.
  Richie: What about my ending?
• Slashed Throat: This is how he dies at Sam's hands in the end.
• Slut-Shaming: Richie insults Sam for being a sexually active young woman during the Motive Rant. After having had sex with her himself.
• Smug Snake: Richie thinks himself a murderous mastermind whose foolproof plan will go off without a hitch, but he's not as tough or smart as he thinks he is. He believed Sam would side with him over is own sister, and is genuinely caught off guard when she opts to free Tara instead of suspect her as one of the killers.
• The Sociopath: Aside from being a Benevolent Boss towards Amber out of their Villainous Friendship, he definitely fits this trope, based on his sadistic nature, superficial charm and manipulativeness, his immaturity, his poor impulse control and how he gets off on killing and torturing others for his own amusement.
• Straw Fan: An extreme version of a dissatisfied and entitled fan.
• Stylistic Suck: Revealed in the sixth film to have written and directed fan films of the Stab movies, all of which are depicted as cheap-looking and poorly acted.
• Tempting Fate: "The villain dies at the end! Those are the rules!" Immediately after this, Sam manages to get the jump on him and stab him to death.
• There Is No Kill Like Overkill: Out of all the Ghostfaces' deaths, Richie's deserves special mention for the sheer brutality that Sam inflicts on him; she stabs him a total of 22 times, kills him by slitting his throat, and shoots his corpse three times (the third being a shot to the head) to ensure his death.
• Too Clever by Half: While a lot of Richie's plan to capture the new and old characters and frame Sam for their murders goes fairly smoothly, the one part that ends up derailing his scheme is when he tried to convince Sam that Tara was the other Ghostface and had lured her back to Woodsboro to die. While she briefly hesitates when she sees Tara tied up in a closet, Sam ultimately trusts her sister more than Richie and cuts her bonds. This one mistake ends up derailing the villains' scheme, and ultimately leads to their deaths.
• Villainous Breakdown: While he isn't exactly sane once he is revealed to be one of the killers, Richie seems to be in control once he reveals his plan to kill off the remaining heroes and frame Sam for it. This changes once things go off the rails when it turns out that Sam freed Tara from her bonds and Sam starts fighting back, with him childishly whining that she is spoiling the ending of his "movie". Once he is on death's door, he pathetically whines and asks what will happen to his ending. Sam then gives him the ending he deserves.
  Richie: Stop. Fucking. Up. My. ENDING!
• Villainous Legacy: Like Billy Loomis before him, Richie's actions inspire others to carry on work. The sixth film's Ghostfaces are all fixated on him; Jason and Greg wanted to finish his work by killing the Carpenter sisters, while Bailey, Quinn, and Ethan are all out to avenge his death at Sam's hands.
• Villainous Valor: Not only he's a Determinator like his predecessors to see the success of his scheme go through, but still keeps his Villainous Friendship with Amber up even when their plan is getting foiled.
• Villain Respect: Despite being an accessory to his murder, Richie has to give it up to Dewey for being so Genre Savvy.
  Richie: You really should've listened to Dewey! He nailed it in one! (points to himself) Look at the love interest!
• Villains Never Lie: Richie correctly argues that going back to Amber's house for Tara's second inhaler is a bad idea; he just leaves out that he's part of the reason why.
• Villains Want Mercy: He screams "No!" just before Sam slices his throat open.
• Villain with Good Publicity: Posthumously; thanks to rumors started by his sister Quinn, in Scream VI Richie is seen by some as an innocent victim framed and manipulated by Sam, supposedly the real mastermind of the Woodsboro killings.

Amber Freeman

Amber Freeman

"Welcome to Act Three."

Played By: Mikey Madison

"See, we had to bring the legacy characters back to make it matter. Can't have a bonafide Halloween without Jamie Lee!"

Growing up in the former home of Stu Macher made Amber obsessed with the Woodsboro murders and the Stab films. Just as outraged by Stab 8 as Richie was, she helps bring him to Woodsboro in the fifth film to carry out their murderous scheme to "fix" the franchise.

