Film / Smile 2

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Spoilers for Smile (2022) will remain unmarked. You Have Been Warned.

Smile 2 is a 2024 Supernatural Psychological Horror film and the sequel to 2022's Smile. It is once again directed and written by Parker Finn and stars Naomi Scott, Lukas Gage, and Rosemarie DeWitt. Kyle Gallner reprises his role as Joel from the first film.

Skye Riley (Scott) is an international pop sensation, ready to launch her new world tour. But after witnessing the horrific suicide of her friend Lewis, smiling ear-to-ear, she gets entangled in increasingly terrifying and inexplicable events. Completely engulfed by the escalating horrors surrounding her and the pressure of fame, she's forced to confront her dark past to regain control of her life before it spirals out of control.

Produced by Temple Hill Entertainment, Bad Feeling (Parker Finn's production label) and distributed by Paramount Pictures, the movie was released to theaters on October 18, 2024.

Reports👁 Image
are being made that Paramount may have given the greenlight for a third installment, with production rumored to begin in 2025.

Previews: Teaser👁 Image
, Trailer👁 Image

Smile 2 contains examples of the following:

• 20 Minutes into the Past: The film is set in 2022, just two weeks after the end of the first one.
• Abusive Parents: Elizabeth unabashedly exploits her own daughter Skye. Even when Skye gets so badly beaten she ends up in the hospital, Elizabeth insists that Skye owes it to her to perform and make money. However, this version of Elizabeth is quickly revealed to be the Entity, so it's unknown if Elizabeth is truly like this to Skye in real life, or if it's just another tactic for the Entity to make Skye feel hopeless and alone.
• Action Prologue: The opening follows Joel's attempt to pass the curse on to someone else.
• Actor Allusion: This isn't the first time Peter Jacobson has played someone with a medical background.
• Agony of the Feet: Skye steps on a glass bottle and gets a huge piece of glass stuck in her foot.
• All Just a Dream: The third act of the film is revealed to be just a hallucination that the entity inflicted on Skye in order to control her.
• Ambiguous Situation: There are so many in this film, it's enough to get its own page.
• Arc Symbol: Smiles, obviously.
  • The scar on Skye's knee resembles a smile.
  • When Skye wipes her mouth to get rid of a fly, she smudges her lipstick which forms a wider smile on her face.
• Asshole Victim:
  • Joel attempts to pass the curse onto a drug dealer by killing his brother in front of him, and specifically sought the duo out because they killed a mother and her child. His plan hits a snag when Yev shoots at him for killing Alexi, and Joel ends up fatally shooting him in the process.
  • Paul dies in the car crash right after he tells Skye that she looks ugly and unfuckable when she's crying. ( Skye might also qualify since she was equally vitriolic, just as coked-up and, to top it off, purposelly caused the accident that killed him)
• Atomic F-Bomb: After her initial meeting with Morris, Skye returns to her apartment only to have a mental breakdown and let three of these out consecutively (with the last being the most atomic) after she hurts her back and pulls out more of her hair, just before encountering the entity's conjurations of the dancers.
• Audible Sharpness: Lewis's katana makes a very faint "shing" sound when he holds it to Skye's throat.
• Back for the Dead: Joel returns from the first film only to be killed off in the film's opening scene.
• Beauty Inversion: Iván Carlo, the guy who plays the creepy fan with bad skin, clearly looks handsome and doesn't have bad skin at all👁 Image
  ◊ in real life. But the makeup (plus the character's disgusting behavior) makes him seem repulsive in this movie.
• Big "NO!": In the final scene, Skye lets out a few of these when she sees the Entity's true monstrous form for the first time.
• Black Comedy: Parker Finn often includes jokes that are darkly humorous to him but may not be picked up by others. One example of this is the bathroom scene. While packing up her toiletries, Skye goes to pick up her toothbrush, but it inflames her back injury and triggers a breakdown that culminates in her throwing a mirror at her shower door, destroying it. And after all that, the only thing she takes from the bathroom is her toothbrush.
• Bookends: The film begins and ends with a shot of one of the Entity's victims staring directly at the camera.
• Call-Back:
  • As Joel walks into Yev's house, he ignores a hallucination of Rose self-immolating.
  • Joel kills Alexi by slashing his throat, the same way that Laura, the Entity's first on-screen victim, died.
• Can't Get Away with Nuthin': Skye probably could have avoided the curse if she hadn't snuck into Lewis's apartment to buy drugs.
