Thanksgiving...With A Side Of...Murder!!! (Something, Something, Leftovers)

2023 and the holiday season may be coming to a close, those things are true and time is relative.  But before that all takes place, I want to look back at the latest and potentially greatest season horror movie to come out.  Thanksgiving is not a very movie-laden holiday outside of Spider-Man, Black Friday, and not this spooky slasher named aptly for the same holiday, Thanksgiving.  

So if you like Scream and I Know What You Did Last Summer but want even more seasonal specific references with some super Bahstahn accents and a good amount of gore, this is that gift that could continue to give year after year.  But hey, will this movie eat and leave neither crumbs nor leftovers?  Or, will this be one overcooked turkey of a film?  

There is only one way to find out so watch that movie and let's figure it all out together.  And once you do, please let me know what you think of this turducken of a horror holiday whodunnit of a movie.  Hit me up on social to share if you are thankful for this or not at either @NickNackMovies or @NickNack_IC on Instagram, Tik Tok, Letterboxd or Twitter (I guess you could call it X if you want).

Transcript

Nick Nack Goes to the Movies Pod S4E6

-Intro/Jingle

-Before we get into the meat of this podcast episode all about movies and such, a side note.  Instead of apologizing for being inconsistent with these, I am just gonna post them when I can and go from there.  Maybe a movie will inspire me to record one, or maybe hopefully I will get back to the grind of these, that and the weight loss.  All of these hopefully getting back to the 2020 numbers of frequent posting a nice slim and trim weight.  

-Sidebar over, so now the fun begins.  There has been some fun filled things I have seen both in theaters and on streaming services of late.  Between Haunting in Venice, Blue Beatle, The Marvels, The Last Voyage of the Demeter, and even Ependa4bles.  But while I might play some catchup eventually on all those, there is really only one movie I could talk about.

-I feel like I have left for the moment the super hero genre behind and have delved further and further into horror not only on this podcast but watching.  Casually watching oldies and even goodies like Jennifer’s Body, the Reynolds Amityville Horror, and that newish A24 hand movie, Talk to Me.  

-But like I said, this season now can still be the season of screams with the brand-new Eli Roth movie, Thanksgiving.

-There are not a lot of Thanksgiving movies overall.  Go on, think about it for a minute or so.  Pause the episode, think, and come on back.

-(PAUSE)

-Welcome back, so what did you come up with.  How many did you come up with.  That Charlie Brown Thanksgiving, maybe those first Harry Potter’s count with seasonal scenes in them.  The first Tobey Maguire Spider-Man of course.  And that is it, besides this 2023 entry into things with Thanksgiving.

-Thanksgiving comes into seasonal slashers the same way that Violent Night came in last holiday season to bring some seasonal gore into things.  One is a somehow more festive and violent Die Hard.  This however is a festive seasonal version of Scream and I Know What You Did Last Summer.  Thanksgiving is an untapped movie market overall besides Spider-Man, so why not make a slasher and keep spooky movies year-round?

-So, with all that in mind, it is hard to be the first to do something, but when Thanksgiving the holiday comes and passes, and this or next year, you reflect on your time watching Thanksgiving, the movie, what will you think.  Will this become a holiday seasonal staple like Elf, the Santa Clause, and Violent night?  Or should you not even take a no thank you helping with this movie?  Either way, after this episode, there will be no leftovers.  We will together leave no crumbs with this episode.

-Actors

-So, with the actor’s segment of these episodes, normally we do a who’s who of these movies.  We go through all the actors and maybe find some fun, oh no way, we know this person from this movie or show.  But this is one of those rare ones where I am pretty unfamiliar with most of the people in this movie.  Not that that is a bad thing, sometimes that is just more fun to get lost in the movie and enjoy it not always saying in your head that is the person from that thing and getting a bit more distant from the movie plot and universe.  Now this was one of those ones where I saw multiple people and wondered if I knew them from somewhere.  But the answer is no, no I do not.

-Who are people you might know, well if you watch Suits, I do not outside of a Tik Tok clip here or there, Rick Hoffman will be instantly recognizable, albeit with a goofy mustache here.  Speaking of Tik Tok, one of their earlier celebs Addison Rae ended up in another.  While the she’s all that remake, he’s all that, did not do super well, I think she got more of a chance here to do a bit more with the role. 

-But lastly, probably the biggest draw has to be Patrick Dempsey.  I know you will all know him as McDreamy from Gray’s Anatomy, but probably not a shocker at all, that is not where I know him from.  I know him from one of the more obtuse Scream movies, Scream 3.  The Hollywood angle with some strange supernatural elements to boot.  But he was good in it, and that gave Sydney a love interest, so you have to like that.  

-Sadly, we have been missing him since that movie, even if he had been teased in the 5th one.  That movie could be in shambles now with all of the actor jumbling around.  Not that we could not end on the 6th one, but I do love that franchise so it would be sad to see it end here.  That and the never culminated season 3 of the first story of that show.