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• All There in the Script: An early script confirms she killed the security guard protecting Tara as Richie was still in the motel around this time and only went to the hospital because Sam told him to check on Tara.
• Ambiguously Bi: Amber is hinted to be in a relationship with Richie, with the two calling each other "hon" and "baby" multiple times, in a Unholy Matrimony-like situation. However, she is very touchy-feely and close with Tara beyond even being a "best friend", actually naming If I Can't Have You… as a potential reason to have attacked her. In an earlier draft of the film, Tara and Amber were even girlfriends; however, this was ultimately removed, leaving her romantic preferences for either a massive question mark.
• Arch-Enemy: Since she killed Dewey and backstabbed Tara, Amber ends up as one for both Gale and Tara. Sidney acknowledges this while handing Gale the pistol for the final blow. When Amber comes back for one last scare, Tara finishes her off.
• Attack the Injury: When Gale throttles her, Amber jams her fingers into her gunshot wound to get Gale off her.
• Ax-Crazy: Amber commits most of the murders in the film and still tries to kill Gale, Sidney, and Sam even after being burned alive.
• Batman Gambit:
  • Amber lures Tara outside the front door, where Richie is standing, by texting Tara a deceptive video of Ghostface stalking Amber.
  • Amber later leads Chad outside by hacking Liv's phone and sending him a message to have him come find "Liv."
  • After revealing herself as one of the killers, Amber wears the Father Death costume to pretend that she is the second killer, which allows Richie to ambush Sam and take Sidney's gun.
• Big Bad Friend: She pretends to be Tara's supportive friend but is really one of the new Ghostfaces.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Amber appears to be Tara's closest friend, but in reality, she wounds Tara severely, and orchestrates (with Richie) the deaths of several people.
• Blood Knight: She's more openly excited by killing than Richie is.
• Boom, Headshot!: Amber reveals that she is one of the Ghostface killers by shooting Liv in the head. Later, Amber is finally finished off with a gunshot through the head by Tara.
• Can't Kill You, Still Need You: The only reason Tara survives both of Amber's attacks is because she and Richie need her alive but wounded and vulnerable to lure Sam to Woodsboro for their plan, by taking advantage of her Big Sister Instinct towards Tara.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist:
  • To Stu Macher, the lead killer's accomplice, a comparison that is capped off by the fact that they lived in the same house.
    • Stu has the outward veneer of a sociable, yet obnoxious, party animal with a serious lack of tact, while Amber presents herself as an empathetic and intelligent Deadpan Snarker who is sensitive to her friends' needs.
    • Both are obsessed with slasher films, though only Amber's motive is directly tied to them (wanting to revive the Stab franchise with new "source material"), while Stu's motive is a combination of For the Evulz (as he claims) and to get back at his ex-girlfriend, while also taking some lesser inspiration from slasher flicks.
    • Stu had an antagonistic relationship with Billy (with possible Homoerotic Subtext within their interactions), while Amber seems to get on well with her partner-in-crime Richie because of their similar motivations (and with confirmed romantic undertones) - even if Amber acts more like the muscle of the operation than Richie does.
    • Both are Ax-Crazy with extremely petty motives and lackluster justifications for their actions. Stu claims to have committed his deeds because of "peer pressure" by Billy, though he is also implied to have had an If I Can't Have You… motive when it came to killing Casey and Steve. Meanwhile, Amber's motives deal with her dissatisfaction with the direction her favorite film franchise was heading, and decided to give the franchise new "source material" to work with, though she later tries to cover her ass by saying that she was "radicalized" by toxic Internet message boards. Regardless, both prove merciless and sadistic towards their victims, whom they either know or are even friends of/lovers with.
    • Whereas Stu reveals his true identity as Ghostface after Billy does, Amber takes Billy's place in the reveal order, even shooting someone just like Billy did.
    • Both prove to be a Dirty Coward when they are confronted with their crimes, and yet both of them are Defiant to the End as they try to kill the remaining characters. However, Stu is still the first of the two between him and Billy to die, whereas Amber ever so briefly outlives her boss Richie.
  • To Charlie Walker, the previous Ghostface accomplice. Both Amber and Charlie play the henchman role to Richie and Jill respectively and are obsessed Stab fans. However, while Charlie likes all of the Stab movies, Amber only likes the first Stab. In addition, it is hinted that Amber doesn't like the contemporary trend of elevated horror whereas Charlie enjoys classic horror movies like Suspiria (1977) and Don't Look Now, both of which would be considered elevated horror in modern times. And while Charlie is disposed of by Jill as a mere pawn, Amber is treated as an equal in her and Richie's scheme, with neither of them backstabbing each other.
• Cop Killer: She murders the lone cop guarding Tara in the hospital. A little later, she successfully kills ex-sheriff Dewey Riley after previous Ghostfaces failed to do so.
• Crazy Jealous Girl: She clearly dislikes Sam, who is dating Richie, but is much warmer around Richie, even though they supposedly hadn't met before. When she's revealed to be Richie's real girlfriend (probably — which is confirmed by Sam in Scream VI) and partner-in-crime, her attitudes towards Sam and Richie suddenly make a lot more sense.
• Crazy-Prepared: She wears a Bulletproof Vest while infiltrating the hospital as insurance against the cops defending the hospital. It later comes in handy when Dewey unloads three bullets into her torso.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: One of the most prolonged, painful, and ignominious in the history of the series. Amber is beaten, shot, and burned alive on an oven stove, melting half of her face. She still survives long enough to try killing the heroes one more time in delirious agony before being killed via headshot. What seals it is that Amber goes down pathetically begging and sobbing for her life, mercy that the heroes empathetically don't grant:
  Amber: Wait, wait, wait, no! I-I'm sorry about Dewey!
  Gale: Fuck you. [guns her down]
• Dark Action Girl: Amber is the Ghostface that kills most of the victims in the fifth movie in brutal fashion, and is distinctly the muscle between her and Richie. She also puts up a fight against Sidney and Gale in the finale, though is eventually overpowered and taken down.
• Death by Disfigurement: By the time she's finally killed, half her face has been burnt off. Her flesh has visibly melted in the shot we get of her charging at Sam, Gale, and Sidney.
• Determinator: Despite being shot several times and being severely burned, Amber still attempts to kill Sam, Gale, and Sidney, only stopped when Tara lands a headshot on her.
• The Dragon: Richie's accomplice in the Requel murder spree, and the more violent of the pair.
• Dragon-in-Chief: If an interview with Radio Silence is any indication, Amber was not only the one who did most of the legwork in the film, but is also the one who actually came up with the idea for a killing spree whereas Richie only believes it was his plan, with Amber being content to lead from behind. Given nothing in the film supports this, it's ambiguous how true it really is.
• Dragon Their Feet: Though she and Richie act more like partners than any Ghostface duo before them, Richie is still the central Ghostface given the bulk of the Motive Rant and the final confrontation with Sam in the climax, referring to their plan as "his" movie and giving Amber orders she follows with little complaint. She still survives him by a few seconds after getting half her face burnt off, attempting one last time to kill everyone before Tara anticlimactically shoots her brains out.
• Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Much like her predecessor Jill, Amber is a pale-skinned, murderous brunette.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: One of her legitimate admirable qualities is not only her Villainous Friendship with Richie is seemingly genuine, but there appears to be Unholy Matrimony Ship Tease between the two.
• Evil Gloating: Amber does this to Gale, taking delight in killing Dewey. Gale responds by punching her out.
• Evil Virtues: One of the few admirable things is that her Villainous Friendship with Richie is genuine.
• False Friend: To Tara who believes Amber is her best friend. It's unknown if the friendship was ever genuine on Amber's part but she is undeniably this by the time of the film.
• Faux Affably Evil: Her Villainous Friendship with Richie is genuine and there is even hints of Unholy Matrimony Ship Tease between the two. She's also a completely ruthless killer who has no problems gleefully mocking Dewey's death to Gale's face.
• For the Evulz: She gloats about Dewey's death purely to spite Gale.
• Framing the Guilty Party: Similar to Roman Bridger, Amber throws suspicion off herself by texting Tara from a cloned phone with her name as the sender. Sheriff Hicks clears Amber as a suspect when she checks Amber's cell phone records and finds them free of any evidence of this.