• Casting Gag: Ray Nicholson is definitely channeling some of his father Jack's creepiness from The Shining.
• Cheated Death, Died Anyway: Joel. He successfully passes the curse onto another person (albeit, not the person he intended) after killing two drug dealers and is spared the Entity's wrath. Unfortunately, as he's fleeing the scene of his crime, he's violently run over by a pickup truck.
• Chekhov's Gunman: The "smiling dancers" in Skye's apartment are her backup dancers from the rehearsals.
• Creator Cameo:
  • Writer and director Parker Finn has a cameo as a photographer.
  • Morris's brother was portrayed by Jeremy Selenfriend, a member of the special effects team.
  • Most of the people in the bar were members of the crew rather than extras.
• Creepy Child: Skye signs a little girl's T-shirt, but it's an awkward exchange due to her smile.
• Cruel and Unusual Death: Just like the first movie, the deaths in this film are quite brutal and graphic. This time around we see Joel getting turned into mincemeat by a truck, Lewis smashing his head in with a giant weight plate three times, a shot of Morris' brother tearing off his jaw with a crowbar, (a vision of) Elizabeth stabbing herself in the neck and eye with a shard of glass, and finally (although off-screen), Skye jamming a microphone through one of her eye sockets.
• Cruel Twist Ending: One that somehow manages to be even crueler than the first! After escaping from the hospital with help from Gemma, Skye meets up with Morris to kill the Smile Entity, but it turns out that the whole episode is just another long, elaborate vision, and she is about to perform on stage when the Smile Entity possesses her, and she kills herself in front of a massive audience. One can only surmise the horrific implications as to what comes next.
• Dark Reprise: A non-musical variant. When the "smiling dancers" grab hold of Skye, they hold her down with a much rougher and more violent version of the choreography from the rehearsals for "New Brain" and "Blood on White Satin."
• Deadly Euphemism: Joel tells Yev that he's going to "give him something," that something being the Entity's curse.
• Decoy Protagonist: The film begins with Joel from the first film attempting to rid himself of the Entity before the focus shifts to the new character of Skye.
• Diabolus ex Machina: Joel's death has absolutely nothing to do with the Entity's curse. He manages to free himself of the demon's grasp, and while he's fleeing from a drug den, a truck comes out of nowhere and runs him over. We have no idea who was driving the truck, if it was a freak accident, if one of the drug dealers ran him over as payback for the two men he killed, or if the Entity found a convoluted way to kill him because it's just sadistic like that.
• Didn't Think This Through: Joel uses what he has learned in the previous movie to put together a solid plan to get rid of the Entity: he targets two criminals who escaped justice, specifically killing one in front of the other to pass it on the survivor, just as the convict in the previous film did. While the first part of the plan goes on surprisingly well, what he failed to account for is that the second criminal would have likely reacted violently to the first one's death, forcing Joel to defend himself. Sure enough, a shoot-out ensues and the second criminal is fatally wounded, though he lucks out when another guy shows up to buy drugs and becomes a valid target. The plan itself is a case of this, although forgivable considering the huge stress and short timespan constricting Joel: the curse can be passed by making someone else witness horrific acts of violence, meaning two violent criminals are very likely to pass the curse to someone else quickly enough. Joel would be free anyway, but the punishment aspect of the plan was likely to fall off anyway.
• Downer Beginning: The movie takes place six days after Joel witnessed Rose's suicide, and it's clear he has little time left before the Entity claims him. Desperate, Joel tries to pass on the curse to a drug dealer who murdered a woman and child. His plan goes horribly awry; Joel accidentally kills the man he was trying to pass the curse onto in front of Lewis, which passes the curse onto him instead, thus starting the chain of events for Skye later. Even worse, Joel ends up getting run over by a truck for his troubles.
• Downer Ending: This movie manages to have an even bleaker ending than the first. Possibly the entire week after Lewis's death was an elaborate hallucination, and the Entity possesses Skye on the opening night of her comeback tour— as in, while she's on stage in front of thousands of people— and makes her ram her microphone into one of her eye sockets in front of the horrified crowd. And since we don't know whether or not the Entity can curse multiple people at once, this raises the frightening implication that it's just started a chain reaction of apocalyptic proportions.
• Dramatic Irony: When Skye shows up on stage, the last thing she sees her mother do is reminding her to smile.
• Dream Within a Dream: Possibly the entire movie after Lewis Fregoli's death, except for the final scene, ends up being one lengthy illusion/hallucination that the Entity created for Skye, which means that possibly all the nightmares and specific apparitions that Skye experiences and seemingly overcomes are this.
