Jennifer Love Hewitt and Freddie Prinze Jr. in Talks to Return for ‘I Know What You Did Last Summer’ Sequel
Though it’s still early in development, the return of I Know What You Did Last Summer will be welcomed by its many fans.
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In 1996, Scream sparked a teen-horror revival, and I Know What You Did Last Summer followed. Now, more than two decades later, the return of Scream (2022) may have sparked interest in the return of I Know What You Did Last Summer.
In an exclusive, Deadline reports that an I Know What You Did Last Summer sequel is currently in development at Sony Pictures. Additionally, the report states that Jennifer Love Hewitt and Freddie Prinze Jr. are “game” to return, though their involvement is not finalized. (update: CBR reported that Freddie Prinze Jr. says he hadn’t actually spoken with anyone prior to the Deadline article, but he did sit down with the film’s director to talk about a potential role in the movie after the article was published. No offers were made, and no new updates have come out.)
The original I Know What You Did Last Summer was released in 1997. The movie was writer Kevin Williamson’s next movie after Scream (1996), though Williamson had written the script for I Know What You Did Last Summer years prior. The story focuses on four friends who accidentally hit a man with a car and dump his body in the ocean. One year later, the friends are brought back together by a killer who is stalking them to punish them for what they did. The movie was a success and led to two sequels in 1998 and 2006, and an Amazon Prime series in 2021 (though the series was more based on the original novel by Lois Duncan).
It’s too early to know what a potential sequel might be about, but the inclusion of Hewitt and Prinze points to the new film being a sequel rather than a full reboot. Jennifer Kaytin Robinson is attached to direct and cowrite. Robinson’s previous work includes directing two features for Netflix: Someone Great (2019) and Do Revenge (2022). Leah McKendrick is set to cowrite the script, and her previous writing credits include M.F.A. (2017). Neal H. Mortiz, producer of the original I Know What You Did Last Summer and its 2021 Amazon Prime TV reboot is in talks to produce the new sequel.
Robinson and McKendrick’s pitch is thought to be along the lines of Scream 5 in that it will be a true sequel meant to pass the story from legacy characters to a new set of characters. That would mean Jennifer Love Hewitt is likely to return as Julie James, and Freddie Prinze Jr. will return as Ray Bronson. But will the movie take the requel route of Halloween (2018) and dismiss some or all of the events of the sequels, or will it be more like Scream (2022) and include the entirety of the franchise’s canon? It’s way too early to tell, but we’ll share the news with you as it comes.