• Hero Killer: No other Ghostface in the series can say they killed Dewey Riley; Amber even declares that "it's an honor" after doing so. She also puts a bullet in Liv's head during her reveal. Amber almost kills Dewey's ex-wife Gale and Chad as well.
• High-Heel–Face Turn: Parodied. When cornered by the heroes, Amber cries and claims that she was radicalized on the Internet, expressing remorse for her actions. They don't believe her, and it's all an act.
• Hypocrite: Claims that Dewey "died like a pussy," and yet has the gall to plead with Sidney and Gale once they gain the upper hand on her.
• Impromptu Tracheotomy: She sneaks up on Vince and stabs him in the throat, which results in him bleeding out to death.
• Informed Ability: Radio Silence has stated in an interview that Amber was the one who committed most of the murders and was the real brains of the duo, but was content to let Richie believe it was his plan. However, nothing in the film itself actually supports this, as Richie is shown to be the more commanding of the pair and the climax treats him as the mastermind of the duo, with Amber given less focus by comparison.
• Jerk with a Heart of Jerk: Amber is aloof at times, but initially seems to be a good friend to Tara and very protective of her, which informs her dislike of Sam (because of her criminal history and her previous abandonment of Tara). Then she turns out to be one of the killers, and is specifically the one who wounded Tara inside her home in the first place.
• Karmic Death: After brutally murdering Dewey and sadistically gloating about it to Gale, she's beaten up, shot by Gale (with Dewey's gun), and catches fire from the stove behind her. When she gets back up shortly after Richie's death, Tara, the first victim she attacked and attempted to kill in the hospital (and the one whose life Dewey died saving), is the one who kills her by shooting her in the head.
• Kick the Dog:
  • Amber mocks Sam and Tara's mother's alcoholism during the Motive Rant towards the end of the film.
  • She also mocks Dewey's death (caused by her), saying that he "died like a pussy", and taunts Gale with the fact that she was the last thing Dewey saw before he died.
• Kick Them While They Are Down: She goes after Tara in the hospital, after she's been left wheelchair-bound and is still recovering from the injuries she sustained from her initial attack (which Amber herself was the perpetrator of) at the beginning of the film.
• Laughably Evil: Acts very obviously deranged following The Reveal, in contrast to her more reserved personality for the majority of the movie. She even jokingly hums "Psycho" Strings while pretending to aim her knife at Sidney.
• Loony Fan: Like Richie, her motive is her possessive fixation on Stab. In Amber's case, it was an obsession that started when her parents bought the house that the Macher family originally lived in.
• Made of Iron: Even after getting burned alive, she's still ready to try and murder the remaining survivors, and is only brought down by a headshot.
• Man on Fire: Sidney smashes a bottle of hand sanitizer on her head, and eventually gets her to accidentally set off the stove, lighting her ablaze. Remarkably, it's not enough to kill her.
• Manipulative Bitch: At the start of the film, Amber makes herself look like a potential victim of Ghostface by sending a video to Tara in order to get her out of the house. Additionally, Amber's suspicions of Sam because of her Dark and Troubled Past are meant to look like concern for Tara's well-being (and to make Sam look like a Red Herring). Overall, Amber makes herself look like a good friend, all the while planting seeds of distrust against Sam to throw attention off herself and Richie and make the intended plan of a Frame-Up against Sam look plausible.
• Miles Gloriosus: Amber brags about killing Dewey, and taunts Gale by telling her she was the last thing he saw before he died, but she begs for mercy once she's cornered by Sidney and Gale, even "apologizing" for Dewey's death.
• Never My Fault: While crying for Gale and Sidney to spare her life, Amber claims to have been radicalized on the Internet, and is not to blame for her actions. Naturally, neither Sidney nor Gale are buying it, and Amber herself probably doesn't believe it and is just saying whatever comes to mind to try and save her own neck.
• Not Quite Dead: Sidney and Gale's confrontation with Amber ends with Gale shooting Amber and setting her on fire when she falls onto the lit stove behind her. After Sam dispatches Richie and shoots his corpse several times, Amber gets back up and rushes towards Sam, Sidney, and Gale with a knife, before quickly being dispatched by a headshot from Tara.
• Older Hero vs. Younger Villain: She's in her late teens and The Baby of the Bunch, in contrast to Sidney in her forties and Dewey and Gale in their fifties.
• Overshadowed by Awesome: Like Stu Macher before her, Amber is heavily overshadowed by Richie after her death; Richie is referenced heavily in the sixth film while Amber only gets a few token references. While it's understandable that Richie's family would focus on him over a girl they probably never met, and that Sam would focus on her duplicitous boyfriend whom she personally killed, even Amber's former friends don't really mention her. Even when Quinn as Ghostface is taunting Gale about Dewey's death, she says "Richie and Amber" killed him, when Amber did it by herself.
• Pay Evil unto Evil: Amber kills Vince, a creepy man who was stalking Liv and pulled a knife on Chad when he tried to stick up for Liv.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: She puts up a solid fight against Dewey and holds her own with Sidney and Gale in the climax. It's also deconstructed in that her smaller build makes it easy for her to be pushed around as Sidney and Gale, both of whom are still injured, show little issue lifting and throwing her at one point.
• Playing Possum: After Dewey shoots her three times, she pretends to be unconscious to get the drop on him when he returns to finish her off with a shot to the head.
• Rasputinian Death: Even by Ghostface standards, Amber takes a lot of punishment before she goes down for good, managing to live through gunshots (albeit blunted by a bulletproof vest), a beating from both Gale and Sidney, a bottle being smashed into her face, a gunshot, and being set on fire before a bullet to the head finally ends her life.
• Sadist:
  • Her attack on Tara in the opening of the film exemplifies her sadistic brutality, as she stabs her seven times, breaks her ankle, impales her palm, and throws her against the ground—all the while tormenting her via phone threats. And Tara was supposedly her best friend. Not to mention that Tara thought Amber herself was in danger, and was coming to rescue her.
  • While choking Gale, she salivates at the idea of being the one to off both her and Dewey.
• Slashed Throat: This is how she takes out the cop guarding Tara.
• Smug Snake: Arguably the biggest example out of any of the Ghostfaces; when she has the upper hand, Amber has a smug grin on her face and gloats about her crimes, but the second she's at a disadvantage, she starts begging for mercy and coming up with hollow excuses for what she's done.
• Teens Are Monsters: She's about seventeen years old, and commits several murders. She might not be the deadliest of all the killers, but like Richie, she is arguably the pettiest and amongst the most sadistic.
• Two-Faced: Amber's not-quite-fatal immolation leaves half her face burnt to a crisp. Thanks to Tara, she didn't have to live with the disfigurement for long.
• Villain Respect: Subverted; as she's killing Dewey, Amber tells him "it's an honor", but once she has Gale at her mercy, Amber brags about how Dewey "died like a pussy".
• Villainous Valor: Not only is she a Determinator like her predecessors to see the success of her scheme go through and does one Last Stand of a berserker charge, but still keeps her Villainous Friendship with Richie up even when their plan is thwarted.
• Villains Want Mercy: She alternates between attempting to kill Sidney and Gale, and then begging them to have mercy on her when they overpower her during their confrontation. Her murder of Dewey makes this a cowardly, futile attempt to save herself from Gale's revenge, with Gale responding by shooting and immolating her.
• Waif-Fu: Amber is only 5'3" with a slender frame, easily making her one of the smallest people to don the Ghostface persona. Nevertheless, she kills at least four people including Dewey, and wounds several others in gruesome fashion. Notably, she's one of only two killers (the other being Jill) to actually seriously wound Sidney.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: Amber has Tara dead to rights two times at Tara's own house and at the hospital, yet she instead settles for torturing her. It's justified as Amber and Richie need Tara alive, albeit severely injured, to lure Sam back into Woodsboro long enough for their plan to work.
• With Friends Like These...: Richie and Amber's killing spree commences with Amber attacking Tara, her supposed best friend, putting her in the hospital by stabbing her multiple times and breaking her leg. Later on, Amber also menaces Tara in the hospital as well, when she's vulnerable in a wheelchair, but Dewey fends her off. Plus, her overall plan is basically to kill off her friends in order to "revive" her favorite film franchise with Amber herself killing Liv and seriously injuring Chad.
• Wounded Gazelle Gambit: Tries to pull this on Sidney and Gale. When they see right through it, she pulls out her gun and starts shooting.