• Drowning My Sorrows: Lewis is snorting a line of coke in his final moments, following a week of torture courtesy of the Entity.
• Dying as Yourself: The one small consolation with Joel's death is that he didn't die having lost all control of his body with the Entity wearing his skin in one of its imaginative ways to commit suicide.
• Establishing Character Moment: During her interview with Drew Barrymore, Skye gives a clearly well-prepared and rehearsed apology to her fans, her loved ones, and her team for her self-destructive behavior prior to the accident. When Drew asks how she's been recovering, the scene momentarily cuts to Skye crying while ripping out her hair, showing that she's hiding a lot of pain and guilt from the public.
• Everyone Went to School Together: Two of Skye's closest friends that we see onscreen (one of whom happens to be her drug dealer), Gemma and Lewis, went to high school with her.
• Expository Hairstyle Change: Skye had long black hair before the crash and wears it in a blonde pixie cut in the present. It's because she tore out much of her hair while in recovery/withdrawl.
• Expy:
  • Skye's concert takes place at Herald Square Garden, a stand-in for Madison Square Garden.
  • Skye's apartment building is called the Wentworth Building, which is actually the Woolworth Building.
• Eye Scream:
  • "Elizabeth" gouges "her" left eye out with a shard from a shattered mirror while Skye helplessly watches.
  • Skye’s final fate is the Entity possessing her to bash her head with her microphone, until the final shot shows it having gone through her eye.
• Face-Revealing Turn: Skye collapses on stage and apparently chokes. After a few moments, she stands up with her back to the audience. She then turns around to reveal she is smiling.
• Facial Horror: Lewis smashes his face with a barbell weight until his skin is peeling off and his jaw is visible.
• Fauxshadow: Another unusual example. Something is... off, about Morris, from the moment it turns out the unknown number that was ominously texting Skye was apparently an ally. His plan to temporarily kill Skye and revive her to kill the Entity is an entirely too good to be true Hope Spot, nobody interacts with him besides Skye, he knows an awful lot about the Entity, and he leads her to a very shady place and acts strangely when she finally agrees to go through with it. While it's certainly not made clear whether or not he actually existed, given that a massive proportion of the movie was a hallucination which may or may not have precluded his introduction, the one "revealed" (in an unclear way) to have been imaginary was Gemma.
• Finger-Forced Smile: When she looks in the mirror in her dressing room, Lewis, bloody forehead and all appears behind her in the reflection, forcing her lips into a huge smile.
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: The Entity terrorizes Skye by having "Elizabeth" stab herself in the eye, foreshadowing the method with which it will kill her.
• Flashing Discretion Shot: When Skye meets with Morris to enact his plan to stop the Smile Entity, he gives her a fresh hospital johnny to replace the bloodstained one she's wearing. Skye immediately strips naked to change, causing a startled Morris to turn away; the camera follows his face and places her behind his head, keeping the viewer from seeing skin.
• Foreshadowing:
  • An unusual and rather convoluted subversion happens during the scenes when Skye is texting Gemma, sending her numerous distressed messages in different situations to which Gemma never replies, although these messages are sent by Skye after she and Gemma supposedly made amends and are best friends again. All of this hints towards the twist how the "Gemma" that Skye made amends with and who later sporadically follows Skye is not real, but rather just another illusion by the Entity, while the text messages and a later phone call with a cold and distant Gemma are real. However, while the former part is technically true, the latter conclusion about the text messages' reliability that was seemingly being foreshadowed ends up being avoided in an even more dramatic fashion when the real big twist is that the vast majority of the movie was all just one big illusion by the Entity, with almost all of those earlier moments when Skye seemingly "connects the dots" and becomes more proactive didn't even happen, which also includes the scene when, thanks to her phone, Skye seemingly "realizes" that Gemma driving the car is the Entity while the "real" Gemma is calling her on the phone after not answering her messages for a long time – in reality, both of these "Gemmas" were just figments of a much more elaborate illusion by the Entity, as were pretty much all the supposed hints towards what's real and what's an illusion.
  • When Lewis sees the Entity prior to his possession, the camera tilts upward, giving the impression that he's looking at something freakishly tall. As we see at Skye's concert, it is.
  • Eyes are a recurring visual element throughout the film. There's an eye drawing in Skye's songbook and she has an eye sculpture on her piano. When she apparently kills "Elizabeth," the blood on her scrubs form the outline of an eye. This foreshadows Skye's ultimate fate by smashing her eye with a microphone.
