Melissa Barrera and Jenna Ortega became the most popular final girls in the last decade with their portrayal as the Carpenter Sisters in 2022’s Scream and 2023’s Scream VI. It seems that they will stay final girls together, as Barrera was taken off of the newest Scream feature, Scream VII, because of her advocating for Palestine on her social media, and Ortega left through her own volition shortly after.

Ortega revealed the reason behind her departure in an interview with The Cut on Monday. The actress stated, “It had nothing to do with pay or scheduling.” As those were the rumored reasons behind her leaving, Ortega further explained, “The Melissa stuff was happening, and it was all kind of falling apart.” She concluded her statement by saying, “If ‘Scream VII’ wasn’t going to be with that team of directors and those people I fell in love with, then it didn’t seem like the right move for me in my career at the time.”

Filmmaking duo Matt Bettinelli-Olpin and Tyler Gillett directed the first two modern reprises of the horror franchise. They were replaced by scribe Kevin Williamson, who wrote the first, second, and fourth Scream films. This was after Christopher Landon, who was named director, left the project shortly after the actresses did.

Scream VII will see the return of Neve Campbell as Sidney Prescott along with Courtney Cox, Mason Gooding, and Jasmin Savoy Brown. The feature is set to hit theaters on February 27th, 2026.

Regardless, it seems both Barrera’s and Ortega’s careers are thriving. With Barrera starring in Bettinelli-Olpin and Gillette’s 2024 horror feature Abigail and leading the romantic-comedy film Your Monster. She is starring opposite Simu Liu in the upcoming Peacock series, Copenhagen. Ortega has two features set to release this year, both of which she executively produced, titled Death of a Unicorn and Hurry Up Tomorrow.