Scream VI

The Bailey Family

General

The New York City Killers (2022)

"Frankly, I expected more from the two of you after what you did to us."

"It wasn't until I saw that photograph of what you'd actually done to him that I knew. That I knew you had to fucking die! You had to be punished! Along with anyone else who stands in our way!"

— Wayne Bailey

The Ghostface killers of 2022, who terrorize the Big Apple.

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• Ambiguously Absent Parent: The matriarch of the Baileys is conspicuously absent, and none of the Baileys talk about her current whereabouts. An early draft of the screenplay revealed that she was murdered by Ethan for objecting to avenge Richie's murder.
• Ambiguous Situation: According to an interview with Radio Silence, it is unknown what the Baileys' real names are.
• Avenging the Villain: The 2023 Ghostface murders are carried out to avenge Richie's death at Sam's hands.
• Ax-Crazy: The trio are among the most brutal murderers in the franchise. For people claiming to be doing this for vengeance, they sure do go all out on anyone who is simply unfortunate enough to be in proximity of Sam or Tara.
• Believing Their Own Lies: They have convinced themselves that Richie was an innocent victim and Sam a brutal and sociopathic killer, the same narrative they've been trying to convince the rest of the world of.
• Berserk Button: They really don't take kindly to Sam talking smack about Richie.
• Big, Screwed-Up Family: A family of three serial killers (four, including Richie)? "Screwed-up" doesn't even begin to describe them. Lampshaded by Tara:
  Tara: [to Wayne] Real great parenting job, by the way.
• Breaking Old Trends: The first time there are three killers when there have never been more than two, and they forgo horror movie trivia in favor of straight-up revenge against Sam and anyone even peripherally involved in the death of Richie.
• Brother–Sister Team: Ethan and Quinn are brother and sister. At one point, they gang up on Chad and take turns stabbing him.
• Connected All Along: Quinn and Detective Bailey pretend to not be related to Ethan to avoid a Contrived Coincidence and hide their familial ties with one another. Additionally, the finale reveals they're Richie's family who wants vengeance against Sam for "murdering" Richie a year prior.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist: Unlike Richie and Amber, an implied couple with an impersonal motive, the Baileys are a family out for a very personal revenge, even if (in true Ghostface fashion) it's a decidedly myopic one. They also have no interest in horror movies beyond respecting Richie's fondness for them, a major contrast with almost every previous Ghostface. Similarly, they are the only killers thus far to be from the same family and the only ones who never encounter or have any association with Sidney. ^note A cut line from the script had them reveal they plan on going after Sidney and her family next, however.
• Disproportionate Retribution: They target Sam because she killed Richie despite the fact she only murdered him in self-defense and after he and his cohort Amber killed several people. Additionally, they also go after the other Woodsboro survivors despite the fact that they weren't physically involved in Richie's death or, in the case of Mindy and Chad, were nearly dead by the time he and Amber were taken out.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: They genuinely love one another despite being psychopathic killers.
• Evil Is One Big, Happy Family: They are a family of killers and genuinely care deeply for one another.
• Fall Guy: Sam is yet again the fall guy for the Baileys by playing into the negative media attention that Sam has received since the Woodsboro requel murders, wanting to frame her for the murders in revenge for murdering Richie, the eldest son of the Bailey family. They also plan to blame Sam's death on an angry conspiracy theorist; whether Wayne has a specific conspiracy theorist in mind is unknown.
• The Family That Slays Together: Wayne, Ethan, and Quinn are the first Ghostface team to be related to one another.
• Hypocrite:
  • They constantly deride Sam as a "killer" because she killed a single person to protect herself, despite all three of them being serial killers, as was Richie, who they want to avenge. Not only that, they manage to kill even more people than Richie and Amber did in their murder spree.
  • Sam and Tara accurately badmouthing Richie is a collective Berserk Button for all three of them, yet they have no problem with posting lies about Sam on the Internet to ruin her reputation (Quinn even brags about it).
  • If going by the early script draft, their passionate dedication to avenging a family member becomes ridiculously hypocritical when considering what they did to their wife/mother.
• Irony: Quinn, who wore Stu Macher's mask and considered him her favorite Ghostface, is killed by a gunshot, like Nancy Loomis, whereas Ethan, who wore Mrs. Loomis' mask, is killed by having a CRT TV dropped on his head, like Stu (the very same TV, no less).
• Misplaced Retribution: The Bailey family targets Sam because she (in self-defense) killed Richie, the eldest son of their family. While this alone would already be Moral Myopia, it gets even worse even they start to target the other Woodsboro survivors as well despite the fact that all of them weren't physically involved in Richie's death (and, in the case of Chad and Mindy, were nearly dead as a result of Richie and Amber's machinations), not to mention the many other victims they accumulate that had either had no connection to Woodsboro whatsoever or tangential connections at best.
• Moral Myopia: They all think they have the moral high ground compared to Sam because she killed Richie, despite the fact that they're all serial killers themselves.
• No-Nonsense Nemesis: Subverted. These Ghostfaces stand out from the usual killers because they're not interested in playing to horror movie conventions or quizzing their targets about their knowledge of horror movies — even though it turns out that they are horror fans, after a fashion, their motive is simple revenge instead of elaborate theatrics. As such, they're among the most dangerous set of killers in the franchise. However, they also fail to kill any of the returning survivors because they neglect to Make Sure They're Dead.
• Revenge: All three share the same motive to avenge their deceased family member, Richie.
• Revenge Myopia: They want to avenge Richie's death at Sam's hands despite the fact that she killed him in self-defense after he orchestrated a murder rampage.
• Siblings in Crime: Ethan and Quinn work together to avenge their brother, Richie.
• Sibling Yin-Yang: Ethan is depicted as a dorky, soft-spoken Shrinking Violet who struggles with talking to girls and gets almost no respect from his peers. Quinn is easy-going, brutally honest, has no problem attracting multiple guys, and seems to be on good terms with the rest of their friend group.
• Sucksessor: Zigzagged. The Baileys rack up a body count of at least nine on top of being some of the most ruthless and brutal killers in the franchise. They also fail to kill any of the Core Four or returning legacy characters, and are the first not to kill anyone during the third act final battle. Even Richie and Amber, who also left behind an unusually large number of survivors, managed to at least kill Liv at the start of the third act and succeeded in killing Scream 4 returnee Judy and franchise mainstay Dewey earlier in the movie.
• Terrible Trio: Wayne is the Big Bad and Ethan and Quinn are his Co-Dragons.