-But all you have to really know is this.  Everyone, known by you or I, new to acting or a veteran, they all play their parts well.  But the real question, now that the appetizers are out there.  Is this a good movie that you should watch?  Well, let’s dive into this feast or famine of a film

-Main Episode

-So, before I get going, fun tidbit.  This movie, contrary to popular belief, it did not just come out of the blue as a random genre fare slasher film with a seasonal backdrop.  Grindhouse, a double feature I have never seen, had a lot of fictitious movie trailers.  This is now the third of those to be made into a movie, including the strange more violent Spy Kids spinoff Machete.  

-If you watch that initial old 2007 fake trailer, thankfully I did not, you might have had some kills and some plot points, not all, but some, spoiled for you.  Fun fact and a warning to not go looking into it all before watching the full feature.  Also, it should be said major spoiler warnings from here on out, this is a new movie and please go watch it first and come listen after.

-So, with the trailer for the actual movie, that is fine to watch, so that gave us all the interesting idea of a masked killer like Scream and I Know What you did Last Summer.  All of that was great.  But the question was how we were gonna get to that setup.  And I did not see this coming.  Black Friday.  So, there is a Bruce Campbell zombie movie about that day that came out and I have yet to see it.  But this movie starts the after the meal or right at the start of the Thanksgiving meal and goes right into the busiest shopping day of the year following this holiday mostly about food and family fun.

-That kickoff and a travesty from it is how we get to the scary seasonal fun and premise of a Pilgrim man hunting people.

-There has always gotta be a motive for these masked serial killers, especially when they are just a regular person with no possessions or magic.  And when we do find that answer for the killer or killers, it makes sense.  But it all stems from one very specific event taking place on a Black Friday.

-And this Thanksgiving movie could have taken place technically in any state, but this movie screams Bahstahn.  The Bahstahn dialects and accents are tremendous and always bring me joy to hear.  As a fellow Mass boy myself, working 4 whole years in that state, it is one of my many home away from homes.  But to fellow podcaster and host of The Good, The Bad, The Watchable and friend of me and the show, eat your heart out Rojas.

-So, this movie actually starts at the end of turkey day and kicks off just hours before the other big holiday of the time, Black Friday, now I am more partial to Cyber Monday, but that is just me.  So, this particular Black Friday has our main cast of teens, one of those movies, our McDreamy sheriff, and the whole town coming to a Walmart like store for an amazing free waffle iron.  I feel like all of these movies have some sort of copyright safe non-infringing version of a Walmart.  Never a Target knockoff somehow

-Things are pretty crazy with how much people want this waffle iron, and the different bahstahn accents flying around made me think I was watching The Town, Good Will Hunting, or the Depahted.

-Having only been to a Black Friday, a true one once.  It was in a mall and maybe we were in it for a bit, but really it was just to see the cinematic masterpiece that was Toy Story 2 in not a Marcus Theaters like you would expect from this Midwest man, but instead, an AMC from the homeland.  Me and Tommy DeVito, Jersey boyz and all that.

-I have never had what this movie has.  But we all have seen those news clips of the crazy ones, and this is one of those.  Things are crazy for 2 security guards and one sheriff, but they come to a head when our fun and spunky group of teens sneak in to get their free waffle irons and show off first.  Like I Know What You Did Last Summer, this is very much an oopsie-daisy from a group of friends getting punished a year later.  That one just on 4th of July.

-Crazy how this movie also starts, a smidgeon it starts out like at least, to Krampus, it shows the wild side a bit of these holidays, and this is for sure a movie that shows the downside of aggressive capitalism.

-And things do go wrong when this over capitalism, with things happening in this movie that really would shock you for the first hits of violence and gore.  One guy gets trampled to death, one guy gets his jugular slashed on broken store sliding door glass, and the last one, one of the nice wives we meet at the tail end of thanksgiving gets run over by carts and somewhat scalped by one.  A star pitcher also gets his arm broken pretty badly.  It is like a much tamer but somehow more gory Hunger Games.

-I can not explain how much of an aggressive start to the movie for an inciting incident this.  It felt like with how much tragedy being shot and shown so quickly and nonchalantly.  This movie was going a mile a minute, and you just could not take a breath.  This really sets the tone for the gore and the dark dark humor you are in for with this festive film.

-But to the next Thanksgiving and Black Friday more importantly, there is some outrage of this town for this store doing another big sale, even with more than 2 security guards this time, and while things up to this point feel more like a fall themed know what you did last summer, we are just gonna call is last summer cause gosh that is a mouth full of a title.  

-After this, the small-town vibe in Thanksgiving, it will always feel more like I know what you did last summer, the phone cyber bullying feels more scream adjacent, an entire franchise based on using phones.  Gosh Scream 7 really got thrown into disarray of late, didn’t it?  I did not realize those leads were on 2 picture deals, but either way, maybe Patrick Dempsey will come back after being a big part of this movie.  All of that but just smack dab in the middle of Bahstahn.

