The Nun II (2023): Cast, Plot, Ending and Where to Watch

The Nun II (2023) is a sequel set in 1956 in which Sister Irene, sent by the Vatican, investigates a string of deaths that appear to be the work of the demon Valak. The film opens in Tarascon, France, where a priest is burned to death in front of his altar boy, and it takes place four years after the events of The Nun (2018).

The Vatican concludes that similar deaths are happening across Europe, so it sends Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) to look into them. She is paired with a younger nun, Sister Debra (Storm Reid), who is unsure of her own faith, and the two travel to Tarascon together. Their destination is a boarding school built in a former monastery, which is where the trail of deaths leads.

If you are new to the series, this is a spin-off rather than a main Conjuring film, and it follows Valak, a demon first seen as a demonic nun in The Conjuring 2. You can read about the demon on the Valak the Nun page, and the Sister Irene Conjuring page covers the heroine.

The full plot of The Nun II follows Irene and Debra from the first killing in Tarascon to a final rite that banishes Valak from a boarding school. After they arrive, a school worker named Maurice (Jonas Bloquet, who also played Maurice Theriault in the first film) becomes possessed, and the headmistress is killed.

The nuns then learn what Valak actually wants. The demon is hunting descendants of St. Lucy so that it can claim her relic, and the relic is hidden inside the school. The building was once a monastery and later a winery, and one of its stained-glass windows shows a goat whose eyes light up red. Irene uses that clue to find the relic, which turns the second half of the film into a search with a demon close behind.

Valak finally attacks Irene directly, but she is a descendant of St. Lucy and the demon cannot burn her. Irene and Debra drive the demon out by reciting the Words of Institution as the wine turns into the blood of Christ. Valak is banished, and the threat to the school ends.

The Nun II reached US theaters on September 8, 2023, with the UK following on the same day and Australia one day earlier on September 7, 2023. Box Office Mojo lists the earliest release as September 6, 2023. No premiere date, city or venue has been reported for the film.

Where can you watch The Nun 2? Availability was checked on November 3, 2026 through JustWatch data on TMDB. In the US, the film streams on HBO Max, and it also appears through the HBO Max and Cinemax channels on Amazon, on TNT, TBS, tru TV and YouTube TV. You can rent or buy it on Amazon Video, Apple TV, Google Play Movies, YouTube and Fandango At Home. In the UK, it is listed as rent or buy only, on Apple TV, Rakuten TV, Amazon Video and Sky Store, with a purchase option on YouTube. In Australia, it streams on Stan, with rent and buy options on Apple TV, Amazon Video and YouTube.

Is The Nun 2 on Netflix? Netflix is not listed in the US, UK or Australia for this film on that date. For the other films, the where to watch Conjuring page compares services by country.

The ending of The Nun II turns on one idea, that Irene's bloodline makes her the one person Valak cannot burn, and in my opinion the film earns that payoff better than its middle stretch suggests. The opening death is a priest burned to death in front of his altar boy, so fire is established as the demon's weapon before the story has properly started. When Valak corners Irene at the school and the flames do nothing, her descent from St. Lucy lands as the answer to a threat the film set up in its first scene.

The stained-glass goat is the cleverest bit of plotting, it could be argued, because the building's history as a monastery and then a winery supplies a goat with red eyes and a reason for wine at the same time. The eyes lead Irene to the relic, and the wine then becomes the centerpiece of the final rite, as Irene and Debra recite the Words of Institution while it turns into the blood of Christ. The location gives both the clue and the weapon.

Debra begins the film unsure of her faith and ends it reciting the rite beside Irene. Storm Reid's character gets a modest arc out of that, although the film gives her less room than it gives Farmiga's Irene.

Is The Nun 2 scarier than the first film? Perhaps the fairest answer is that it swaps the remote Romanian abbey of The Nun (2018) for a boarding school full of children, which changes the kind of fear on offer. The sequel also runs 110 minutes against 96 for the original. I find the sequel the more polished film and the first the more oppressive one, but that is taste more than measurement.

The closing scene with Ed and Lorraine Warren is what ties the film back to the main saga. For where it sits in story order, see the Conjuring timeline.

Yes, The Nun II has one post credit scene, and it features Ed and Lorraine Warren. Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga appear as the couple, using archive footage from The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It. It could be argued that this links the Nun strand directly to the main saga rather than adding a new tease.

The Nun II was filmed in France, with the main locations in Aix-en-Provence and Tarascon. Principal photography began in France on October 6, 2022, after earlier preliminary photography that began on April 29, 2022. The locations include:

• Aix-en-Provence, France: the former Couvent des Prêcheurs monastery stood in for the boarding school.
• Aix-en-Provence, France: the Chapelle des Ursulines stood in for the Tarascon church.
• Tarascon, France: the Arc de Boqui and rue Proudhon.

The French monastery gives the sequel a school setting that sits close to the story's own invented history of a monastery turned winery.

The Nun II earned $269.7 million worldwide on a $38 million budget, according to Box Office Mojo and The Numbers, which is roughly seven times its cost. For the full comparison across the series, see the Conjuring box office page. More facts:

• The boarding school scenes were shot at the Couvent des Prêcheurs, a former monastery in Aix-en-Provence.
• Akela Cooper was hired as the first writer in 2019, and Ian Goldberg and Richard Naing joined as co-writers in 2022.
• Bonnie Aarons returned as Valak, and Storm Reid joined the franchise as the new lead Sister Debra.
• The film earned a Visual Effects Society nomination for Outstanding Effects Simulations in a Photoreal Feature.
• In the chronological order of the series, The Nun II comes third, after The Nun (2018) and Annabelle: Creation. See the Conjuring movies in order guide for the full list.