Detective Wayne Bailey

Detective Wayne Bailey

"There's a very special bond between a father and his first son."

Played By: Dermot Mulroney

"Have I been a perfect dad? No. Have I maybe overindulged Richie's love of these little movies? Yeah, maybe. For me, they're just a little dark."

An NYPD detective who is revealed to be Richie Kirsch's biological father, and the father of his two accomplices, Quinn and Ethan.

---

• Actor Allusion: This is not the first time Dermot Mulroney plays an imperfect father.
• Affably Evil: Out of all the Ghostface masterminds, Wayne is the only one that genuinely believes in retribution, never allowing his emotions to get ahead of him. Even when it does, it comes across as being sincere, and when both of his children appear dead, he goes ballistic. During his attempt to kill the Carpenter sisters, he acts like a Fun Personified goofy dad having family fun time with his children, laughing it up with them. In his last moments, he even thanks Sam for sparing him with the fatal blow...until she doesn't.
• Ambiguous Situation: It's not explained if the dead body he uses to fake his daughter's death was yet another victim he murdered.
• Arbitrarily Large Bank Account: He acquires an abandoned movie theater and converts it into a shrine to house Richie's massive collection of memorabilia about the Stab franchise and the previous Ghostfaces. It is never established how a police detective is able to fork up the several million dollars such a large property would cost in Manhattan.
• At Least I Admit It: Compared to some of his predecessors, he's more willing to say how he wasn't a perfect parent to Richie and considers it possible that he may have enabled him to become the Loony Fan he was.
• Avenging the Villain: Obviously in regards to Richie. Then he upgrades to avenging Ethan and Quinn after they are dispatched.
• The Bad Guys Are Cops: The head Ghostface of Scream VI is a cop, using his power to go around New York on a rampage.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: He wanted to portray Sam as a Ghostface, just like her father and grandmother. When Sam does don the costume, it's to kill Bailey just as savagely as he and his children murdered several other people. Sam even throws the trope name in Bailey's face while she taunts him over the phone.
• Benevolent Boss: Like Father, Like Son, he never mistreats nor disposes his own children who are his accomplices. After his children are killed, he tries to avenge them.
• Big Bad: Of the sixth film. He's behind the revenge plot against the Carpenters, Sam especially, for the murder of Richie in the previous film. He's also the first Ghostface to have more than one accomplice, as well as the first police officer to be one of the killers.
• Big "NO!": Gives an almighty one just before Sam (in full Ghostface costume) turns him into a human pincushion.
• Bullying a Dragon: Bailey knows better than anyone what Sam is capable of when she's pushed too far, yet his plan is to keep pushing her. When things go awry, it costs Bailey his two remaining children and earns him a death even more brutal and bloody than Richie's.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist:
  • To Nancy Loomis from the second film. Whereas Nancy was an absentee mother for most of Billy's life, Wayne is more supportive of Richie to the point he enabled his obsession with the Stab movies by helping him create his shrine, despite not fully understanding them himself. Whereas Nancy groomed Mickey to be her accomplice and plotted to have him as the fall guy, Wayne enlists the help of his two remaining children and doesn't betray either of them. Lastly, when the self-righteous mother act is peeled away, Nancy's outrage over Billy's death is really over how Billy's killing spree reflected on her parenting and insists she was a good mother despite running out on him after an affair, while Wayne openly admits to not being a perfect father and his grief, by comparison, is depicted as genuine, if twisted, and motivated by love for his late son. Furthermore, Wayne is more aggressive in costume as he kills three bystanders in the bodega for standing between him and his intended victims, Sam and Tara; in contrast, Nancy is more cautious and immediately backs off from killing Sidney after Derek intervenes.
  • To his own son, Richie. Richie was a horror movie fanatic who carried out a killing spree in the hopes of inspiring a new Stab movie after despising the most recent one, and his accomplice was Amber, with whom he was heavily implied to be in a relationship. Richie also targeted Sam because he thought that, since she was Billy Loomis' daughter, she would make the perfect "villain" for his planned movie. Bailey, by contrast, never really got horror movies and is out to avenge his dead son, a far less petty motive than Richie's, and he's assisted by his two college-age children. His campaign against Sam has nothing to do with Billy (although her parentage does make a convenient weapon to use against her), and instead, Bailey wants her ruined and dead for killing Richie. Both Richie and his father wanted to make Sam the villain of their story, but their motives were completely different.
• Corrupted Character Copy: Of Dewey, a fellow police officer who lost a member of his family in a Ghostface massacre. Unlike Dewey, Bailey's family was the Ghostface in question, and Bailey himself turns to the other side of the law to try and avenge him.
• Crime of Self-Defense: Just like Nancy Loomis before him, Wayne couldn't care less that Sam killed Richie in self-defense, nor does he care that Richie planned to frame Sam for his and Amber's own murders.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Sam tops her efforts in the fifth film with Richie, Wayne's own son, by stabbing him as little as thirty-two times, before stabbing him through the eye for good measure.
• Didn't Think This Through: He wants to avenge his son by going after the justifiably ruthless Sam who killed him. He doesn't think twice about dragging his remaining children into a dangerous revenge plot which inevitably gets them all killed.
• Dirty Cop: "Dirty" is probably the kindest way to describe Bailey, a Serial Killer who is trying to frame Sam for the murders he and his kids committed. He even taunts Sam that his word will be believed over hers, since he's a police officer.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Bailey is motivated by his eldest son's death at Sam's hands, and he works well with his two younger children as well, going ballistic when he sees Sam kill Quinn.
• Even Evil Has Standards: While killing Jason and Greg was for pragmatic reasons, not moral ones, Bailey still expresses disgust for Jason's sociopathic reveling in having murdered an innocent person, throwing Jason's own words in his face while eviscerating him.
• Evil Counterpart: To Kirby Reed. Both are cops who came close to a Ghostface killer and survived (though Kirby was attacked by Charlie, while Richie is Wayne's son). However, Kirby is a hero, while Bailey is the lead Ghostface of VI.
• Evil Old Folks: He's by far the oldest Ghostface yet, considering that all of his three kids are adults. He's also one of the most brutal, as shown with his murders of Jason and Greg, as well as the bodega massacre.
• Evil Virtues: Love and loyalty; Bailey is motivated by grief for his eldest son and is still a loving father to his other two children, and unlike other Ghostface teams (except, fittingly enough, Richie and Amber), they're all genuinely loyal to one another.
• Eviler than Thou: He's confirmed to be the one who disembowels Jason in the opening kill, and his Pre-Mortem One-Liner establishes he's not out to make a movie, nor does he care about doing so.
  Jason: But... We have... To finish... The movie!
  Ghostface: WHO GIVES A FUCK ABOUT MOVIES?!
• Eye Scream: After viciously stabbing him no less than thirty-two times, Sam finishes Bailey off by driving her knife through his eye.
• Firing One-Handed: He shoots and kills the bodega store owner with a shotgun with one hand.
• Frame-Up: Bailey's ultimate plan is to frame Sam for both his and Richie's killing sprees before killing her, intending to not only end Sam's life, but completely destroy her reputation.
• Hired to Hunt Yourself: He's the lead investigator of the latest Ghostface killing spree, and is actually the man behind the murders.
• The Hunter Becomes the Hunted: After being briefly knocked out while fighting Sam, Bailey comes to to find her gone, only to realize that Sam is now using a Ghostface costume and tactics to stalk and torment Bailey, just like he did to her.
• Hypocrite:
  • He taunts Sam over the phone for being "a liar and a killer", which is pretty rich coming from a Killer Cop who poses as Sam's ally and who viciously kills several innocent people.
  • Despite seeming genuinely disgusted by Jason murdering Laura for a deeply petty reason, Bailey kills multiple innocent people himself just for getting in his way or being peripherally involved in Richie's death.
  • Wayne's aforementioned disgust that Jason is murdering people because he's just a Loony Fan of the Stab franchise rings hollow when his son Richie (who Wayne is dead-set on avenging) was motivated by the exact same reason.
  • He himself is not a fan of the Stab movies, considering them "a little dark". Among other things, he dismembered Greg and stuffed his body into a fridge for Jason to find. Granted, both of them had it coming, but still.
  • Bailey decided to kill Sam when he saw the state Sam left Richie in; Bailey himself murders Jason and Greg with a comparable level of brutality.
• Improbable Aiming Skills: He is able to land three headshots in a row, one-handed, with an ankle-sized revolver against the mannequins in the Ghostface shrine in the final confrontation. Unfortunately for him, Sam as Ghostface is able to close into melee range from behind him before he can react, with gruesome results.
• Killer Cop: He's the one responsible for orchestrating the Ghostface killing spree that terrorizes the Big Apple.
• Laughably Evil: After The Reveal, he acts like a goofy dad despite being a killer.
• Manipulative Bastard: Initially convinces Sam that Kirby is the killer by saying that she's not an FBI agent anymore and she's been off the deep end for months.
• Misplaced Retribution: Sam acted alone in killing Richie, but Bailey also wants to kill Tara, Gale, Chad, and Mindy, who never laid a finger on Richie (the latter two spent Richie's death scene barely alive after Amber and Richie nearly killed them).
• Noble Demon: Downplayed, but Bailey is the only Ghostface to ever express any moral problems with one of the people he kills, and he's a genuinely loving, if rather uneven and, by his own admission, imperfect, father, making him the most comparatively noble Ghostface (admittedly a very low bar, but still).
• Outliving One's Offspring: Richie's death is what drove him to kill in the first place. Then, his daughter Quinn gets gunned down by Sam — the very same person who killed Richie (in self-defense) — in front of him. Narrowly subverted by his youngest son Ethan, who dies moments after his father.
• Papa Wolf: Much like Nancy Loomis before him, Wayne Bailey loved his eldest son and seeks to kill Sam in retribution for her killing of Richie in self-defense.
• Parental Favoritism: Bailey clearly favored Richie, saying there is no bond greater than one with the eldest son... right in front of Ethan, his other son. Additionally, for his cover, he treats Ethan like a stranger while not lying about his relationship with Quinn.
• Pay Evil unto Evil: He murders Jason and Greg, two wannabe Ghostfaces who plotted to murder the Carpenter sisters. Bailey even taunts Jason with his own words about how it felt to murder someone.
• Pet the Dog: Despite his hatred of Sam, he seems to sincerely thank her when she nearly avoids giving him the fatal blow.
• Pragmatic Villainy: The main reason he had Jason and Greg killed off, with a touch of genuine disgust for their motives. Despite sharing the same target, their agendas wouldn't have aligned by the end, and Bailey didn't want a pair of bratty film students killing Sam before him and his family could.
• Revenge Myopia: Bailey wants to avenge his son's death, which is fine by itself. However, along the way, he and his children murder several people who are totally innocent, and they conveniently ignore that Sam killed Richie in self-defense.
• Shotguns Are Just Better: As noted here, he was responsible for the bodega attack, making him the first Ghostface to use firearms in-costume. Justified, as he's a police officer and would know how to use a firearm.
• Spear Counterpart: To Debbie Salt/Nancy Loomis. Both are parents in hiding seeking vengeance for their deceased murderous sons, specifically by hunting down and killing their ex-girlfriends and killers.
• Tempting Fate: Bailey repeatedly taunts Sam about her murderous lineage and her own capacity to kill. Once she's been pushed far enough, Sam ends up unleashing that darkness on Bailey and his two remaining children.
• Villain Ball: After he sees Sam kill Quinn, Bailey charges at her despite being armed with a gun that had at least one round in it.
• Villain Has a Point:
  • A teacher giving you a mediocre grade (not even a failing grade; it was a C-) is a ridiculously petty motive for murder, as Bailey rightfully points out to Jason.
  • Bailey and his children insist on calling Sam a killer; given their and Richie's actions, the accusation is laughably hypocritical, but given how savagely Sam killed both Richie and eventually Bailey himself, it's hard to argue that there's not a grain of truth to it.
  • During the standard Motive Rant, Bailey admits that he isn't a perfect father; it's a major understatement, but it's also clearly true.
• Villainous Breakdown: Both Sam's words of mockery towards his children and the fight she puts up against him very clearly get to Bailey's head. He has an offended reaction to Sam's put-down of Richie more closely befitting a child than a police officer, and screams over the phone at her when she calls him as Ghostface, ultimately smashing his phone on the ground for no good reason.
• Villainous Parental Instinct: Bailey admits to not being able to understand Richie, but he still loved him and hates Sam for killing him and became Ghostface for revenge. He also shows no interest in betraying either Ethan or Quinn, which is extremely rare among Ghostfaces. He also notes that it was Sam's extreme measures in killing Richie that convinced him to exact revenge.
• Villainous Valor: He gives it his all to make good on his word to avenge Richie, then immediately upgrades to avenging his other fallen children Quinn and Ethan after they are taken out against Sam.

