Yippee-ki-yay, movie lovers, it's Jan here and in this video I'll be explaining the shocking
ending of The Nun, how the movie connects to the rest of The Conjuring Universe and
sets up a Nun sequel, and I'll be revealing secret Valak easter eggs.
And make sure you stay till the end where I'll also explain the movie's big twist.
If you're here for the first time, do subscribe for all my regular videos and more upcoming
horror videos too.
Of course, spoilers ahead for the movie, so take care if you haven't seen it yet.
Or tap here to watch my Freaky Facts about the making of The Nun.
The big reveal at the end of The Nun is that Frenchie's real name is Maurice, and that
he's the French-Canadian farmer whose exorcism the Warrens discussed during their lecture
in the first Conjuring movie.
"Take Maurice here.
A French-Canadian farmer with no more than a third-grade education..
..yet, after he was possessed, spoke some of the best Latin I'd ever heard.
Sometimes backwards.
A dark spirit made its home in this man."
"And like that.. ..an upside down cross started to appear from within his body."
At the end of The Nun, we see the origins of that cross inside Maurice's body via the
upside-down cross that's revealed on the back of Frenchie's neck.
We also see that during the final fight with Valak, the demon Nun vomited a snake into
Frenchie's mouth.
The demon Valak has a number of names, one of which is "the Marquis of Snakes" meaning
he has the power to summon and command snakes, which suggests that the snake Valak put into
Frenchie means the demon possessed him or can control him.
In fact, the movie's director Corin Hardy has described Frenchie as the film's "secret
weapon" and it's interesting that in The Nun, Frenchie works as a delivery man to the abbey
which is a neat bit of foreshadowing for how many years later Maurice delivers that horrifying
vision of Valak to Lorraine.
"I had a vision in Amityville.
It was the same one I had seven years ago.
I had a premonition of your death."
In a similar way to how the Church closed the gateway to Hell at the time of the Duke,
at the end of the film, the portal in the convent is closed when the blood of Christ
spills into the pool of water on top of the opening.
Sister Irene appears to have defeated Valak when she spits holy blood all over the demon
which seems to send him back to Hell via the gateway in the convent's floor, but it looks
like she was a little too late as right at the end it appears that Maurice is now the
vessel for Valak to escape.
That ending was foreshadowed near the start of the film when Frenchie told Sister Irene
that the locals always spit when the castle is mentioned in order "to ward off evil".
And although Frenchie said it was "an old and silly superstition", he spat on the ground
himself before entering the castle for the first time.
James Wan has already said he has a potential story in mind for a Nun sequel which would
come back to Lorraine's story in the two Conjuring movies so far.
Which means a Nun sequel could explore how Valak returns via Maurice and could also illuminate
just why the demon is so interested in the Warrens.
OK, so we need to talk in some more detail about Sister Irene and how the movie teases
a number of connections between her and Lorraine Warren.
First, there's the interesting coincidence that Taissa Farmiga, who plays Irene, is the
real-life sister of Vera Farmiga who plays Lorraine.
Taissa is around 21 years younger than Vera and with The Nun set in 1952, about 19 years
before The Conjuring and 25 years before its sequel, it seems possible there could be some
kind of family connection between Irene and Lorraine that might be revealed in the next
Nun or Conjuring movie.
And although during set visits for The Nun, cast and crew said there's no connection,
they could just be trying to keep things under wraps or give themselves time to figure out
exactly how that'll work in a sequel.
Character-wise, Irene's visions and premonitions are similar to Lorraine's psychic abilities
and could point to their being related by blood or otherwise connected.
Then there's a very interesting parallel in how the demonic nun reveals itself to both
Irene and Lorraine.
Valak manifests itself to Irene via a mirror during one of Irene's visions in a similar
way to how we see Lorraine's vision of the demon in a mirror during her Amityville séance.
The Nun movie also echoes the scene from The Conjuring 2 where the demon nun's shadow crawls
along a wall before physically appearing in the painting of the Nun where it attacks Lorraine.
