Scary Movie 6 is already a wall-to-wall gag machine, but if you bailed when the credits started, you missed two of the movie’s sharpest swings. Marlon and Shawn Wayans stashed a pair of full-on sketches at the very end as a reward for the diehards: a Longlegs riff called 'Short Hand' and a Nosferatu send-up called 'Brosferatu'. Now they’re breaking down how those scenes came together and why they got pushed past the curtain call.
What shows up after the credits (and why)
- 'Short Hand' takes a big bite out of Osgood Perkins’ Longlegs, specifically its creepiest stretch: the interrogation sequence. It also brings back Chris Elliott as his Scary Movie 2 breakout creep Hanson/The Caretaker, and pairs him with Damon Wayans Jr. and SNL ’s Heidi Gardner. Gardner and Damon Jr. are playing twisted versions of the roles originally played by Maika Monroe and Blair Underwood, and their back-and-forth is the engine of the bit.
- If you felt deja vu: the movie plants a mid-credits tease first. Gardner and Damon Jr.’s cops show up earlier and hilariously tackle the wrong person at a bus stop, while the Nicolas Cage-like killer they’re hunting slips by. That moment is the setup; 'Short Hand' is the full payoff during the credits.
- Director Michael Tiddes leaned into Longlegs’ look, shooting the sketch with wide-angle lenses so it feels like its own mini-movie, not just another scene tossed into the montage. In earlier cuts, dropping this chunk into the main story pulled audiences too far off course, so the team saved it for the end where it could play as a standalone short without messing with the flow.
- 'Brosferatu' goes the other direction tonally: a buddy-comedy riff on Robert Eggers’ Nosferatu that leans hard into Marlon-and-Shawn-in-chaos-mode. It was actually in the body of the movie at one point, but got nudged out.
- The replacement? A Michael Jackson biopic parody anchored by Kenan Thompson as Jermaine Jackson. The Wayans felt the MJ sketch had broader reach and gave the main cut some non-horror balance that the vampire bit couldn’t. Instead of binning 'Brosferatu', they parked it after the credits because it was too funny to waste.
'We just thought Heidi was hilarious. We were thinking about that character, it’s always about the character,' Marlon Wayans told Entertainment Weekly. 'And that character being psychic, but playing it dumb, but still being hilarious' sealed it.
'I think the Nosferatu scene, 'Brosferatu,' was a part of the movie,' Marlon added, 'but we replaced 'Brosferatu' with Michael Jackson because it was just a way bigger movie.'
The fun nerd stuff
This is one of those behind-the-scenes choices that actually makes the bits land harder. The team built Scary Movie 6 so densely with genre riffs that chopping these sketches for time would’ve been a loss. By moving them to the credits, they could commit to the Longlegs aesthetic (those wide lenses are doing a lot) and let the Nosferatu joke spiral into full buddy-comedy chaos, all without derailing the main plot’s rhythm. You get the joke, the style, and the payoff, just on its own terms.
Did the gamble pay off?
Short answer: yep. Scary Movie 6 opened to a franchise- best $56 million domestically on a $30 million budget, crossed $105 million worldwide in its opening run, and even outpaced Masters of the Universe. That’s not just a comeback, that’s a 'clear the lane, we’re back' kind of result. And if you stuck through the credits, those last two sketches make sure the final laugh’s yours.
Which horror movie do you want them to roast next? Drop your pick below — I’m taking bets now.