Ethan Landry

Ethan Landry

"I've always wanted to stick something in you, Tara!"

Played By: Jack Champion

"Mindy was right. It was easy to juke the roommate lottery. I mean, all I had to do to meet you is room with a conceited, condescending alpha literally named Chad."

Chad's college roommate and the brother of the late Richie Kirsch. Ethan is one third of a new trio of Ghostfaces along with his father Wayne and older sister Quinn.

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• Abhorrent Admirer: Of Tara.
  • He at one point yells that he's wanted to "stick something in [her]" for a while. Tara pays him in kind.
  • At another point, she yells "Fuck you!" at him, and he invites her to "go ahead."
• Affably Evil: Despite being The Unfavorite, he and his sister and father are more akin to a dysfunctional family than a gang of sociopathic killers. They also seem to genuinely care for each other, treating their murder attempt on Sam and Tara as having family fun time.
• The Alibi: Ethan keeps bringing up the alibi that he had economics class when the others point out his absence during the apartment murders. Given the confirmation that he is the one responsible for the apartment murders, it is suggested that either he didn't have an econ class that night, skipped said class, or went to class but still had enough time to act as Ghostface.
• Attack the Mouth: Tara stabs him through the mouth and twists the knife.
• The Baby of the Bunch: Ethan is the youngest of the three Bailey siblings.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Although Mindy immediately pegs him as a suspect, Ethan keeps up a facade as a stuttering, soft-spoken nice guy, the complete opposite of his genuine, sadistic personality.
• Blood from the Mouth: When he comes back for one last scare, he's yelling with blood pouring from his mouth.
• The Brute: Between him and his sister, he's the most eager to indulge in violence following The Reveal. Even his own family seem to regard him as little more than extra muscle in their scheme. Fittingly enough, he is also the tallest of the trio.
• Call-Back: Ethan's characterization provide several nods to Stu Macher, a killer from the first film. He tells the heroic Tara that he's always wanted to stick something in her while trying to kill her, much like how Stu, in a similar struggle with the heroic Sidney, told her, "I've always had a thing for ya, Sid!" He also comes back briefly after the heroes have thought they killed him, and dies once and for all by getting a TV (the same TV used to kill Stu, even) smashed over his head.
• Co-Dragons: He, along with Quinn, are Bailey's accomplices in the sixth film's murder spree.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Tara stabs him deep in the mouth and twists the knife. However, he still has some energy to try and attack Tara and Sam, only for Kirby to drop a television set (the very same set that fried Stu Macher, no less) on his head, crushing it and killing him for good.
• Dragon Their Feet: In franchise tradition, he comes back for one last scare after Bailey is killed.
• Dramatic Unmask: Between him and Quinn, he unmasks himself first, confirming that Mindy's suspicions were right.
• Evil Gloating: After stabbing Tara in the side, he yells out "Gotcha!" before she stabs him through the mouth.
• Evil Is Petty: While stabbing Kirby, he makes sure to aim for exactly the spot where Charlie had stabbed her twelve years prior, even using Charlie's old knife to do it.
• False Friend: He pretends to be Chad's friend, but, in addition to secretly being one of the killers, Ethan admits that he actually hates him, considering him a Jerk Jock (more out of incel-esque jealousy than anything else) and gleefully reveling in having "killed" him.
• Foil: Ethan doesn't have much luck with the ladies and even claims to be a virgin. This is in contrast to his "sex-positive" sister Quinn and brother Richie, who was able to attract the likes of Sam and Amber.
• The Friend Nobody Likes: Ethan is constantly undermined by his friends even before The Reveal, and everyone quickly believes he's the likeliest candidate to be Ghostface based on genre savviness. Even his father seems to view him as an afterthought.
• Green-Eyed Monster: The reason why Ethan stabbed Chad nearly to death is, among other things, because he's envious of his success with girls; Tara in particular. Though he eventually goes on to attempt the same thing on Tara.
• Hero Killer: Radio Silence stated in an interview that Ethan was the Ghostface in the apartment, which means he killed Anika and "Paul".^note While Radio Silence are also open to the idea that his father Wayne can be the killer responsible for Anika and Paul's deaths, they remark that Ethan's actor Jack Champion did some of the stunt work during the apartment attack, implying they lean more to Ethan as the Ghostface in said sequence. He also stabs Tara and Kirby, and almost kills Chad.
• Karmic Butt-Monkey: Ethan was always considered the likeliest suspect to be the killer, even before The Reveal. He is antagonized and no one particularly respects him, even more so as the body count rises. After the reveal, it's implied that his father favored his late brother more than him.
• Laughably Evil: Acts very overtly deranged following The Reveal in a complete 180 from his "shy and dorky" (in Mindy's words) personality beforehand.
• Made of Iron: Sam hits him in the head with a brick and stabs him five times in the chest, neither of which does much to slow him down. Tara seemingly kills him by stabbing him through the mouth and twisting the blade... but even then he has enough energy for one last scare until Kirby drops a television on his head, finally killing him for good.
• Matricide: An early script for Scream VI reveals that Ethan killed his mother simply because she protested against the rest of the Kirsch/Bailey family's scheme to avenge Richie's death.
• Not Quite Dead: After Tara stabs Ethan through the mouth with the knife that Sam gave her, Ethan is down for the count while Sam shoots Quinn in the head and stabs Detective Bailey to death while wearing the Ghostface costume. After the deaths of both his father and sister, Ethan gets up and rushes at Sam and Tara before Kirby crushes Ethan to death by dropping a television on him - the very same television that Sidney used to kill Stu in the first movie.
• Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: It's implied that Ethan's motivated more by sadism and his own pent-up frustration than avenging Richie.
• Oblivious to Their Own Description: He scoffs that being a psychotic Serial Killer must really run in Sam's family, apparently without realizing the irony.
• Obviously Evil: Mindy immediately describes him as suspicious because he's new to the group, and they all respond negatively to him when he arrives at the crime scene after Anika's death. This time, they're right about him.
• Only One Name: He is one of the very few characters not to have his surname revealed explicitly in the movies. This turns out to be for a good reason - to hide that he's a Bailey, like his sister Quinn and his father Wayne.
• Pragmatic Villainy: Saving Mindy's life after Quinn attacked her was only done to throw suspicion off of him and sow distrust between the others, with he and his family stating their intent to finish her and Gale off at the hospital after killing the rest.
• Psychological Projection: Ethan describes Chad as "conceited [and] condescending", implicitly projecting his own frustration and jealousy onto him.
• Sadist: While he's with his family in a plot avenging Richie, he seems to relish in the killings and doesn't mention Richie like his sister or father. During the ladder scene, Ethan opts to put down his knife and toy with Anika as she tries to cross to the other side, which eventually causes her to fall to her death. While waiting for Tara to fall from a railing, Ethan slashes at her feet, laughing and cheering as he does.
• Screaming Warrior: When he comes back for one last scream, he charges at Sam & Tara, while yelling like a berserker (which is impressive, given how deeply Tara drove a knife into his mouth).
• Slasher Smile: He has several notable ones — when he unmasks himself as one of the killers, when he brandishes a knife to Kirby before stabbing her, when he says he always wanted to "stick something" in Tara, and when he stabs Tara, gloating "GOTCHA!" with the widest smile ever before the former stabs him in the mouth.
• Tempting Fate: At one point, he asks Sam, "What are you gonna do about it, bitch?" She responds by carving him up like she did his brother.
• The Unfavorite: Implied since Wayne gushes over his bond with Richie, while conveniently ignoring Ethan.
• Villainous Crush: He's implied to have a crush on Tara, never mind that he's trying to kill all her friends and her eventually.
• Villainous Valor: Not only is he a Determinator like his predecessors to see the success of his family's vengeance go through, but does one Last Stand of a berserker charge before getting a television set dropped on his head.
• "Well Done, Son" Guy: Implied in how Wayne treats him about the massacre, while praising Richie, to be at least part of his motive.
• You Need to Get Laid: Implied to be part of his motive; it's heavily implied that he tried to murder Chad out of jealousy for his comparative success with women.

Quinn Bailey

Quinn Bailey

"Yes, you are, you motherfucker! You killed our brother!"

Played By: Liana Liberato

"Do you know how easy it was to turn Sam from the hero of Woodsboro into the villain? How easy it is to convince the world to believe the worst in people rather than the best?"

Sam and Tara's roommate and the sister of the late Richie Kirsch. Quinn is one third of a new trio of Ghostfaces along with her father Wayne and younger brother Ethan.

