Yahoo Movies Smile 2 debuts with higher Rotten Tomatoes rating than Smile
Smile 2 has put an even bigger grin on the faces of horror fans than its predecessor, debuting with a higher Rotten Tomatoes score than Smile.
The sequel to the 2022 horror centres on global pop star Skye Riley (Naomi Scott), who sees her world unravel when she embarks on a world tour and encounters the sinister, smiley entity of the first movie.
Once again written and directed by Parker Finn, Smile 2 has opened with an 82% critics' score on Rotten Tomatoes – a slightly higher rating than the first, Certified Fresh film, currently sitting at 80%.
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Critics have been praising Finn's commitment to build on the premise introduced in Smile, while hailing Scott's Skye as a new, layered horror heroine.
Ahead of general release, let's take a look at what the mostly positive reviews have been saying about Smile 2 and whether it leaves room for a threequel.
It's not just the sequel's razor-sharp and inventive, gory scares that surpass its predecessor, but a profoundly complicated heroine shaping the edgier style of horror.
Smile 2 has its audacious moments but, as Finn's script unveils implausible plot twists, this sequel elicits neither terror nor smiles but, rather, shrugs.
From the writer-director of the 2022 horror sleeper Smile comes a solid sequel that sicks the suicide-hex phantom on a pop star played – in a highly volatile, committed performance – by Aladdin's Naomi Scott.
It's all exceptionally silly, and fans of the first film might find the first hour little more than a rehash of Smile, but there's still something admirable about Parker Finn's gusto.
The movie is hardly subtle, yet Parker Finn has become a clever enough filmmaker to make reality feel like a hallucination and hallucinations feel like reality.
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Smile 2 is more of the same. A lot more. But it's just as scary, and this time it's feistier and funnier, proving that the premise has legs and some malleability.
More than anything, this sequel is proof of the endless versatility that could turn Smile movies into an October box-office fixture for decades to come.
Still, there's much to be said for a director so unencumbered by timidity, and the sequel will leave plenty of horror fans grinning from ear to ear.
Parker Finn, like his entity, is interested in getting his bony fingers into those sticky tender parts we'd rather hide away, slurping our pain like ambrosia and confronting us with the fact that, more often than not, the enemy staring back is you.
For fans of the first film, it's more of the same, and for any casual horror viewers who are up for a funhouse thrill this October, it'll do the trick.
Smile 2 is in cinemas on October 17 in the UK and October 18 in the US.
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