The Reasons Why Actors Didn't Return To Their Spooky Franchises

According to Matthew Lillard, his character, Stu Macher, was originally intended to survive the original Scream and return in the franchise's third installment, orchestrating the film's mayhem from behind bars. This would have involved, among other things, getting high school students to do his dirty work for him on the outside; however, before the sequel started filming, a national tragedy led to a massive change of plans.

The massacre that took place in Columbine High School on April 20, 1999, meant the idea of homicidal high schoolers hit a little too close to home. According to Lillard, this led to a massive rejiggering of the plot, which, in turn, nixed his character's reappearance.

With the exception of Robert Englund as Freddy Krueger, few actors are as synonymous with their villainous film roles as Doug Bradley, who played Pinhead, the lead cenobite in eight Hellraiser films, many of them low-budget, direct-to-video sequels.

By the time Dimension rushed a ninth film into production in order to retain the rights to the franchise, however, the veteran actor was no longer interested in returning for more cheap sequels. He passed on both 2011's Hellraiser: Revelations and 2018's Hellraiser: Judgment, even after Gary J. Tunnicliffe (a long-time special effects creator for the series) and the writer of the last two films approached him personally.

Ultimately, in 2022, David Bruckner helmed a long-in-development remake of the property, which took the cenobites in a new direction, casting Jamie Clayton in the Pinhead-like role of the lead cenobite.

Actor and stuntman Kane Hodder may not have originated the role of Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th, but he's played the hockey mask-wearing slasher more times than anyone else, in a four-film run from Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood to Jason X.

For 2003's Freddy vs. Jason, however, which hit screens just a year after Jason X, he was unceremoniously replaced by Ken Kirzinger. What's worse, though, is that, according to Hodder, he doesn't know why.

Hodder told the Boo Crew podcast:

I was told I was doing the film, and then replaced. So that's worse. I never expected, just because I had done the previous one, that I would do the next one. I was always very happy when they said that, but I never expected it. But when you're told you're doing it, then you tend to expect it, and that didn't work out.

Thora Birch has been acting since she was 4 years old, and she's been involved in a lot of projects, from American Beauty to Ghost World to The Walking Dead to 2022's The Gabby Petito Story, which she also directed. But one project she wasn't involved in was Hocus Pocus 2.

In the 1993 original, Birch originated the role of Dani Dennison, one of the kids who has to deal with the trio of resurrected witches played by Bette Midler, Kathy Najimy, and Sarah Jessica Parker. While those three returned for the 2022 Disney+ sequel, however, scheduling conflicts kept Birch from reprising her role.

“I was just a little dismayed I wasn't able to make it,” she told Entertainment Tonight.

Neve Campbell was pretty much the only cast member of the Scream franchise with a surviving character who didn't return for 2023's Scream VI. According to an interview she gave to People magazine, the reason for her absence simply came down to money and principles.

“I did not feel that what I was being offered equated to the value that I bring to this franchise, and have brought to this franchise, for 25 years,” Campbell told People. “And as a woman in this business, I think it's really important for us to be valued and to fight to be valued.”

“Why would I do just one day of shooting on something I did 30 years ago?”

This was Rick Moranis's response when asked why he turned down a cameo role in the 2016 Ghostbusters reboot. “It just makes no sense to me.”

Despite a lengthy hiatus from appearing in front of the cameras (though he did some voice work in the interim), Moranis told The Hollywood Reporter that he wasn't retired, merely “picky.” When asked what it would take to get him to appear in a movie again, he told the publication, “I'll continue to be picky. Picky has worked for me.”