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• Affably Evil: She and her brother and father are more akin to a dysfunctional family than a gang of sociopathic killers. They also seem to genuinely care for each other, treating their murder attempt on Sam and Tara as having family fun time.
• The Alibi: Invoked. Quinn attacks Gale and Mindy to give Ethan an alibi for both situations since the protagonists are still suspicious of her brother.
• Berserk Button: Insulting her family. She charges at Sam when she brings up Richie's pathetic last moments, and later tries to attack Sam again when Tara stabs Ethan and Sam gleefully tells her she's "down another brother."
• Big Brother Worship: Even before revealing herself as one of the killers, she mourns her brother and can't keep her emotions completely at bay while talking about him to Tara (even though she doesn't say it was Richie). Once she does reveal herself, speaking ill of Richie sends her into a rage.
• Boom, Headshot!: Sam takes Quinn down this way, calling it a very effective way to kill someone in front of Quinn's father.
• Co-Dragons: Along with Ethan for Bailey in the sixth film.
• Daddy's Little Villain: She loves her family and especially loves helping her father in his criminal schemes.
• Dark Action Girl:
  • Downplayed. Her only confirmed kill is Gale's boyfriend which was done with ambush tactics. Outside of that after The Reveal, she's the least threatening of the Ghostfaces and goes down with a single bullet to the brain without doing much to either of the Carpenter sisters.
  • Having said that, Quinn is the one who puts Gale and Mindy out of commission for the grand finale along with nearly killing Chad with Ethan which makes her the Ghostface who does the most damage to the experienced characters.
• Defiant to the End: Even with Sam aiming a gun straight at her face, Quinn just glares at her in overwhelming rage before taking a bullet to the head.
• Determinator: Takes a brick to the face and gets back up because she's so determined to kill Sam and Tara for killing Richie.
• Dramatic Unmask: Quinn is the last of the three killers to reveal herself to Sam and Tara. Her unmasking also reveals that her death earlier in the movie was faked.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: She's arguably the most upset about Richie even early on. She gets pissed when Sam speaks ill of him and when Tara stabs Ethan, she gets even more pissed.
• Even Evil Has Standards: In her phone call to Gale, Quinn expresses disgust at how she was willing to use past Ghostface murders as a means to make a successful career and sees it as an ample reason why Gale should suffer a painful death.
• Evil Genius: It was her idea to spread the rumors that Sam was the Ghostface of the third Woodsboro killing spree instead of her brother and Amber. One has to admit that it's very smart tactics to ruin someone's reputation, leaving them even more vulnerable.
• Evil Redhead: Has fiery orange hair and is one of the Ghostfaces.
• Faking the Dead: She staged her murder and used her father's influence as a cop in order to throw off suspicion that she was actually a Ghostface.
• Fiery Redhead: Quinn has red hair and is the hot head of the trio.
• Hero Killer: After the reveal, Quinn takes credit for Gale's and Mindy's attacks; by extension, this means she was the one who killed Brooks, Gale's new boyfriend. Subverted in the case of Gale though as when it looks like that she's killed Gale, the paramedics on site confirm that Gale is still alive, albeit with a weak pulse. Still, it's the closest any Ghostface has gotten to killing Gale Weathers. She and her brother also come close to killing Chad.
• Hypocrite: Much like her brother Richie, whom she admires so much. She claims to be "sex-positive," but after she's revealed to be one of the Ghostfaces, she yells at Tara to shut her "whore fucking mouth."
• Karmic Death: Shot in the head by her former roommate after being revealed as the one responsible for most of Sam's psychological torture.
• Kick the Dog: While taunting Gale, Quinn takes a moment to throw Dewey's death in her face for an extra bit of cruelty.
• Love-Interest Traitor: Quinn allows Ethan to murder her boyfriend as part of a faked attack on her.
• Made of Iron: A brick to the face doesn't keep her down for long - Gale also hits her square in the face with a cast-iron pan and it only slows her down for a few seconds.
• Malicious Slander: Quinn is the one responsible for spreading the rumor that Sam framed Richie and Amber for the 2022 Woodsboro murders, to smear her name in revenge for Richie's demise.
• Mistaken Death Confirmation: She is apparently confirmed to have died in the apartment attack, but is actually still alive. Her father helped her to be inaccurately identified.
• Older Hero vs. Younger Villain: She's the Ghostface who attacks and almost kills Gale, who is in her late fifties.
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: She's the smallest member of the Ghostface trio in this movie, but it doesn't hinder her too much when she's killing someone far bigger and muscular like Gale's boyfriend Brooks.
• Playing Possum: While fighting Gale in her apartment, Quinn plays unconscious after Gale gets the upper hand, even letting Gale take the knife from her hand, only to suddenly spring to life and drive a shard of glass into Gale's stomach as soon as she's within reach.
• Really Gets Around: Apparently. Quinn's promiscuity is commented on by everyone in the movie, though it's unclear if she's really like that or if it's a facade so that no-one will come into her room when she's thought to be having sex/faking a Ghostface attack.
• Sadist: While approaching Sam, who is seemingly helpless trying to save Tara from falling into Ethan's murderous clutches, Quinn approaches her with a smile, strolling casually while tapping her knife on a railing to show how much she's enjoying Sam's helplessness.
• Shared Family Quirks: At one point, she flips her knife in the same way that Richie does.
• Slasher Smile: Gives Sam a blood-soaked one when she confronts her post-reveal. It goes away quickly, and pales to the one Sam gives right back to her.
• The Tooth Hurts: When Tara takes a brick to Quinn's face, she knocks out several of Quinn's teeth.
• Villainous Valor: Doesn't take a brick to face that knocked the teeth out of her mouth to impede her effort to avenge her fallen brother, but a bullet to the head to stop her dead on her tracks. To Quinn's credit, even that impending bullet doesn't get her to show fear.
• Villain Respect: She mentions that Stu Macher is her favorite Ghostface killer.

The Wannabes

General

• Big Bad Wannabe: Jason and Greg want to finish "Richie's movie" by becoming the Ghostfaces to off Sam and Tara, but Wayne, the real Big Bad, has no trouble deducing their identities and outmatching them in combat. Moreover, they only kill one person, meaning they are the Ghostface team with the lowest body count.
• Decoy Antagonist: Jason and Greg are introduced as the new Ghostfaces, literally the Big Bad Duumvirate in any Scream movie. Neither of them live past the Cold Open.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: They live together and have been best friends since junior high.

Jason Carvey

Jason Carvey

"But... we have... to finish... the movie!"

Played By: Tony Revolori

"It was even better than we ever could have imagined. I mean, when the knife went in her, it's like she wasn't human anymore. Just an animal. And every time it went in, she was less and less human. And then, she was just meat."

An Argento-obsessed film student attending Blackmore University in New York. Jason is one of two killers planning to go after the Carpenter sisters. Unfortunately for him, another Ghostface had different plans.

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• Advertised Extra: Despite getting his own character poster, he's only in the prologue of the film and only briefly interacts with one of the protagonists.
• Affirmative-Action Legacy: He's the first non-white Ghostface.
• Asshole Victim: He and Greg are really only taken out by the Bailey family because they were a wrench in the latter's revenge plot against Sam. That said they were plotting their own Ghostface killing spree with Jason murdering his professor over a grade as "practice" and relishing in it so it's hard to feel sorry for them. For bonus points, Mindy even recognizes him as "that chode from our film studies class".
• Bait-and-Switch: You're led to believe he's the killer of VI when in reality, he's the first victim of the actual Ghostface.
• The B Grade: He murdered Laura just for giving him a C- on a paper.
• Breaking Old Trends: Jason is revealed to be the killer right at the beginning of the film, which in addition to being already a big trend-breaker means he lacks any Bitch in Sheep's Clothing facade. He also turns out to actually be the first victim of the movie's actual Ghostface, making him the first introductory Asshole Victim.
• Corrupted Character Copy: He has some similarities to Randy, such as watching a horror movie before being attacked. However, he's a killer.
• Dead Star Walking: The final victim of the opening prologue. Uniquely enough, considering he's one of the Ghostfaces.
• Deathly Unmasking: He unmasks himself for the dying Laura after stabbing her.
• Dirty Coward: He relishes Laura's fear and pain but when the table is turned and he ends up on the receiving end, he quickly panics and is reduced to whimpering with fear.
• Disproportionate Retribution: Jason kills Laura implicitly because she gave him a C- on a report. Even the actual Ghostface of the film seems to find this distasteful.
• Evil Is Petty: He killed his college professor in a drawn-out fashion just for giving him a C- on an essay.
• Expy: Of Mickey, the Scream 2 killer. Like Mickey, he's a film fan who's intentionally providing a "sequel" (though, in Jason's words, he's actually "finishing the movie") to Billy/Richie's actions.
• Faux Affably Evil: He has a laid back demeanor despite being a killer.
• Gutted Like a Fish: He's stabbed repeatedly by Ghostface, to the point where his intestines start to poke out of his wounds.
• Hate Sink: He's the most uncharismatic, wormy and pathetic of any Ghostface killer in the whole film series. Wanting to first test his killing skills out, he catfishes and tricks his film professor Laura Crane—who gave him a low grade—into going out on a date with him so that he can lure into a dark alley and taunting her for the dumb decision, proceeds to brutally stab her to death. Jason and his roommate Greg Brockner intend to start a new spree to not only finish Richie's work—having been part of his cult—and take revenge on Sam and her sister Tara while having already stalked and developed a rapport the latter, only for both Jason and Greg before him to be brutally and easily murdered by the actual Ghostfaces—Richie's family—before they can execute any further designs.
• Irony: Despite Jason's admiration for Richie, he's murdered by Richie's father for being a complication to his own plan to avenge Richie.
• Karmic Death: He's killed in a similar manner to his only victim — though it's taken a step further in that he gets disemboweled. Ghostface, disgusted by Jason's sociopathic bragging, even throws Jason's own words in his face while butchering him.
• Kick the Dog: He brutally and sadistically murders his film studies professor, a perfectly nice and innocent woman, just for giving him a mid-level grade on a paper and brags about it afterwards.
• Loony Fan: Jason's desire to kill Sam and Tara has nothing to do with believing the rumors about Sam being the true mastermind of the previous year's killings; he just wants to finish Richie's "movie" by including the ending he planned.
• Meaningful Name:
  • His first name is a clear nod to another slasher villain, while his last name is befitting of someone who uses a knife as a weapon. Bonus points for watching Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan in his apartment mere moments before he's killed.
  • In the Cold Open, he unmasks himself in defiance of the series' traditional whodunnit format just as Jason's debut movie Friday the 13th Part 2 strips out the whodunnit element of the first Friday.
  • It also becomes an Ironic Name since he dies the same way Alice, Voorhees's first victim, does: getting assassinated after finding a corpse in the fridge.
• Psychopathic Manchild: Considering he murdered a teacher for giving him a mid-level grade, he's undoubtedly this.
• Skewed Priorities: At least one thing he shares in common with Richie. Disemboweled and at the mercy of Ghostface, his last words are about how he has to finish the Stab movie. His killer even calls him out on this before striking the killing blow.
  Jason: But... We have... To finish... The movie!
  Ghostface: WHO GIVES A FUCK ABOUT MOVIES?
• The Sociopath: He's a fairly realistic portrayal of a low-functioning one. He at one point talks up how cool it felt to kill Laura, noting how he specifically felt that it was neat that she felt less like a person and more like meat the more he stabbed her, showing a clear Lack of Empathy. He also shows low impulse control and an incredibly fragile ego, killing Laura for giving him a mid-level grade on a paper.
• Soft-Spoken Sadist: He remains laid-back and relaxed even when detailing his first kill, never once hamming it up unlike the majority of the other Ghostfaces.
• Sucksessor: He and Greg by virtue of being killed by the real Big Bad at the beginning of the movie are the Ghostface team with the least amount of kills at only 1. And they're the only Ghostfaces to get caught before their big unmasking — something that even Stu managed to avoid. Of course, the ones that found them out were also serial killers, but still.
• They Look Just Like Everyone Else!: Used to creepy effect in when Jason murders his college professor, then removes the costume and blends seamlessly back into the New York city street. He even stops to talk to Tara on the way back to his apartment, with the suggestion that he and Greg planned on killing her and Sam later that evening.
• Unknown Rival: Jason wanted to murder Sam to finish what Richie started. Sam, even after Jason is dead, gives no indication that she even knew he existed.
• Villains Want Mercy: He begs for Ghostface to stop as he's getting stabbed.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: He's the first Ghostface to be killed in the prologue of the movie.
• You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: He was actually an unwitting pawn in the scheme of the Bailey/Kirsch family and is killed after fulfiling their need to get him out of the way for their plan to kill Sam and Tara.

