The absolutely terrifying Smile 2 was released this weekend and I’m going to have nightmares for weeks over the film, but specifically the ending. The first film already traumatised me enough and somehow the second is even more eerie, and now the director has explained what the ending of Smile 2 really means it takes everything to a whole new level.
Right, so if you’re invested in what happens at the end but can’t face watching it in the cinema yet or need a little refresher, let’s have a quick recap of what happened in the lead up to the horrifying ending.
Via Paramount
Our main character Skye is taken to hospital for exhaustion following some very hectic events. But she knows she needs to make a speedy getaway from the hospital as Morris, who has also been impacted by the demon, thinks there’s a way to get rid of it. His theory is that if you bring the heart rate of someone who has been possessed down to zero then the demon will have no way of passing onto someone else.
In the process of trying to escape the hospital, Skye obviously gets possessed and ends up murdering her mother. Her best friend Gemma comes to her aid and helps her escape, only for her to end up being the demon. Typical.
Via Paramount
Skye strangely ends up in a Pizza Hut freezer with the demon but the scene then cuts to the stage where it turns out she’s inside a chrysalis and the whole thing has just happened inside her head. Yeah, I was confused too.
The absolutely terrifying demon that appeared at the end of Smile makes a cameo on stage, surprise performance anyone?! The demon is quite literally wearing Skye and unzips itself as off screen Skye mutilates herself by shoving her microphone into her brain through her eye. That’s going to need a plaster at a bare minimum.
Unfortunately, this also means the thousands of people watching her tour in person, and through live stream have now seen the demon… bring on Smile 3!
Okay, but what does this all actually mean? Well, the director has explained the ending of Smile 2 and what it all means for the future.
Via Paramount
The director told The Wrap: “I didn’t know how I was going to pull it off, but I had this idea of some final images. And I was like, Alright, that’s a journey that I just absolutely fucking love.
“And for me, I love that the ending of this film echoes the ending of the first film, but they also are diametrically opposite.”
He also wanted the cinema audience to feel complicit in Skye’s demise, commenting: “The audience in that arena, staring through the screen at the audience in the movie theatre.” He wants us to think: “Wait, did we do this? Like, by us coming back and watching ‘Smile 2,’ have we done this to Skye? Are we somehow complicit?”
As for what was going on with the whole Pizza Hut freezer scene, he explained: “I hope it raises the question about whether that is part of people’s journey.
“This idea of how it breaks you utterly and completely – does it need to take you to this place in your head that then it can really come in and just snuff out all hope and do that last fracturing of the character that prepares them for this final moment?”
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