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SYFY WIRE Teen Wolf

Dylan O'Brien explains his 'difficult decision' to not return for the 'Teen Wolf' movie

The star of MTV's Teen Wolf has his reasons for moving on from the film revival.

By Matthew Jackson
Dylan O'Brien GETTY

Last month, Paramount+ revealed the cast for its upcoming revival of Teen Wolf during a ViacomCBS investor event, and fans immediately noticed certain key names were missing. While many alums from the hit 2011 TV series, including star Tyler Posey, were back on board, other key players like Dylan O'Brien were missing from the revival's cast list. Now, O'Brien is explaining to fans why he didn't make the time to return to Beacon Hills for one more shapeshifting adventure.

Speaking to Variety to promote his new film The Outfit, O'Brien explained that the development process for the new sequel film, which will reunite much of the original cast with series creator Jeff Davis, came at him and his former co-stars rather fast, leaving him with a tough choice. 

“It was a difficult decision. A lot went into it,” O’Brien said. “The show couldn’t be more dear to me. It was the first thing I ever did I and so many people there are extremely dear to me. It was something I was trying to make work but it all happened very fast. We didn’t really know that it was happening and they kind of just threw it at us a little bit, which is fine because we all love the show. We were trying to figure it out.”

Teen Wolf launched O'Brien to stardom when the series -- a sexier, darker update of the 1985 film starring Michael J. Fox -- arrived in 2011, and led to opportunities like dystopian action series The Maze Runner and, shortly after the series ended, the Transformers spinoff film Bumblebee. As Stiles Stilinski, the best friend of the title "Teen Wolf" Scott McCall (Tyler Posey), he was a major contributor to the show's entire run, which may be part of why he decided to walk away from the revival. For O'Brien, it seems he said all he wanted to say with Stiles and Teen Wolf

“Ultimately, I just decided it was left in a really good place for me and I still want to leave it there," O'Brien said. "I wish them well and I’m going to watch it the first night it comes out. I hope it f***ing kicks ass, but I’m not going to be in it.”

O'Brien is, of course, keeping plenty busy even without the Teen Wolf movie. He'll next be seen in The Outfit, has other movie projects on the horizon and, of course, helped Taylor Swift break the internet last year when he co-starred in All Too Well: The Short Film. He's also not the only other major Teen Wolf alum who seems to be skipping the movie. Tyler Hoechlin, who played the werewolf Derek Hale on the series, is a little busy playing Superman, so he'll also apparently sit the film out. 

Teen Wolf returns later this year to Paramount+.