SPOILER WARNING: The following feature contains massive spoilers for A Quiet Place: Part II. If you have not yet seen the film, and don't wish to know details about the way the movie ends, read on at your own risk!
John Krasinski’s A Quiet Place comes to an end with a literal bang, and we’ve been feeling the reverberations ever since the movie debuted back in early 2018. After months of watching society fall apart and trying to stay as silent as possible, the surviving members of the Abbott family made a special discovery that suggests that the tide could possibly turn in the war against the vicious, sound-sensitive invaders. But can they actually succeed after so much damage has been done? The sequel works in part to answer that as it barrels towards its thrilling conclusion – and the A Quiet Place: Part II ending most definitely advances the greater battle being fought in the fictional world.
But what exactly goes down in the in the third act of the new horror movie, and what does it mean for the future of the series? It’s those questions that have motivated the creation of this feature, and below we will dig deep into both the facts and speculation. However, before we do that let’s first just do a quick recap of the events that go down in the last half hour or so of A Quiet Place Part II.
What Happens At The End Of A Quiet Place Part II
Having split its narrative in two halfway through the movie, A Quiet Place: Part II’s ending plays out on two separate fronts: in the abandoned warehouse where Evelyn (Emily Blunt), Marcus (Noah Jupe), and the baby hide out from an alien that has discovered their bunker; and with Regan (Millicent Simmonds) and Emmett (Cillian Murphy) on an island where they find other survivors who were brought together during an evacuation organized by the National Guard.
After spending the night on said island, Emmett goes back to the boat that he and Regan were on and is horrified to discover slash marks that indicate that they have brought one of the extraterrestrials to the safe haven. He attempts to run back and warn everybody as quickly as he can, but it’s too late, as the monster has already begun laying waste to the small community. Emmett runs into the nameless man who welcomed him the previous night (Djimon Hounsou) and together they get to Regan so that they can try and lure the beast away from everybody and get to the radio station.
The attempt to grab the alien’s attention works, and they arrive at the location of the “Beyond The Sea” broadcast – but the nameless man is killed when he hesitates about his commitment to the mission and worries about the safety of his child.
Meanwhile, Evelyn, Marcus, and the baby are left staying silent in the soundproof furnace while a deadly threat looms only a few feet away, and the gauge on the oxygen tank reveals they will run out of air soon.
At the radio station, Emmett is slashed and incapacitated by the sound-sensitive creature, leaving Regan left to get the job done. She successfully gets inside the booth, kills the song, and uses the magnet on the hearing aid that her father (John Krasinski) devised to stick the device to the microphone. The monstrosity freaks out, just like the one at the end of A Quiet Place, and while it isn’t totally down for the count, the teenage heroine is able to finish the job with a metal pole.
In the warehouse, Marcus – who has been listening to the radio with his headphones – hears the broadcast change, and realizes the opportunity. He puts the static noise up to full volume as he opens the furnace door and charges at the invader. Taking a pistol, he shoots it in the head, saving his mother and the family's newborn.
How The Fight Against The Alien Continues
A Quiet Place ends with the Abbotts discovering that feedback from Regan’s hearing aid is harmful to the aurally enhanced aliens, and the girl’s primary motivation throughout A Quiet Place: Part II is sharing that knowledge with the world – even if it means going against the wishes of her mother. Ultimately that is something at which she is able to succeed, and there’s the hope that people hear what she has done and use it to their own advantage.
Not only does A Quiet Place: Part II further delve into that weakness of the outer space horrors, but it also reveals another one: the aliens can’t swim. This was something that was apparently learned in the early days of the invasion, and it opens the door to the question of how people are thriving on islands around the world, and therefore how many people could be around to help rebuild society.
There is another obstacle that is standing in the way of that progress, though, and it has nothing to do with the attackers from the sky. It turns out that while there are communities trying to thrive after the apocalyptic event, there are also others that act in more feral and violent ways. Even if the world does get past everything with the monsters, there will still be those people to deal with.
What’s Next For Emmett And The Abbott Family
First off, it should be noted that A Quiet Place Part III is not a guarantee, as it has not yet been officially announced by Paramount Pictures. That being said, John Krasinski has hinted that a third movie could be on the table, and if we’re being optimistic that means we can more freely look at the ending of Part II through the lens of being a set up for another chapter.
By the end of the sequel, the Abbott family remains disconnected, as the narrative doesn’t cover the part of the story where Regan gets back together with her mother and siblings. With the sound from the hearing aid heard over the radio, Evelyn and Marcus obviously know that the mission overall was a success, but they have no way of knowing if only Regan or only Emmett made it to the broadcast source. Regardless, it feels safe to assume that their next move will be to try and get to the radio station themselves – and the teenager and family friend will presumably be on the lookout for their arrival and try to find a way to signal them.
What is far less simple is what the future holds for the attempt at eradicating the aliens and winning Earth back for humanity. Getting the feedback from the hearing aid out to as many audio sources as possible is definitely the best idea… but what proves to not be so simple is making sure it is heard and understood by other people. The range of the station is clearly limited (it wasn’t even powerful enough to reach the Abbott family farm due to it sitting in a valley), but that’s not even the biggest problem: There is clearly going to be an issue when it comes to survivors hearing the broadcast, as listening to the radio isn’t exactly something people can just do anymore, and even if they do hear it they will have no way of knowing that it can be used as a weapon.
Presumably the best way of going about things would be to get the feedback to play from as many sources as humanly possible around the world… but how does that get done when infrastructure has fallen apart and all communication has been strangled? If we do wind up getting A Quiet Place: Part III, one assumes that will be the mission at the heart of it.
A Quiet Place: Part II is now playing in theaters, looking to be one of this strange year’s biggest summer movies, and will be available to stream on Paramount+ starting on July 12, 45 days after its big screen release. To discover all of the rest of the films that are set to debut between now and the end of December, be sure to check out our 2021 Release Schedule.
