Warning: This article contains SPOILERS for Smile 2
AlthoughSmile 2’s twist ending is ingenious, it also sets up a major problem forSmile 3.Smile 2manages to take director Parker Finn’s sleeper hit from 2022 and expand on the twisty psychological horror in numerous ways. WhileSmilefocused on a mental health professional who was cursed after witnessing the death of her patient,Smile 2centers on Naomi Scott’s glamorous pop star Skye Riley as she struggles against the franchise’s demonic villain.Smile 2’s Skye is based on real-life musicians, but her eventual fate is fortunately not one shared by any entertainment industry stars.
Smile 2 Ending Explained: What The Big Twist Means
Smile 2’s ending heightens the dark themes of the first film on a truly massive scale, potentially setting up an absolutely horrifying sequel.
InSmile 2’s ending, Skype realizes that she has been trapped in an exhausting hallucination for an almost unknowable amount of time as the demonic entity wears down her defenses. Unable to stop the demon anymore, she finally succumbs to the monster while onstage at a concert.Smile 2’s twist ending should be predictable, since viewers guessed that the sequel would end with an entire concert’s worth of witnesses being cursed whenSmile 2’s premise was first announced. However, Finn’s misdirections manage to make the twist surprising, and it is a genuinely grim shock when Skye dies onstage.
Smile 2’s Ending Forces Smile 3 To Explain What Happens To Multiple Witnesses
Thousands Of Concertgoers See Naomi Scott’s Skye Riley Die
However, Finn’s killer sequel ending has left theSmilefranchise in a tricky position.The question posed bySmile 2’s ending is whether every witness gets cursed simultaneously or not, and it is almost impossible to work out a satisfying answer. Presumably, every witness saw Skye die, which means they all get cursed at the same time. However, this would be pandemonium. Furthermore, the sudden onslaught of mass death could easily be traced back to the concert inSmile 3’s story. WhileSmile 2’s monster is slightly differentfrom the original movie, it seems to operate the same.
The concert ending of Smile 2 leaves the demon with countless potential victims, but Smile 3’s insular story can’t focus on all of them at once.
TheSmiledemon wears down its victims over a matter of days, subjecting them to increasingly elaborate hallucinations that eventually lead them to take their own lives. However, until now, the demon has done this to one victim at a time. The pattern is so consistent that characters in both movies could track the demon’s progress by looking back through death records. The concert ending ofSmile 2leaves the demon with countless potential victims, butSmile 3’s insular story can’t focus on all of them at once. What makes theSmilemovies so scary is their singular perspective.
Why Smile 3 Having Multiple Victims Would Be So Problematic
The Smile Franchise’s Formula Needs A Singular Focus To Succeed
TheSmilemovies need to center on one victim since they take place inside their heroes’s heads.Smile 2killed off Joel earlyso the sequel had a fresh perspective, but its sequel can’t be about thousands of people at once. In fact, an ending similar toSmile 2’s twist ending already killed another iconic horror franchise when 2017’sRingsdidn’t know how to follow its similar twist. That reboot ended with the cursed video going viral and, despite its box office success, never received a sequel. Now,Smile 3must find a way forSmile 2to avoid the same fate.