  • During the rehearsal of "Blood on White Satin," the backup dancers all place their hands over Skye's body. Later, the Entity creates phantoms of her dancers and they do the exact same thing, albeit more menacingly as they're now trying to hold her down.
  • There are, however, some straight examples during the last sequence: the doctor saying that Skye is severely dehydrated despite her constantly drinking water through the movie tells us not to trust what we see and that the Entity is able to conjure far more complex, subtle and enduring scenarios than anticipated. There are also several logical jumps and inconsistencies that cannot be explained by the Entity's power (like Skye managing to free herself and overpower her mother without a struggle, suddenly learning how to drive and managing to do so for around a minute with her eyes closed) that hints at the fact that the whole scene is not real.
  • There is one before that point, when the "smiling dancers" appearing in Skye's house drag her down, and a bloody arm is shoved down her throat, not unlike how the final possession was revealed to take place in the first movie. Even if it's not the exact moment Skye gets possessed, the Entity is in complete control after that point.
  • During the confrontation in the abandoned Pizza Hut, when the Entity impersonates Skye from the night of her car accident, the creature says it's been waiting for Skye for a "long time". Even though the actual time that's passed is hard to keep track of because the Entity's powers render a large portion of events a hallucination, it doesn't seem that it was haunting Skye any longer than its previous victims. But by the end of the film, it becomes obvious what it said it was waiting for: a chance to possess a victim in front of an audience of thousands which, depending on how one interprets the situation, could lead to its chain of victims turning into a full-on network.
  • Even the pictured poster is an example. The thin red crack running down Sky'e right eye and the wider red crack forming her mouth into a smile alludes to her final fate: possessed by the Entity through her mouth and forced to kill herself by slamming a microphone into that eye. An alternate poster depicts Skye bathed in red light while a white light in the shape of a smile is over her right eye, also foreshadowing her fate.
    • In addition, when Skye is attacked by the "smiling dancers," her right eye gets slammed into the piano. Later, when she apparently kills her mother, she slaps the right side of her face. Both of these foreshadow her fate.
  • Despite Skye's mother pushing Skye to contact and call Gemma, she seemingly doesn't notice, nor interact with Gemma the morning after Gemma supposedly sleeps over at Skye's.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus:
  • If you pause on the scenes where we get brief glimpses of Skye's phone contacts, you can spot Adele, Beyoncé, Doja Cat, and Lady Gaga among them. It also lists director Parker Finn.
  • During the charity event, Skye freaks out when she sees Paul approaching her while smiling. She closes her eyes and he disappears. However, the teleprompter still has Paul's name listed in her speech, showing that she's still hallucinating.
• Fright Beside Them: Done on a larger scale than in the first film. Skye gets back in touch with her friend Gemma, whom she had previously alienated with her increasingly abrasive and vulgar behavior. The two of them make amends, and Gemma sleeps over at Skye's apartment. In the days that follow, Skye texts Gemma several times when she is in distress but receives no reply. Eventually, she runs into Gemma during a crisis and the two of them get into a car and drive away together. Soon, however, Skye's phone rings. She answers, and it's Gemma, explaining that she was confused by Skye's texts since they hadn't seen each other since their falling out. The entire reconciliation was an illusion created by the demonic Entity.
• Fury-Fueled Foolishness: Skye, high on coke and in the middle of a raging argument with her boyfriend, yanked the steering wheel on the highway and pulled them off the road.
• Gone Horribly Right: Joel does manage to pass on the curse without succumbing to it himself. But instead of passing it on a heartless drug lord who murdered a little girl and her mother, Joel accidentally passes the curse on to Lewis, a small-time drug dealer who isn't a malicious person. Lewis then ends up passing it to his client, pop star Skye Riley, which kicks off the horrific events of the movie.
  Joel, tearfully: It wasn't meant for you... it wasn't meant for you!
• Gory Discretion Shot: The end of the film does not show Skye jamming the microphone into her eye, instead focusing on the horrified reaction of the audience. Also qualifies as a Sound-Only Death, up until we see the aftermath.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Skye is prone to explosive outbursts and repeatedly flies into destructive rages, and while plenty of it can be blamed on the toll of the Entity's torment, it's very heavily implied that this is not a new tendency.
• Half the Man He Used to Be: Joel's legs and lower torso are completely obliterated when he's run over, leaving only the upper half under the truck.
