Another Simple Favor’s Bonkers Ending, Explained

This post contains spoilers from Another Simple Favor.

One of the biggest reveals in the tangled web that is 2018’s A Simple Favor—the campy Paul Feig thriller starring Anna Kendrick as upbeat mommy blogger turned amateur sleuth Stephanie—comes when she learns that the enigmatic woman with whom she’s obsessed, Blake Lively’s dressed-to-kill Emily, is an identical twin. Even better, she’s a triplet whose third sister sadly died at birth, Emily says in a throwaway line that turns out to be the key to unlocking the new sequel Another Simple Favor, now streaming on Prime Video.

Seven years after the events of the first film, Stephanie is promoting her book The Faceless Blonde, which details how Emily landed in prison for murdering her father and twin sister, as well as shooting her husband Sean (Henry Golding) and attempting to kill Stephanie for uncovering her crimes. (Stephanie also slept with Sean while Emily was away killing said twin sister for the insurance money.) But interest in the scandal has waned, and Stephanie could use some inspiration for a sequel. Right on cue, Emily crashes Stephanie’s sparsely-attended reading and reveals not only that she’s been released from prison, but that she’s getting married to the mob—or at least a member of it: Italian businessman Dante (Michele Morrone, best known for Netflix’s 365 Days erotic thrillers). Emily demands that Stephanie be her maid of honor at their wedding in Capri. Should she refuse, “I’ll sue you into oblivion,” Emily vows.

The frenemies trade jabs and sip cocktails, burdened only by the drunken exploits of Sean, who grumbles about having to accompany his and Emily’s son Nicky (Ian Ho) to the wedding. Then Sean is fatally injected with drugs while taking a shower in his hotel room, and more bodies follow. Dante falls into an exploding brickhouse of fireworks shortly after marrying Emily; a hapless FBI agent (Taylor Ortega) investigating the murders is stabbed. Stephanie is blamed for the killings, detained by local authorities and put on house arrest.

But in reality, Stephanie is innocent. And so is Emily. Because the real Emily is actually locked away in a hotel room—and her believed-to-be-dead sister Charity, also played by Lively, is actually alive, and has been posing as Emily for most of the trip.

Before we keep going, here’s a refresher on Emily’s demented family tree. She was born Faith McLanden—sister to Hope, who would spiral downward into addiction as an adult, and Charity, who was presumably stillborn. The girls’ devoutly religious mother Margaret (Elizabeth Perkins taking over for Jean Smart, a casting change explained with a witty line about having work done) believes her offspring are demonic and killed their third sister in the womb. She turns a blind eye to her husband’s abusive treatment of Faith and Hope. The sisters eventually burn down the family home and kill their father, splintering apart to hide from the cops until the events of A Simple Favor.

The sequel reveals that Emily’s long-lost Aunt Linda (Allison Janney), who delivered the triplets, also kidnapped Charity right after she was born, raising her in secret. . Given that she was mothered in the shadows by a total lunatic who used her as bait while conning various men, Charity is rather stunted. Lively speaks in a sexy baby voice in the role of a woman raised to brutally kill people so that Mommy can take their cash. The deranged pair’s latest ruse is to kill Emily and frame Stephanie so that they can seize Dante’s family fortunes.

What Linda doesn’t bargain for is Charity’s strange fixation on her only living sibling. In an icky turn that goes even further than anything on The White Lotus season 3, Charity tells Emily that she wants to bring her pleasure, murmuring something about both of them “being one” before drugging and molesting her sister. It’s a very disconcerting Lively-on-Lively sexual encounter that—let’s face it—really didn’t need to be in this movie.

Soon, Emily and Stephanie each escape their respective traps and reunite. First, Stephanie taunts Emily, calling her a “sister fucker”—a callback to the first film, where Emily repeatedly, very justifiably teases Stephanie for sleeping with her own half-brother. Then Emily admits that her marriage to Dante was a total sham. She was supposed to wed him only to help Dante cover up his secret affair with his lover Matteo Bartolo (Lorenzo de Moor), a member of a rival mob family.

Both women are lured to a cliffside by Charity and Linda, who have a weapon pointed at tween-aged Nicky’s head. Emily takes advantage of Charity’s creepy feelings towards her, convincing her sister with another groan-inducing kiss to keep both Nicky and Stephanie alive. Charity takes the bait, pushing Linda off the cliff and inexplicably agreeing to publicly take blame for every murder and return to prison as “Emily.”

This nonsensical choice—everything could be sorted out by some finger print-testing, ladies!—forces real Emily (née Faith) back into hiding, while Stephanie writes her next book and raises Nicky alongside her own son Miles (Joshua Satine, who’s been blissfully occupied at summer camp this whole time). In one final absurdity, Emily is shown roaming the streets of Italy unencumbered by any of the trauma she’s just faced or the separation from her son—wearing perhaps the most eye-catching outfit costume designer Renee Ehrlich Kalfus has ever created for these movies, with not even a baseball cap or hair-dye change to disguise her. (DeuxMoi would have been onto Emily in a second!)

While taking her midnight stroll, Emily runs into Dante’s mother, Portia (Elena Sofia Ricci), who confirms that she knows her true identity (duh) and hands her an envelope, telling her: “I have another simple favor to ask you.” With two of the three triplets alive and Emily’s next chapter as a mafia lieutenant introduced, a third, perhaps even more bewildering movie could very well be on its way. All future character siblings beware.