WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for director Corin Hardy's The Nun, out in theaters everywhere now.


The Conjuring spinoffs have expanded upon the mythos of Warner Bros.' horror cinematic universe, but the latest installment, The Nun, sets up future events more so than the Annabelle prequels before it do. While the film's more obvious link to the larger franchise is the origin of the demon Valak that terrorizes Lorraine Warren (Vera Farmiga) throughout 2016's The Conjuring 2, The Nun has an even deeper connection that serves as the inciting incident for the entire series.

The Nun is set primarily in 1952, earlier than any other chapter in the hit Conjuring universe. Following the mysterious suicide of a nun at Cârța Monastery in Romania, the Vatican sends Father Burke (Demián Bichir) and young novitiate Sister Irene (Taissa Farmiga) to investigate after the woman's body is discovered by local villager Frenchie Theriault (Jonas Bloquet).

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Frenchie escorts the duo to the abbey, where they learn its occult history, which includes the demon Valak crossing over from Hell through a rift in the catacombs. As Burke and Irene are confronted with escalating satanic activity that begins to spread from the monastery to the surrounding area, Frenchie returns with guns blazing to save them from the evil.

Frenchie in The Nun

The trio ventures deep in the catacombs to find an artifact containing the blood of Jesus Christ to close the rift and banish Valak back to Hell. Once inside, the demon attacks them, directly wounding Frenchie after the young farmer comes to Irene's aid when she is temporarily possessed, and Burke is injured by a ghost. Before the priest and farmer are finished off, a cleansed Irene uses the artifact to seal the rift and seemingly condemn Valak to Hell. However, while it seems they have succeeded in saving the day, the film's final twist reveals that not everyone walks away with a happy ending.

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As Frenchie parts company with Burke and Irene, the farmer reveals his actual name is Maurice, which is a major clue to his role later in the franchise. While the priest and nun leave Romania for good, Maurice scratches an itch on his neck, revealing to the audience the wounds he suffered while battling Valak are actually an inverted cross marking his own secret possession by the demon.

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The film then flashes forward to a familiar scene from the series' first film, 2013's The Conjuring. Using footage from the original film, set in 1971, the scene revisits Lorraine and Ed Warren (Patrick Wilson) as they give a lecture on the nature of demonic possession, with Carolyn Perron, victim of the first film's demon, quietly in attendance. The Warrens describe a previous supernatural encounter with a farmer named Maurice who was possessed by a demon. The demonologists then show the class footage of them performing an exorcism on Maurice, with newly filmed material of Bloquet as an older version of Frenchie. Before being exorcised, the farmer touches Lorraine and lets out an evil howl, presumably beginning her connection to Valak years before the events of The Conjuring 2.

The flash-forward epilogue to The Nun accomplishes several mythos-building tasks for the Conjuring series. The first film had Lorraine contemplate leaving the world of paranormal investigations and exorcisms entirely after an especially troubling case: The epilogue to the latest spinoff shows the audience exactly what traumatized Lorraine all those years ago.

REVIEW: The Nun is Gleefully Spooky and Surprisingly Fun

While Valak's connection to The Nun and The Conjuring 2 was already obvious, by reframing sequences from the original film into the prequel, it also establishes the demon as perhaps the overarching antagonist across much of the franchise. Valak is retconned as a sort of satanic mastermind that launches the film series in the first place.

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How this expanded context will impact future installments of the Conjuring cinematic universe has yet to be seen, but while Valak may have ostensibly been banished back to Hell by Lorraine at the climax of The Conjuring 2, it also suggests that Valak has overcome attempted exorcisms before, including one at the hands of the Warrens in the footage they share during their 1971 lecture.

With plans for a direct follow-up to The Nun, a third Conjuring film, and a spinoff focused on The Crooked Man from The Conjuring 2 that was secretly orchestrated by Valak all along, there is a good chance the Warrens, and movie audiences, haven't seen the last of the demonic entity in the series.


Directed by Corin Hardy, The Nun stars Demián Bichir, Taissa Farmiga, and Jonas Bloquet. It is currently out in theaters everywhere now.