• Heroic Sacrifice: A despondent if determined Skye becomes fixated on defeating the Entity by the end of the film, telling Morris that ultimately it doesn't matter what her final fate is as long as she doesn't hurt anyone else. Tragically, there was never much chance of this actually happening.
• Hope Spot: The Downer Beginning and Downer Ending both have this to the fullest possible extent.
  • Joel manages to successfully exploit the loophole of gruesomely killing someone in front of a witness, thereby freeing himself of the curse. However, he's confronted by more gangsters as he attempts to flee and is then run over by a truck.
  • Like Rose in the first film, Skye attempts to confront the Entity by killing herself. There is a moment where it seems to work, only for the Entity to then show that she's not holding the syringe. Then it's revealed that none of that is happening either; she's on stage in front of thousands of fans.
• Ironic Echo: The Entity tells Skye to "break a leg" before she goes onstage, echoing the fact that her leg was broken in the car accident that killed her boyfriend Paul.
• It Began with a Twist of Fate: If Skye hadn't dropped her last three Vicodin pills down the sink, then she probably wouldn't have texted Lewis for another day or two, potentially sparing her from the Entity.
• Left the Background Music On: According to Parker Finn, the music that plays when Skye emerges at her concert was crafted to serve as both the out-of-universe soundtrack and an in-universe tune that would play for the show's opening. In fact, it was later released on the official Skye Riley YouTube channel as one of her songs.
• Lightswitch Surprise: After meeting Morris and deciding to run away from her life, Skye tries to avoid this by turning on all the lights in her apartment while preparing to leave. After having a breakdown in her bathroom, she goes to her walk-in closet, turns on the light, and sees her "backup dancers" standing in her way, smiling at her.
• Lonely at the Top: One of the film's central themes. Despite being an international superstar with millions of loyal fans and a devoted team, Skye is often by herself and feels trapped by the pressures of fame. It's clear that she wants someone to love her for being Skye the person rather than Skye the singer.
• Ludicrous Gibs: When Joel gets hit by the truck in the trailer, there is a lot of blood and entrails on the road (plus his severed foot), and the direction of the swerving truck causes the blood to form into a smile.
• The Mafiya: Yev and Alexi have heavy accents and tattoos based on those used in Russian prisons.
• Male Frontal Nudity: "Alfredo" appears full naked during the scare in Skye's apartment, though the shadows partially obscure him.
• Match Cut:
  • When Skye sees "Lewis" in her apartment and just sits in bed, the scene cuts to her being prepped in her dressing room the next day, matching her vacant expression.
  • After the disaster at Darius's foundation event, the camera slowly pans across the room as Darius and Elizabeth try to explain themselves to the event organizers, showing Skye sitting off to the side. Then it cuts to Skye's walk-in wardrobe where she's sitting in a corner checking her messages.
• Meaningful Name: Skye's drug dealer is named Lewis Fregoli. The Fregoli delusion👁 Image
  is when someone believes that multiple people are actually the same person in disguise, which, as shown in the first film, is the Smile Entity's MO and fits Laura's description of it "wearing people's faces like masks."
• Mirror Monster: While looking in the mirror, Skye sees Lewis looming behind her, but when she looks back, he's not there.
• Missing Time: Skye repeatedly experiences this due to the Entity's hallucinations. For example, she loses nearly an hour between calling Gemma and her actually coming over.
• Mood Whiplash:
  • In one scene, Skye sits down to sing about her struggles while playing her piano. This is a tender, vulnerable moment for her — she's not performing in front of the crowd, just singing with passion, all alone in her apartment... or so she thinks. Her genuinely moving attempt to channel her stress into music gets interrupted fairly quickly by the Entity.
  • One of the earlier musical performance scenes. It goes from a music video tingling your scalp with ASMR beats to a jumpscare and Skye is screaming in horrified agony with an open fracture.
• More Teeth than the Osmond Family: If you look closely at the Entity-Skye during the freezer scene when it opens its mouth impossibly wide, you can see multiple rows (at least 5) of teeth.
• Morton's Fork: Almost all the obstacles and perils that Skye faces throughout the movie end up being less than inconsequential – they didn't even really happen but were instead just illusions created by the Entity to torment her (and also waste precious time). Even small victories such as Skye seemingly being in control for brief moments do not count, as the apparitions that she seemingly overcame were just Dream Within a Dream and none of that had any influence on reality, in which the Entity was firmly controlling Skye until the very end.
