Thanksgiving ending explained: Who was the killer?

Thanksgiving, Eli Roth’s incredible 2023 slasher, has been a hit on Netflix. Here’s our breakdown of the ending and the movie’s big killer reveal.

Instead of a feast of turkey and mashed potatoes, the characters in Thanksgiving will be the meal. They are being hunted by a serial killer dressed as a pilgrim and wearing a John Carver mask. The movie focuses on the characters as events from a gruesome Black Friday event make them the target of the killer a year later.

In true slasher horror fashion, Roth has audiences try to speculate who among the seemingly normal characters is the killer. Is it someone hidden in plain sight? Roth sticks to real Plymouth history as John Carver was one of the people who braced the journey on the Mayflower and one of the original settlers of the town.

After garnering positive reviews – you can read our four-star review – Thanksgiving topped Netflix’s movies chart recently. With more people watching it for the first time, we’ve explained everything you should know by the end. Warning: spoilers ahead!

Thanksgiving ending explained: Who was behind the John Carver mask?

Sheriff Newlon (Patrick Dempsey) is revealed to be the killer in Thanksgiving.

To better understand Sheriff Newlon’s motives for becoming the serial killer John Carver, the events of Black Friday a year prior play a big role. In the small town, RightMart is the supermarket popular for its Black Friday event. Jessica’s (Nell Verlaque) father, played by Rick Hoffman, is the boss and rich guy in town. He decides to have the store open a day early on Thanksgiving.

The movie starts with Sheriff Newlon arriving at his friend Mitch Collins’ (Ty Olsson) house for Thanksgiving. But Mitch is called away to work at RightMart when one of the employees doesn’t show up. Due to the chaos of Black Friday, the store is swarmed with angry, vile, and impatient buyers from inside and outside of town.

Jessica and her friends arrive as Evan (Tomaso Sanelli) wants to get a new phone. They sneak into the store through an employee entrance – angering everyone waiting outside as Evan taunts them. Mitch’s wife arrives with Sheriff Newlon with dinner and crowd control. The shoppers soon break free of the barricade and swarm the locked doors. In the chaos, Mitch’s wife gets trampled and two customers’ carts clash and fatally hit her in the head. While the customers argue, they are unaware her hair is caught in the wheels. They unknowingly peel off part of her scalp. To stop everyone, Sheriff Newlon fires his gun.

Fast forward to a year later and John Carver kills his first victim – a local diner waitress. It’s soon revealed she was one of the people responsible for the Black Friday chaos and the death of Mitch’s wife. Jessica soon realizes all the victims are tied to what happened. Jessica and her friends are on the list, as well as people identified in the social media video and security footage.

TriStar Pictures

The ending of Thanksgiving has Jessica escape John Carver’s attempt to kill them for dinner. At the storage facility where the parade floats are held, Jessica comes to a shocking realization. Remembering Sheriff Newlon’s quote of noticing the small details, she sees the same fuzzy plant stuck to her pants and his shoes. Sheriff Newlon is the John Carver killer. He had used her and the others to identify the people at the Black Friday event.

His motive? Their actions caused the death of Mitch’s wife. It’s revealed Sheriff Newlon and her were having an affair. She was also pregnant with his child and was ready to divorce Mitch. Due to Jessica and her friend’s taunting, angering the customers, and lack of humility from the customers, his true love had been killed.

Read Dexerto’s review of Thanksgiving here, and why Thanksgiving could bring back Patrick Dempsey to Scream 7 here. You can also find out more about Thanksgiving 2 here.