Derek

"You are concerned with my personal well-being, and not with trusting me or anything, right?"

- Derek questions his girlfriend, Sidney's trust in their relationship.

Derek was the college boyfriend of Woodsboro Murders survivor, Sidney Prescott in Scream 2 (1997 film, set in 1998). A pre-med student at Windsor College, he aspires to be a doctor. He is also a member of Omega Kappa Beta's fraternity.

He serves as the sequel's biggest red herring, and the character antithesis to Billy Loomis, Sidney's previous boyfriend from the original film.

Derek was the eighth and final character to fall victim in the 1998 Windsor College Murders in Ohio, in the second Ghostface killing spree. He was killed by Mickey Altieri. It is unknown who portrayed him in Stab 2 (1999).

Background
Derek is a pre-med student from Ohio, U.S born in approximately 1978. He enrols at Windsor College as a freshman sometime in 1997. During this time, he became acquainted with Sidney Prescott, who relocated far away from her hometown of Woodsboro, California, and they fell in love.

During his time at college, he became a member of the Omega Kappa Beta fraternity, the sorority Delta Lambda Zeta's big brother. This sorority consists of Lois, Murphy and Sidney's best friend and roommate, Hallie, whom may have introduced the two.

The Windsor College Murders
After 22-year-old seniors, Maureen Evans and Phil Stevens are murdered, he approaches his 19-year-old girlfriend Sidney, after noticing she skipped class. She is seen with fellow survivor, Randy Meeks after film theory class. He kisses his girlfriend as comfort, much to Randy's jealousy. Later, when Dewey Riley comes to visit, Derek himself is shown subtly jealous of Sidney's warm embrace of the former cop. Sidney, however, refers to Dewey as their "surrogate big brother", quelling Derek's slight jealous look.

After Gale Weathers attempts to get Sidney to have an unauthorized, spontaneous interview with Cotton Weary, she slaps her. Derek then holds her back and they exit the scene.

He later goes to Delta Lambda Zeta Soroity party with the others, and makes a joke about Sidney not joining the sorority. Ghostface returns and attacks Sidney after Cici Cooper's murder; he runs into the house after hearing his girlfriend's screams, and tries to catch the killer. However, during the short chase, Derek's arm is slashed by the assailant, who is able to disappear shortly afterwards. While no vital areas are injured, it only makes him more of a suspect. At the cafeteria, Sidney points to her secret security — Officers Richards and Andrews — appointed by Chief Lewis Hartley. Derek appears disconnected from the descriptions of the two men that Sidney describes, causing Mickey to chime in and ask, "Derek, penny for your thoughts?" Suddenly, he begins to sing.

He serenades Sidney in the cafeteria, he gives her his Greek letters fraternity necklace to show her how much he loves her. Hallie explains to Mickey Altieri the nature of why this is forbidden in fraternities, as you cannot "give your letters to your girls". She warns "the brothers are gonna kick his ass, but it's tradition".

When Sidney is tormented by Ghostface at the Agamemnon rehearsal of The Oresteia play. Sidney expresses concern that Mickey should be on her watch-post, not Derek, and Derek explains that they swapped.

When his fraternity brothers find out, par for the course, they capture him, and "party" with him on the empty school theater stage. When Sidney finally find him, he is still on the stage-bound and tied up from their party with him. Sidney attempts to release him until the arrival of Ghostface, who turns out to be Mickey Altieri. Mickey leads Sidney to believe that he was his "partner" in the killings. Sidney panics and becomes distracted her long enough for Mickey to shoot him in the heart, mortally wounding him. Derek tells Sidney he would never hurt her, as he slowly dies. Derek's death is particularly heartbreaking for Sidney, since she mistakenly believed him to be the killer, and faulted herself for letting him die. Mickey taunts Sidney for her mistake, saying that Derek was everything she wanted, he was funny, nice, handsome, a good singer, and was studying to be a doctor.He then mocks her about her dead mother, saying that "he was just the kind of guy you'd like to take home to mom, if you had a mom!", much to the anger of Sidney. Sidney uses his Greek letters necklace to whip Mickey in the eye to escape. She continues to wear it in his memory for several years, right until the climax of Scream 3 (2000). During the events of Scream 4 (2011), she is no longer in possession of the necklace.

Allies

 * Windsor College
 * Sidney Prescott - Girlfriend
 * Hallie † - Friend
 * Randy Meeks † - Friend

Enemies

 * Windsor College
 * Mickey Altieri † - Former Friend / Killer
 * Nancy Loomis † - Killer

By Derek

 * "I think I love you, so what am I so afraid of?" (Derek sings Tom Cruise, Top Gun to Sidney).
 * "I hope that was an off-the-cuff remark that holds no subtext whatsoever."
 * "I suppose I should be understanding."
 * "How am I gonna get you alone?"
 * "And I don't want to see you get hurt."
 * "I am gonna fucking kill you! You are dead! Dead!" (To Mickey before he is shot in the chest by him)
 * "I would have never hurt you." (Dying words)

About Derek

 * "He's bright and funny and handsome. Decent singing voice. And he was going to be a doctor. This is just the kinda boy you'd like to take home to mom. If ya had a mom." (Mickey to Sidney).
 * "Since Derek here disappeared on my ass, I've been on my own, all fucking night. Thanks a lot, partner." (Mickey implicating Derek as a killer).
 * "Boyfriend, killer, boyfriend, killer..." (Mickey)
 * "Yeah, it's awfully convenient." (Dewey about Derek's arm-slash wound).
 * "Derek, he's after me. He killed Hallie." (Sidney telling Derek that Hallie is dead before he is killed by Mickey.)
 * "He just needs to know the 90s is no time to play hero. Why would he go back in that house anyway?" (Mickey enforcing suspicion onto Derek).

Trivia

 * He was described as "a young man, handsome and smooth" in the script.
 * Derek wears a blue checkered shirt, similar to Billy's blue plaid shirt in the original film, which is a red herring.
 * Jill Roberts later wears a white-and-blue plaid shirt, and finally Richie Kirsch—who resembles Derek's nice, supportive boyfriend persona—wears a blue plaid shirt as well.
 * When Derek is arm-slashed, Dewey finds it suspicious and convenient. However, later in the fourth film, Jill is also arm-slashed, and Dewey does not take concern towards this, possibly learning from his mistake. Despite this, Jill is the killer, and this was an intentional misdirection.
 * Derek is paid tribute to in Scream 3, with Sidney still wearing his Omega Kappa Beta necklace, being the first man to truly love her. She does not wear it anymore in the fourth film, indicating she has moved on, eleven years later.
 * This Greek ritual is known as lavaliering, when a fraternity member bestows a necklace with Greek letters onto an important sorority woman in his life.
 * Deleted Scene: A scene in Sidney's bedroom introduces the planned buddy system. Hallie, Derek, and Mickey would take turns in protective duty to Sidney and keep watch of her. This explains why Sidney asks where Mickey is during the rehearsal of her play, when Derek shows up, and why he states they "swapped".
 * In the original script, Derek was one of the killers, a film student, and working alongside secret girlfriend Hallie in a Natural Born Killers-inspired outlaw couple way. They still operated the guidance of mastermind, Nancy Loomis.
 * Several scenes fauxshadow this red herring in the final product, such as Derek sitting next to Hallie in the cafeteria, their connections to the Delta Lambda societies.

Appearances

 * Scream 2 (1997 film)