Smile 2 is undeniably one of the scariest movies of 2024, but the film manages to incite fear in its audience through several different methods. It’s not all jump scares and brutal violence, but rather the film takes a very gradual, intentional approach to building tension that pays off even stronger in the long run. Many of these scenes are bound to stick with audiences long after the credits roll, which is even more effective than cheap scares played out merely for shock value. All of this comes together to make Smile 2 one of 2024’s most successful horror movies.
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The story of Smile 2 picks up directly where the first film ended, with Kyle Galner’s character Joel forced to pass the curse on to somebody else. That person ends up being a successful musical artist named Skye Riley, whose life has already been turned upside-down by a traumatic car accident that killed her celebrity boyfriend and left her permanently scarred. As she’s hunted down by the supernatural killer, Skye turns to a mysterious source to help her kill the demon for good. Smile 2 repeats some aspects of the first movie, but twists them for a totally new atmosphere.
10 Skye Is Harassed At The Meet And Greet
One Fan Just Doesn’t Know When To Stop
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This scare happens fairly early into Smile 2, just as Skye is beginning to realize that something is happening to her. After one of her shows, the protagonist makes her way to a Meet and Greet with her fans, where she’s stopped by a little girl who keeps smiling at her. It’s one of the first instances of the creature haunting Skye, and it’s made even creepier by the fact that nobody else at the convention seems to notice what’s happening.
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But what’s most uncomfortable about this scene is another interaction that Skye has, this time with an older man who begins harassing her. It’s a powerful scene that shatters the audience’s expectations for the film: everybody knows that Skye is going to have to battle the demon from the first movie, but what’s not expected is the other conflicts that she has in her life – such as these obsessive fans. It’s an interesting look into the power of stardom and celebrity, which distracts the viewer just for a second from the film’s main plot.
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9 The Creature Attacks Skye In The Walk-In Freezer
The Final Showdown Of The Film Is Really Creepy
The ending of Smile 2 creates some problems for a potential sequel, but it’s absolutely thrilling when considered in isolation. During Skye’s final battle against the creature, the singer locks herself in a walk-in freezer in order to slow her heart rate before injecting herself with a drug that will kill her for a brief moment, with the intention of killing the demon at the same time. However, this simply makes the creature even more aggressive and menacing, adopting Skye’s own appearance in the aftermath of her car accident.
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The Smile movies are both stories about overcoming trauma and facing your fears, and that’s exactly what happens in the Smile 2’s walk-in scene. Skye is brought face-to-face with the moment that her life was seemingly ruined, drawn into a physical fight with the manifestation of trauma that’s eating her alive. It’s a very profound and poignant moment, but the film also makes it absolutely terrifying with the violent imagery and uncanny nature of the demon.
8 Lewis Appears In The Mirror Behind Skye
The Demon Takes Many Forms To Scare Skye
Lewis Frilogi is the character from whom Skye inherits the curse, and it’s the moment of his death that initially haunts her in Smile 2’s first act. The singer begins to see her friend’s mutilated face everywhere she turns, and this allows for some well-timed jump scares as the ghost makes its appearance. The most effective happens when Skye is in her dressing room, and she sees Lewis suddenly appear in the mirror behind her, digging his fingers into her mouth to make her smile.
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The demon is always mocking Skye with its smile, and this comes to represent Skye’s inability to be happy without thinking of the trauma inside her.
The smiling imagery runs throughout Smile 2, but it’s never portrayed in a positive light. The demon is always mocking Skye with its smile, and this comes to represent Skye’s inability to be happy without thinking of the trauma inside her. It’s never clear exactly which scenes are real and which are imaginary in Smile 2, but it’s safe to assume that many of the demon’s appearances are actually hallucinations from Skye that happen suddenly and scare both herself and the audience.
7 Skye’s On-Stage Meltdown
The Protagonist Loses Her Composure In Front Of All Her Colleagues
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One scene in Smile 2 sees Skye Riley speaking on-stage as a favor to her friend, giving an important speech about the meaning of her work as a singer. However, things quickly turn south when the demon makes another appearance in the form of a smiling audience member. The creature totally derails Skye’s speech, ruining the autocue and forcing her to break down on stage in front of everybody.
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The scene is a metaphor for trauma’s ability to rear its head in the most unexpected of moments, and Smile 2 does an excellent job of portraying this. One’s first instinct is to cringe at Skye’s disrupted speech, but the film’s twisted atmosphere and creepy characters immediately make the audience share in her fear and forget about what she must look like to everybody around.
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6 Skye Is Haunted By A Naked Attacker
The Stalker Returns To Skye’s Dark Apartment
Skye is clearly a troubled character in Smile 2 long before the demon takes control of her. She’s recovering from addiction, she’s pushed all her friends away – Skye even pulls out her hair as a result of her withdrawals and stress. Through all this, the film ensures that it touches on several important themes instead of merely scaring the audience with ghosts and jumpscares. Another of these themes is celebrity stardom and toxic fans, which the demon preys on to torture Skye even more.