In this movie, the nun's shadow crawls along the chapel wall before appearing in the mirror
behind Irene.
On top of that, during Maurice's exorcism which we see at the end of The Nun, the way
he grabs and looks at Lorraine makes me wonder if he senses a connection between her and
Irene who he knew from Romania or, perhaps in his terror, he mistook Lorraine for Irene,
or maybe it's actually Valak who feels the connection between the two women.
There's also an Annabelle: Creation easter egg in The Nun when we get to see again the
photograph of Sister Charlotte with three nuns and Valak that she showed to Mr Mullins
in the Annabelle prequel movie.
"That's sister Maria.
That's sister Anna.
And that's sister Lucia."
"Who's this?"
"I... don't know.
I don't think I even met her."
I was wondering if we might actually meet Sisters Maria, Anna and Lucia, but the fact
they were never mentioned in the Nun movie makes me think they probably perished at the
hands of Valak before Sister Irene arrived.
Like in The Conjuring 2, The Nun also packs a number of hidden Valak words into the background
of the movie.
The first one I noticed is that Valak's name is hidden in the window frame of Sister Victoria's
room.
You can also see "Valak" in part of the periodic table on the classroom wall, and it also appears
as "VA01 LAK" on the luggage truck's license plate; in addition to that, it's hidden among
the trees of the forest.
Right, now it's time to talk about that big twist that occurs when Irene is keeping vigil
in the chapel.
She sees nuns walk in to the chapel to pray with her to keep Valak at bay but later they're
all tossed aside by the demonic force.
As Sister Irene continues to pray in an attempt to hold back the evil power, Valak slices
a "V" into her exposed shoulders.
The carving continues turning the "V" into a pentagram, marking Irene and foreshadowing
how Valak will later trick her and lead her into a pentagram, finally possessing her before
Frenchie places holy blood on her face to cast out the demon and bring her back.
Visually this is an impressive scene; however, what happens next turns our understanding
of the movie upside down when Sister Irene realises that none of the nuns were ever really
there with her.
And at that point, it seems like all of Irene's interactions with the nuns have just been
visions or spirits.
This revelation links back to the opening scene of the movie where Sister Victoria committed
suicide.
It seems like Victoria knew she was the last surviving nun at the convent which is why
she knew she had to sacrifice herself so that Valak couldn't take her soul and use her as
"a vessel to escape."
And peppered through the movie are clues hinting that the convent is empty of any living nuns.
For example, the Abbess – who is dead herself – won't let anyone into the convent when
they arrive and only Irene is allowed in the next day.
Also, initially when Irene finds Sister Oana dead in the chapel it looks like she's only
just died, however after Irene's vision disappears, Oana's body is still there but it's very dark
and seems to be decomposing suggesting Oana's actually been dead for some time.
Which indicates that Irene's conversations with Oana were not with a living nun but rather
they were visions or appearances of Oana's spirit.
It's possible many of these visions have been a trick by Valak to weaken Irene psychologically
and prepare her to be possessed when she unknowingly walks into the pentagram.
Basically, Valak has been taking her through the three stages of demonic activity: infestation,
oppression, and finally possession.
A narrative thread left open at the end of the movie is Father Burke's wounded eye which
he suffered when the ghost of Daniel attacked Burke with his serpent tongue which latched
itself on to the Father's eye.
Daniel was the boy who died when Burke tried to exorcise him.
Although Burke eventually gets away, I wonder whether he was infected in any way similar
to what happened to Frenchie.
Overall, the plot of The Nun seems more complicated and ambiguous than it needs to be and although
I've laid out my understanding of the twist based on my initial viewing, I can see there's
room for different interpretations.
I'd love to hear your theories and thoughts about the movie and its ending in the comments
below and on Twitter, plus do share any other Conjuring connections you spotted!
Tap left to check out some freakishly creepy facts about the making of The Nun or tap right
for more horror movie videos.
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Thanks for watching and see ya next time.
Yippee-ki-yay, movie lovers!