SuperMechagodzilla posted:

The frame story is borderline-incomprehensible, but it is possible to break it down.

For starters: the AI - stored in the ice-cream truck's computers - is somehow receiving a live feed from every camera in LA. Hearing the protagonist say that he wants to be 'part of something bigger than himself', the AI targets him and kidnaps his girlfriend. (There are at least two slaves/accomplices in the truck, assisting it with this.)

Copying the girlfriend's image, the AI begins sending a video to random people's phones. Although the video appears to depict a woman in distress, it contains brief snippets of the 'haunted footage' from the previous films. Anyone who watches these videos is put into a trance that, apparently, makes them both aggressive and eager to film everything.

As more and more people start filming this way, the AI begins editing their footage into a feature film about the protagonist's search for his girlfriend. Once the film is complete, the AI splices in more 'haunted footage' and forces the protagonist to upload the whole thing to the Internet - basically doing what the cellphone video did, but worse.

As the editor of the film, the AI specifically shaped the footage into this narrative to make a point that humans are stupid and weak, or something.

Two minor details render the ending ambiguous: 1) the film continues for a few minutes after it's been, ostensibly, 100% uploaded (meaning that the AI was lying about needing the switch), and 2) the end credits are a hypnotic pattern overlaid over the film playing backwards - reversing all the damage and making the last shot of the film the girlfriend standing on the bridge, in the sunset.