Smile 2 ending, explained: Skye Riley's tragic final hour

Spoilers ahead for Smile 2

Smile 2, the follow-up to the 2022 film, is now available to rent or buy on demand, and many feel that Parker Finn's sequel is bigger, better, and scarier than its predecessor.

This time around, the Entity targets global pop sensation Skye Riley (Naomi Scott), who is already struggling to cope with the aftermath of a traumatic car accident that left her hospitalized and killed her actor boyfriend. Her pain makes her the perfect target for the malevolent being acting like a parasite, forcing its hosts to commit suicide in front of a witness before latching onto its next victim.

Released this past October, Smile 2 earned positive reviews from critics and performed well at the box office, making over $132 million on a $28 million budget. It seems like there is a good chance for a third film to happen sometime in the future. The ending of Smile 2 certainly sets up a catastrophic plot for a potential third movie that I'd love to see come to fruition. Let's discuss the film's final act, read on for a full explanation and breakdown of the Smile 2 ending.

The Entity's show-stopping performance

Toward the end of the movie, Smile 2 makes several big moves to heighten the dramatic tension. A flashback reveals that Skye caused the car crash that killed her boyfriend. They were both high on drugs and got into an intense argument, culminating with Skye jerking the steering wheel.

The following shocking moment features Skye waking up in a special retreat after she blacks out in her apartment during the fight with the menacing Entity-created backup dancers. Her mother, Elizabeth, brutally kills herself with a shard of glass from a broken mirror. Or did she? Skye realizes that Elizabeth stabbing herself was a hallucination and it was actually her who killed her mother.

Forced to go on the run, Skye calls her friend Gemma for help. The pair drive toward a Pizza Hut, where Skye intends to meet Morris, stop her heart, and hopefully rid herself of the Entity once and for all. But the creature isn't done playing tricks just yet. The "Gemma" in the car isn't Gemma at all, but another hallucination. Even more shocking is that Skye listens to a voicemail from the real Gemma that reveals that the Entity has been pretending to be Gemma for the whole week they've been hanging out again. Skye forcefully reasserts control and seems to break the hallucination.

Morris and Skye plan to execute their plan in the walk-in freezer so the low temperature will lower Skye's body temperature quicker and make it easier to revive her. But their plan fails. Skye injects herself with the syringe meant to stop her heart, yet the Entity is unaffected.

Worse, she wakes up again and finds herself performing on stage in the middle of her tour. Her mother is alive and well in the crowd. Skye realizes that she'd been hallucinating basically everything and the Entity takes the opportunity to kill Skye in front of everyone in attendance at the concert, seemingly infecting everyone there simultaneously.

What was real and what was fake?

The most confusing aspect of the film's final act is the eventual reveal that most of, if not all, the third act of the movie (maybe even the whole thing) was a hallucination. Although it appears like Skye manages to temporarily kill herself and even fight off the Entity to reassert control over her own mind, the ending scene reveals that it didn't work. The Entity is still there and more terrifying than ever.

By showing Elizabeth in the audience, we know that Skye never killed her, and that Elizabeth might not have been in the retreat at all. Actually, the end of the film makes it impossible to discern what aspects of Skye's story were real and which weren't. The part where Skye learns "Gemma" was the Entity all along indicates that Skye has been hallucinating almost entirely ever since she saw Lewis kill himself. Maybe none of it was real.

Chatting with The Wrap, director Parker Finn revealed he loved the ending because it felt meta.

"The audience in that arena, staring through the screen at the audience in the movie theater. Wait, did we do this? Like, by us coming back and watching ‘Smile 2,’ have we done this to Skye? Are we somehow complicit?”

Smile 2 is now available on demand.