• Ms. Fanservice: Skye is a fit, attractive woman. Her tight, revealing stage outfits and her glamorous photoshoots make no secret of that. Skye doesn't seem to mind playing this role — really, the only issue she has with one midriff-baring outfit is the fact that you can see an abdominal scar from the wound she acquired her car crash. Though in her private time, she wears very loose, comfy, formless clothes.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Joel has this reaction when he finds Lewis at the drug house, realizing that the curse will be passed onto a regular person instead of a drug kingpin who murdered a child.
  Joel (to Lewis): I didn't know anyone else was here. [...] [whispering] I'm sorry.
• Newscaster Cameo: Skye's first appearance is an interview on Drew Barrymore's talk show.
• New York Is Only Manhattan: Subverted. Skye lives in a Lower Manhattan penthouse and meets Morris at an East Village bar, but she goes to Staten Island to attempt to kill the Entity. "Gemma" is not enthusiastic about going to Staten Island at all, responding to her request with "Ew, why?"
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero!: In Joel's attempt to pass the entity on to someone he feels deserves it, Joel inadvertently sets off a series of events that not only leads to his own death but also leads to hundreds (possibly thousands) of people, including children, getting infected at once.
• Noodle Incident: Shortly before they had a falling-out, Gemma did something that made Skye call her opportunist scum. We never find out what it was. However, a series of candid photos on the news shows Skye screaming at Gemma while doing coke, suggesting that her drug addiction was a factor.
• Not Quite Saved Enough: Joel does manage to pass on the Smile curse in the opening scene, only to end up run over minutes later. It doesn't even seem to be related to the curse in any particularly clear way.
• Nothing Is Scarier: We don't see any of the Entity's hauntings from Lewis's perspective, whereas Laura's haunting was shown in Laura Hasn't Slept and Joel briefly sees a burning Rose while walking to the drug dealer's house. Morris sends a video that Lewis posted where he sees something smiling at him in a corner but there's nothing there. Given his reactions, the Entity was definitely not kind to him.
• Oh, Crap!: Besides the entire film being one long chain of these, the worst one comes at the end when Skye realizes that nothing she had been seeing with Morris or the abandoned Pizza Hut was real; she's actually on stage, about to perform in front of thousands of fans, and the Entity is ready to claim her.
• The Oner:
  • The entire opening sequence with Joel is one shot that lasts about seven minutes.
  • When Skye has a breakdown in her apartment, the shot lasts just under two minutes from her downing a bottle of Voss to throwing a mirror at her shower door.
  • The argument between Skye and Paul before the car crash is one unbroken shot that's just under three minutes long.
• Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping: When Skye drops her last Vicodin pills down the sink, Naomi Scott briefly slips into her natural British accent when she tells Elizabeth to wait a second.
• Orifice Invasion: As in the first film, the Smile Entity's method for possessing the protagonist is to stretch her mouth open big enough to accommodate itself as it crawls inside her. THIS time however, there's no merciful zoom out of the event, and the audience is treated to the gruesome sight of Skye's mandible dislocating and tearing.
  • Earlier, when Skye is mobbed by the "smiling dancers" in her apartment, one of them shoves most of his arm down her throat.
• Pay Evil unto Evil: Joel attempts this by trying to pass the curse on to Yev who murdered a woman and her child. Unfortunately for him, Yev is shot and bleeds to death, and the relatively innocent Lewis happened to be standing there the entire time and saw the whole thing.
• Police Are Useless: Lampshaded. Skye asks Morris if he's tried going to the police, but he says that trying to involve them is pointless since they wouldn't believe him and are completely powerless against the Entity.
• P.O.V. Cam: During the flashback to the crash, the camera alternates between Skye and Paul's POV.
• Product Placement: Voss bottled water is a consant presence in the film as Skye chugs it often and the branding is made quite visible. Skye also uses an Apple iPhone and someone is using a MacBook during the "New Brain" rehearsal.
• Psychic-Assisted Suicide: As per the understanding of the Smile Entity, Lewis' seven days are up and he tries to get Skye to help him in the trailer, unwillingly passing the curse onto her when he kills himself.
• Recycled with a Gimmick: The plot more or less follows the structure of the first one beat for beat, with the main differences being exploring what it would be like if the Entity possessed a pop star and, ultimately, that some unclear but even more significant amount of the film was a hallucination - though in any case still an escalation of the first's third-act Hope Spot.
• The Reveal: Skye caused the accident that killed her boyfriend.