Greg Brockner

Greg Brockner

Played By: Thom Newell

Jason's roommate and one of two killers planning to go after the Carpenter sisters. Unfortunately for him, another Ghostface had different plans.

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• Asshole Victim: He and Jason are really only taken out by the Bailey family because they were a wrench in the latter's revenge plot against Sam. That said they were plotting their own Ghostface killing spree so it's hard to feel sorry for them.
• Body in a Breadbox: His body is found hacked to pieces in the fridge by Jason in order to bait him before brutally killing him.
• Dismembering the Body: Jason finds Greg's body hacked to pieces and stuffed in the fridge by the real Ghostface.
• The Ghost: Greg is seen only as mangled body parts.
• Informed Ability: Greg never gets the chance to demonstrate his skills as Ghostface on screen unlike Jason, who at least manipulated and killed Laura Crane.
• Killed Offscreen: He's the only Ghostface to never actually appear onscreen alive — or to even be seen in the suit, for that matter — with the only visuals of him being his mutilated corpse or a photo of him used by the police.
• Off with His Head!: His head was cut off and placed alongside his body in the fridge though it's unknown if this was after he died or what killed him.
• Posthumous Character: Given that Greg is killed sometime before Jason, it's not made clear if he is ever alive for the events of the movie, but he is another wannabe Ghostface.
• We Hardly Knew Ye: As true as this is of Jason, it's doubly true of Greg, who never appears onscreen except as mangled body parts. We learn that he was in cahoots with Jason over what was going to be the next massacre, but nothing else.

Other

Billy Loomis (Hallucination)

Billy Loomis

"How you doing, Sam?"

Played By: Skeet Ulrich

Appearances: Scream (2022) | Scream VI

"Sam, Sam, Sam... There's a killer on the loose. He's threatening you and he's threatening your sister. Are you gonna run away from who you are, like you always do, or are you gonna use it?"

One of the original Ghostface killers who has long since died, but exists as a figment of the mind of his illegitimate daughter, Sam Carpenter.

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• Affably Evil: Unlike the real Billy, who was Faux Affably Evil and a massive jerk to boot, this version tries to be something of a dark father figure to his daughter Sam, encouraging her to stand up for herself with The Killer in Me and embrace her murderous impulses, retaining the real Billy's villainous charisma. When Sam is pinned down by Richie, he encourages her to grab a knife, providing a Heroic Second Wind in defeating Richie, and is then shown smiling at her victory.
• Ambiguously Evil: He relishes in pride with what his real self accomplished and goads Sam into darker behaviour, but much of this is rooted in encouraging her to survive and fight back against those tormenting her. He doesn't actually encourage her to act violently towards anyone innocent and his goading taunts of Sam are generally a form of Tough Love, but he's also clearly taking delight in her acting on her violent urges.
• Ambiguous Situation:
  • While there's no doubt he's a product of Sam's mental illness, because her exact diagnosis isn't given in either 2022 or VI, it's not clear entirely what he is exactly. Is he an outright hallucination, intrusive thoughts that are visualised for the audience, a dissociative personality, or something else entirely? If he was just a hallucination, he probably wouldn't have the same level of consistency in behaviour nor be her only hallucination, but if he was an intrusive thought Sam reacting to the sight of him and other silent gestures he makes would be unlikely, but then he's yet to induce a Split-Personality Takeover like a dissociative personality alter would. There's certainly more messed up about Sam than merely seeing him (her admitting to enjoying killing, the sheer veracity she has when doing it, her admitted drug use, her issues with depression and latching onto her sister to an unhealthy degree, and history of antisocial behavior), but these don't really sway the possibility of what he is in either direction nor rule any out. On top of that, he's self-aware enough to recognise he is merely a product of her imagination and directly calls out his appearance being the result of her medication not being strong enough, which even for someone who's aware of her illness like Sam is unusual.
  • To a lesser extent, why exactly she sees him looking how he does, namely in the same blood-stained white shirt he died in. Is this purely Sam's overactive imagination going off of photos of him in life and the depiction of him in Stab, or more grisly, has she seen crime scene photos of his dead body after his death, and thus the image of him in such a state is burnt into her mind? The former is a bit too uncannily accurate but if the latter, he should also have the gunshot wound Sidney put in his forehead to ensure he was truly dead. Tying in with the former point, it's entirely possible the physical manifestation of him is for the audience's benefit in which case the accurate mental image of him is just to ensure audiences recognise him, but Sam is clearly reacting to something visual whenever he appears.
• The Corrupter: Billy often tries to prod Sam into succumbing to her murderous impulses, although, playing to her conscience, he mostly suggests that she do so against people who have it coming.
• Enemy Within: Subverted—although he initially seems like a set-up for a Split-Personality Takeover or something to that effect, the murderous instincts in Sam that he represents actually end up saving her life and helping protect her sister.
• Historical Hero Upgrade: In-universe. In life, Billy was a scumbag: he murdered his girlfriend's mother for causing his parents' divorce, and then went on a killing spree nearly a year later to punish his own girlfriend for her mother's sins. Additionally, as revealed in this film, he cheated on Sidney around the events of the first movie, impregnating his mistress, which led to the destruction of his daughter's family after she found out the truth. In her hallucinations of him, Sam sees Billy as a manifestation of her mental illness, but he also gives her advice on how to live her life, and helps her to kill Richie.
• The Killer in Me: Actively tries to get Sam to embrace her killer instinct. Played with, in that he is goading her into confronting and killing the new Ghostface, rather than her friends or family.
• Knight Templar: Playing to Sam's violent tendencies and genuine conscience, he is quick to suggest that Sam solve her Ghostface problems with brutal murder; notably, despite Sam's fears to the contrary, Billy never so much as suggests that she harm an innocent person (at least, not as of the end of Scream VI).
• Luke, I Am Your Father: Although Sam already knows the truth before the movie starts, his sudden appearance as a Mirror Monster figure directly leads into The Reveal that she's his biological daughter.
• Papa Wolf: Sort-of; he's the manifestation of Sam's father, but is by no means the real Billy Loomis who wasn't even aware Sam existed in life and was dead before she was born. Still, much of his behaviour is rooted in trying to protect Sam, or rather, encourage her to protect herself by any means necessary. As he's not real, this protective fatherly instinct is merely Sam projecting onto him these traits, but the result is still the image of Billy Loomis trying to protect his daughter the way he does best.
• Posthumous Character: Billy is still dead for real, appearing to Sam as a hallucination and manifestation of her own psychosis.
• Sir Not-Appearing-in-This-Trailer: Billy was understandably not part of the marketing of the film, given that his presence gives away his unexpected connection to Sam Carpenter.
• Spirit Advisor: In the form of hallucinations produced by his daughter's unspecified mental illness.
• So Proud of You: He's seen smirking at his daughter after she absolutely butchers Richie in self-defense.
• White Shirt of Death: This Billy is shown wearing the same white t-shirt that the original Billy wore when he died, covered in dried-up blood.

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