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Shortly after her conversation with Gemma, Skye’s demon takes the form of the stalker that attacked her earlier in the film, chasing her through her apartment. While it’s not the most obviously frightening scene in the film, the way director Parker Finn creates tension and unease makes it one of the most uncomfortable to watch.
5 The Opening Car Sequence
Joel’s Presence In Smile 2 Is Short-Lived
Custom Image by Simone Ashmoore
Although Smile 2 doesn’t follow Joel for the majority of the film, the opening sequence clearly explains how he manages to get rid of the curse and indirectly pass it to Skye. The scene has a totally different tone from the rest of the movie: it’s very fast-paced, high-intensity, and violent, unlike Skye’s more methodical and gradual story.
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In the scene, Joel kills a criminal in front of his associate in order to pass the curse onto him, but when more criminals turn up at the door and chase him from the house, Joel is hit by a fast-moving car in one of Smile 2’s biggest jump scares. The camera then slowly pans across his mangled body, revealing a trail of blood that forms the shape of a smile. It’s a chilling moment that immediately sets the tone for the story that’s to follow.
4 The Smiling Creatures Appear In Skye’s Apartment
The Demon Appears In Multiple Forms In Skye’s Apartment
Custom image by Brennan Klein
For the majority of Smile 2, there’s always one person who’s following Skye with a creepy smile on their face. It was the same in the first installment, and it’s a rule that’s been closely stuck to since then. However, given the dramatic reveal in Smile 2’s ending, the film leaves some room for it to play with this formula and bend reality a little. Therefore, when Skye is alone in her apartment one night, the creature manifests as a whole crowd of people.
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The smiling figures only move when Skye turns her back, but they quickly overwhelm her and create a suffocating atmosphere that raises the tension from zero to one hundred straight away. By having the creatures merely watch Skye from a distance before attacking her, the scene becomes even more menacing and frightening.
3 Skye Visits Lewis’ Apartment
The Inciting Incident Of Smile 2 Is One Of It’s Scariest Moments
Lewis Frigoli’s death scene was all over the marketing for Smile 2, but that didn’t make it any easier to watch. Lewis is the bystander that caught the curse from Joel’s death in the opening scene, and when Skye visits his apartment to score some drugs for the pain in her back, he’s too far gone to be saved. As the demon takes over him, Lewis smashes a weight into his own skull, killing himself.
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The way that the camera barely moves from Lewis’ face as he crushes his own skull is very disturbing, and the use of physical effects and practical makeup to create the illusion is really well done.
Despite knowing the scene is coming, this moment is still Smile 2’s most shocking incident. The way that the camera barely moves from Lewis’ face as he crushes his own skull is very disturbing, and the use of physical effects and practical makeup to create the illusion is really well done. Lukas Gage’s dedication to his Smile 2 death scene really paid off, and it remains one of the most distressing images in the film.
2 The Creature Finally Beats Skye On-Stage
Smile 2 Ends In A Similar Way To The First Film
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In the final moments of the film, it’s revealed that everything following Skye’s hospitalization was actually a hallucination caused by the devil: she never killed her mother, or escaped with Gemma, or tried to kill the spirit in a freezer. Instead, when Skye wakes up from her supernatural nightmare, she’s on stage at the concert and proceeds to kill herself in front of thousands of people in the audience.
Skye’s inability to defeat the demon wasn’t a huge surprise, since the original film opted for a very similar conclusion, but the film’s decision to kill her in such a brutal way in front of so many people was still horrifying, and the practical effects used to create the monster are chilling.
1 Skye (Sort Of) Kills Her Mother
The Film’s Most Disturbing Scene Is Extremely Violent
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Although it’s ultimately revealed to be a dream, the moments directly following Skye’s mother’s death are some of the most harrowing in the entire film. The death itself is violent, but it’s Skye’s realization that she was responsible for unwillingly killing her own mother that really chills the audience to the bone. Naomi Scott’s incredible performance in Smile 2 really peaks here, and the audience truly feels her horror at her own actions.
This is the moment that things really turn upside down in Smile 2, and Skye is fully consumed by the trauma that powers the demon inside her. It’s the beginning of an all-time great horror finale, fuelled by the disgust and guilt that Skye directs towards herself for killing her mom.
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28 8.5/10 Smile 2 HorrorThriller
Smile 2 is the sequel to the 2022 psychological horror film by director Parker Finn that centers on a therapist who witnesses a patient’s suicide, leading to a series of terrifying supernatural events. The sequel will see the return of Finn as director, with Paramount continuing distribution.
Director Parker Finn Release Date October 18, 2024 Distributor(s) Paramount Pictures Cast Kyle Gallner , Naomi Scott , Lukas Gage , Rosemarie DeWitt , Dylan Gelula , Peter Jacobson , Raul Castillo , Miles Gutierrez-Riley Runtime 132 minutes Main Genre Horror Expand
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