• Rewatch Bonus:
  • On a second viewing, it's clear that the TV on which we first see Skye is the same one in Lewis's apartment, suggesting that the Entity through Lewis became aware of her while watching the interview.
  • Skye calls Gemma and leaves a voicemail. Gemma immediately calls her back. With the twists later in the film, watching this again makes the viewer wonder if anyone actually did call Skye.
• Rule of Symbolism:
  • In a 👁 This example contains a YMMV entry. It should be moved to the YMMV tab.
    Fridge Brilliance Serial Escalation of the previous movie, resulting from Skye being a Contrasting Sequel Main Character compared to Rose. Skye is revealed to have been trapped so thoroughly in a hallucination it's hard to tell when it even began. Rose from the last movie was trapped in several herself but it was discernible when they started and ended; Rose's trauma, which the Smile Entity represents/feeds on, is due to a singular moment in her life whilst the rest of it was built around being a respectable psychiatrist to try and move on. Skye's life is that of a pop singer, something which brings her a great deal of stress and unhappiness she cannot escape from, given that it is her whole purpose, and her own traumatic event and drug addiction only made it worse. Rose's one case of trauma presented several isolated hallucinations whilst Skye's life of it led to ones that seamlessly blended together or simply one in constant effect.
  • Skye's tour opener is intended to have a butterfly theme, with a butterfly motif on her costume and Skye emerging from a chrysalis setpiece. Since the tour is her comeback and she has a new haircut, it all uses imagery of metamorphosis so Skye can rebrand and resume her career and move past her issues. At the end of the film, the Smile Entity has twisted Skye's perception so thoroughly that she ended up at her tour opening without realizing, and the Entity faces her with the avatar of an exact copy of herself, butterfly costume and all, before taking the metamorphosis theme literally by tearing the fake Skye body open and emerging in true form from its skin as if it were a chrysalis. This visual and the loss of hope, realizing she'd been manipulated so thoroughly, then breaks Skye down enough for the Entity to enter her and metamorphose the real Skye into its total host.
  • Parker Finn made extensive use of mirrors throughout the film, to show how Skye can never escape herself and her image. In the end, the form that the Entity takes when it's ready to possess Skye is herself.
• Same Plot Sequel: This movie pretty much follows its predecessor down pat, following the same beats. While the protagonist is very distinct, and there are a few elements that are unique to this movie, it still can be summarized with the exact same words and still be accurate to its premise.
• Scenery Porn: There are a number of disorienting yet beautiful drone shots of the New York City skyline.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here!: After meeting with Morris and refusing to go through with his plan, Skye decides to run away from her life. Unfortunately, the Entity then creates multiple phantoms to capture her.
• Shout-Out:
  • Parker Finn based Lewis's death scene on Alfred Molina's appearance in Boogie Nights, down to the bathrobe he's wearing.
  • The room where Skye prepares herself for a shoot is partly inspired by the Black Lodge from Twin Peaks. It's hard to notice at first, because the room is decorated and uses a more neutral color palette, but a shot of her alone in the room looking in the mirror makes it clearer with the monochromatic zigzag patterned floor and the walls being wholly curtained.
  • When Skye is chased by the "smiling dancers," she momentarily looks away and sees that they're much closer than before, similar to the Weeping Angels from Doctor Who.
• Shown Their Work: Parker Finn worked with surgeons to create accurate scars on Skye's body, basing it on what victims in severe car accidents might receive. The scar on her torso is from what's called an exploratory laparotomy, which is used to examine the internal organs for any damage.
• Shrine to Self: Skye's apartment is decorated to her accomplishments, including a platinum record and an issue of Rolling Stone with her on the cover.
• Single Tear: Skye sheds one after watching "Lewis" kill himself.
• Slasher Smile:
  • A given, being the sequel to Smile (2022). Lewis kills himself while giving off a malicious smile, latching the curse onto Skye as she begins to see others with that same smile.
  • Although a big smile is essential to most stage performances, the Entity's signature smile in the last scene, finally taking full control of Skye's body, is unnerving enough that even her huge crowd of adoring fans who worship her and are full of adrenaline quickly stop cheering upon seeing it.
• Slashed Throat: How Joel kills Alexi with a utility knife.
• Small Role, Big Impact:
  • Joel, the only returning human character from the first film, is onscreen for just a few minutes but his actions set the film's plot in motion.
  • Lewis is only around for a few scenes, but his presence at the drug den that Joel was at and passing of the curse onto Skye leads to the rest of the movie.
