Is Candyman in Scary Movie 6? Marlon Wayans' Shorty has his own reason to say the name into a mirror
Say his name five times into a mirror and something comes for you. In a Scary Movie, that something was always going to be a lot less scary and a lot more useful to Shorty.
Candyman is in the new Scary Movie, sort of. Paramount released the sixth film in the franchise on June 5, 2026, with Marlon and Shawn Wayans back as Shorty and Ray, Anna Faris and Regina Hall back as Cindy and Brenda, and Michael Tiddes directing a script by the Wayans brothers and Rick Alvarez. In between the Scream riffs and a long list of newer targets, the film makes room for one quick trip to a bathroom mirror.
The Candyman scene
In a very brief bit, Shorty stands in front of a mirror and chants "Candyman" over and over. The figure who answers the summons does show up the way he does in his own movies, but he isn't the hook-handed ghost.
He's a drug dealer with a badly scarred face, and Shorty is calling him to buy THC-infused gummies. Shorty also takes a moment to make fun of the man's "acne." The candy names are references to other horror movies.
That's the whole gag, and it's built entirely on who Shorty has always been. Twenty-six years after the first film, he's still the franchise's resident stoner. The Associated Press' Mark Kennedy, reviewing the new one, noted that Shorty "is still a stoner who plays video games," except now he's super rich thanks to crypto.
Every other character in horror says "Candyman" five times to prove they're brave. Shorty does it because he's out of gummies.
Where the joke comes from
The ritual belongs to Bernard Rose's 1992 Candyman. Tony Todd played the title character, the ghost of a 19th-century Black artist who was murdered and who appears when his name is said five times in front of a mirror. Todd came back for both sequels, in 1995 and 1999, and Nia DaCosta's 2021 film picked the story back up as a direct sequel to the original.
Todd died at his home in Marina del Rey in November 2024, at 69, ABC7 reported. The Scary Movie bit never puts anyone in the Candyman role itself. The man in the mirror is a dealer, not a new Candyman.
Everything else Scary Movie 6 spoofs
The mirror chant is one of the smaller bits in a crowded film. The big targets include:
- Scream: The main frame. The town is Woodsville, Ghostface is hunting the original characters, and Cindy is riffing on Sidney Prescott.
- Get Out: Shorty gets his own trip to the sunken place.
- Sinners: Ray's church scene and a house party at the Meeks place.
- The Substance: Gail Hailstorm's transformation, which ends with Marlon Wayans back in White Chicks drag as Tiffany.
- The rest: Longlegs, Weapons, Smile, M3GAN, Final Destination, Terrifier 3, Halloween, Ma and a post-credits Nosferatu spoof called "Brosferatu."
Audiences turned up for the reunion: the film opened to about $55 million, the biggest opening in the franchise's history, and passed $215 million worldwide on a $30 million budget. Critics were much less kind. Kennedy gave it 1.5 stars, and the film sits at 24% on Rotten Tomatoes. The Candyman joke lasts seconds, but ScreenRant still ranked it third among the film's best parodies, which says something about the competition.
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