Smile 2 Ending Explained – What Is Real?

Smile 2 follows an ongoing path of carnage being left in the wake of the evil grinning demonic entity from the first film. When the curse infects troubled pop superstar Skye Riley (Naomi Scott) the terror of the horrific hallucinations caused by the entity take on a whole other level, as the demands of being a celebrity expose Skye to all sorts of pressured and vulnerable situations for the demon to play upon.

By the time Smile 2 reaches its bloody end, a lot of viewers may be confused about what happened – and which parts were real. Below you’ll find a detailed explanation of Smile 2‘s ending, and which parts actually happened.

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Smile 2 Ending Explained (Spoilers)

The third of Smile 2 begins after Skye has a major public breakdown while giving a speech at a fundraiser for her record executive boss, Darius (Raúl Castillo). Skye retreats into seclusion but finally decides to answer the mysterious texts for an unknown number she’s gotten since first being infected by the curse, watching her drug dealer kill himself. Skye meets the mystery texter who turns out to be Morris (Peter Jacobson), a nurse whose brother was killed by the entity. Morris pitches a theory that the entity is a supernatural parasite who must pass from one live host to another – and that if Skye can isolate herself, stop her heart, and then resuscitate it, she will kill the entity.

As soon as Skye and Morris form the plan, the entity attacks Skye in her apartment that night, causing her to hit her head and get a concussion when fighting off grinning versions of her background dancers. Skye wakes up in a recovery facility where her mom Elizabeth (Rosemarie Dewitt) insists she straighten out her erratic behavior and get ready for her upcoming tour. Skye witnesses the entity possess her mom and it makes her cut her own neck open with a broken shard of the mirror – only for Skye to suddenly find she is the one holding the shard of glass and is covered in her mom’s blood. Skye grabs a gun and breaks out of the facility, escaping with her best friend Gemma – only to realize that she never really reconciled with Gemma, and she’s escaping alone.

Skye returns to Morris and together they go to an old restaurant Morris rented that has a deep freezer and tries to give Skye a series of injections – one to stop her heart and one to restart it, while the freezing temperature preserves her brain. The plan goes sideways and the entity ultimately reveals that it’s all a hallucination, and Skye can’t really kill herself.

In reality, Skye finds herself onstage at her tour opening, with her mom very much alive, cheering her on from the front row. The entity finally appears as a smiling version of Skye and then bursts out of her to reveal its true demonic form. The entity crawls inside of Skye’s mouth, completing her possession; Skye takes her microphone and impales herself through the face with it.

Smile 2: What Was Real?

There are any number of story beats from Smile 2 that are forcing viewers to question the reality of the film, afterwards. The sequel has multiple rug-pull moments that reframe what we think we know – such as the climatic reveal that had never really reconnected with her estranged BFF Gemma, and every scene the character has in the film is just an illusion. That said, here’s a breakdown of some of the more specific questions about what is reality and what is illusion in the film.

Did Skye Really Kill Her Mom?

No, the entire sequence at the recovery center where Elizabeth got killed and Skye went on a gun-toting rampage was an illusion – we know this because Elizabeth is alive in the crowd at the concert, and the concert is still taking place, instead of Skye being arrested or in jail.

Did Skye Really Try to Kill Herself?

The entity outright tells Skye during their climactic showdown in the freezer that the entire sequence with Morris and the two injections isn’t real. That’s actually a saving grace for the film: up until that moment the entire rehab escape and slapdash plan to run a Flatliners play on Skye started to feel like it jumped the shark. Finding out it was a cruel prank being played by the entity makes so much more sense.

Was Morris Real?

This is one of those areas of Smile 2 that is going to be ambiguous (at least until writer/director Parker Finn or the cast clarify it). There’s no real hard proof that Morris was ever really there: the entity clearly laid a trap for Skye with the whole death and resuscitation plan, and Morris definitely wasn’t there the second time they met up and tried to use the freezer.

At best, Morris was real the first time and is a character who is still out there with knowledge on how to fight/kill the entity. At worst, he was a red herring all along and, like every character in these films so far, no one has actually figured out a way to beat the entity.

What Happens Next With The Smile Curse?

The big game-changing element in Smile 2 is that Skey Riley is a major celebrity. That creates a unique framework for the scares that Smile 2 creates – but it also has major ramifications for the ending.

It’s been established that the entity needs moments of trauma to move from one host to another – but up until now in the series, that’s been a 1-to-1 transfer process. When Skye kills herself in front of an entire viewing audience, it causes trauma on a widespread scale – as highlighted by the final camera shot of the people in the crowd all being traumatized. The implication is that the entity can now infect people on a widespread scale (a whole pandemic of infection, if you will…), setting up Smile 3 to be a much, much, bigger scale of the psychological-horror concept.

Smile 2 is now in theaters.