• Spiteful Spit: Skye attempts to do this when she's confronted by the Entity, but it's holding her by her throat, causing her to fail.
• Splash of Color: When Skye and her dancers are rehearsing "New Brain," everyone is dressed in neutral white, black, and grey while the curtains and Skye's socks are red.
• Stage Mom: Skye's mother Elizabeth is also her manager. While it is ambiguous how much is real and not the Entity's influence, it is implied that she is pushing for her daughter to be in show business in order to benefit herself.
• Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome: A relatively unsurprising case. Joel gets run over by a truck at the beginning, but witnessing the death of one of the cursed was already known to be how it passes on in the first time, so him dying was pretty much guaranteed. What wasn't guaranteed was him successfully passing on the curse, only to die mere minutes later regardless.
• Suspicious Ski Mask: Joel puts on a ski mask before going into the drug house to pass the curse to Yev.
• Tantrum Throwing: While trying to pack up to leave, Skye throws a mirror at the glass door in her shower, shattering it.
• Thousand-Yard Stare: The film opens with a shot of Joel having a completely vacant stare after what had been six days of agonizing torment by the Entity.
• Throwing Out the Script: Skye gets invited to speak at Darius's benefit dinner. However, the Entity's influence causes the teleprompter to stop scrolling, forcing Skye to give an impromptu speech in which she calls out the high demands of the entertainment industry. To finish messing with her, the Entity asks her to introduce Paul Hudson, her deceased boyfriend, as the next speaker.
• Time Skip: The film opens six days after Rose killed herself and then picks up within a week afterwards.
• Trailers Always Spoil: The teaser trailer quite clearly shows a wounded Joel running out into the middle of the street before getting pulverized by a truck. What's even more irritating is that this is the first scene in the movie.
• 👁 This example contains a TRIVIA entry. It should be moved to the TRIVIA tab.
  Tuckerization: Skye keeps her Vicodin pills in a mint tin labeled Sarroff's, after the film's cinematographer Charlie Sarroff.
• Uncertain Doom: When Skye appears to be choking on stage (which is really the Entity possessing her), Elizabeth, Joshua, and Darius can be seen leaving the crowd to presumably get help backstage, leaving it unknown if they get infected by the Entity. Also, it's unknown if the Entity will possess the entire audience or just one individual, leaving the fate of some 20,000 people unclear.
• Understatement:
  • During their interview, Drew Barrymore describes Skye has having gone through "a rough patch." She replies that it's generous to call it that.
  • Lewis tells Skye that he's having "the worst week." If the first film is anything to go by, the Entity has not been kind to him.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Joel ignores a hallucination of a burning Rose at the start of the film. Justified in that he's probably been seeing a lot of freaky shit in the last six days, and he's in the midst of trying to pass the curse on in the short time he has left.
• Villains Out Shopping: Joel intercepts the drug dealers while Alexi is returning from getting coffee. Yev asks if his brother got his pumpkin frappe.
• Visual Pun:
  • When Skye is in Lewis's apartment, the news is talking about an upcoming snowfall while the camera focuses on the line of cocaine on the table.
  • During the rehearsal for "Blood on White Satin," Skye apparently breaks her leg while on stage.
• Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Skye pukes on screen after watching Lewis kill himself.
• Wham Line: As Skye is being driven to Staten Island, she gets a call from Gemma, despite the latter being her apparent driver. During the call, we get this exchange that really drives home how much of a hold the Entity now has on Skye:
  Skye: Did you spend the night at my place?
  Gemma: What? I haven't been to your place in like a year.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: We never see the driver of the truck that kills Joel or learn if they were injured or killed in the crash.
• Would Hurt a Child:
  • There are several young girls and teenagers in the audience when Skye kills herself. While it's unclear whether the Entity can possess multiple people at once, they have all been inflicted with horrific psychological trauma at seeing one of their beloved singers die so gruesomely on stage.
  • Joel specifically picked his victims because they had killed a girl.
• You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: Elizabeth's reaction when she comes to Skye's apartment and sees that she's still in her pajamas.
• Your Mind Makes It Real: Invoked by Skye to deal with the false Gemma. It's revealed to be subverted in the end, though, since Skye was already trapped in an illusion anyway and only allowed to believe it to torment her more, with the Entity even throwing back her words at her mockingly.
• Zerg Rush: Skye gets chased by a group of "smiling dancers" in her apartment, which is the first time the Entity manifests multiple phantoms at once.