-So, we revisit this RightMart after things were a real wrong mart after last year.  And wouldn’t you know it, this wrong mart is having another Black Friday sale after some real fatalities just a year ago.  And this wouldn’t be Scream adjacent, especially more the Scream TV series Lakewood stuff, without some vague social media bullying/foreshadowing.  Our group of moderately at best fleshed out teens get some John Carver Insta posting, the new Ghostface here that is based on a real person’s likeness this time.  Kind of has that Guy Fawkes things going, so not a bad design.

-Do you think every movie Tik Toker Addison Rae will be in will have some tie to Social Media? This and the All That remake, just makes sense.  But I feel like she plays into it in a fun way here.

-Now if you know my initial guess rule with these, when the cast has a fair amount of unknown young people, if there is a famous one, you assume they will die early or they will be the killer, Jack Quaid in Scream 5 obviously.  

-If there is one thing this movie does, is really really lay into the Thanksgiving details.  The social media post invites them into a Thanksgiving dinner…from hell, probably.

-The blame is placed on them, and other around the town, but probably a bit of that is just for this town tragedy.  But it is not like a hidden secret like Last Summer.

-But like that movie, after this tough moment, our final girl heir apparent for the franchise lost her golden arm pitching boyfriend only for him to return right here, now with her dating this square of a dude who she was hella disinterested in.  This love interest could have been more Scream with suspect number 1 being either of these.  But with Last Summer, heartthrob for the ages Freddie Prinze Jr. was not once but twice assumed the killer for coming back and working some less than glamorous family job.

-I feel bad that these characters and actors are mostly unknown to me outside of Rae and Dempsey.  I will try to introduce them by name, character, and hope you remember that as I bring them back up.

-But the names I deff do not need are all the non-teen friend group folks who start getting wacked in vaguely Thanksgiving ways, some more obvious than others.  But in short, anyone who was super aggressive during that Thanksgiving tragedy, stars getting killed off.  And sticking people to frozen surfaces and like skin being ripped off, you can tell this was visceral from the beginning, but these become the real killer moments where it all happens.  The first one was like a flash by and not so thanksgiving like somehow being cut in half with a car and a dumpster lid.  But for the randoms, some are more thanksgiving like using an electric turkey carver, some are taken directly from that fake trailer from the Grindhouse movie, and then beheading a mascot turkey at a Thanksgiving parade, which feels “festive” for a holiday that has a staple of eating turkey.

-I would like to think the Dad and RightMart owner was never a suspect, but it is funny that Suits actor Rick Hoffman is once again a business mogul who something something boardroom cutthroat led him to this local business tycoon.  Just with a mustache now and a different name of Thomas Wright, for RightMart.

-But besides killing off the more randoms, somehow both Addison Rae and Tomaso Sanelli, cast as Evan perfectly as that hot head jock type.  Like I saw him and swore I saw him in Stranger Things, or somehow with time travel, Freaks & Geeks.  The reveal of the killer, who we go on the assumption there is just one, regardless of the background, it feels tough to be able to kidnap 2 people at the same time.  I will give some theories I had right after watching at the end especially with an upcoming sequel.  

-While it takes ages to get a death in the friend group, something that people were annoyed with in Scream 5, probably more importantly, Scream 6, we do get a few at least.  This isn’t Friday the 13th or Halloween when we were cleaning the slate every movie.

-I do love a vauge Eastern European dad’s reaction, who it is implied is some sort of criminal type, immediately sees what is going on and gets his daughter TF out of there, or at least that is the plan for Jenna Warren’s Yulia.  

-So, besides the immediate fun of potential mob boss dad, I like that, while there seems to be a debate, her dad and the cop guarding them just get a tranq gun dart.  The killer pilgrim is just really targeting people who really had things to do with the Black Friday incident.

-And maybe it was obvious, but the teases in how Yulia gets got is something.  The earmuffs feel like a tease to her eventual fate of getting corn on the cob holder ear skewered.  Not that that is the killing blow, but you have to give this killer credit for going like way out of his way to use Thanksgiving props for his serial killing.

-Nell Verlaque’s Jennifer never really feels super like the main character in this movie until she is literally the one running away and the one in the final act who discovers the killer’s identity.  But when her and Gabriel Davenport’s Scuba show up to try and save their friend with a gun they bought from probably the most fun character in the movie, instead Yulia ends up on a buzzsaw getting super disemboweled.  This movie really pulls no punches with the gore and it only gets grosser from this to probably be expected Eli Roth movie.  At times, not this part, but other times, this movie could easily feel to gross for people and not make it a holiday staple on a day that has food as a bit part of it.

-But before we get to the true main course of this tale, have to give props to Joe Delfin in the role of McCarty who with his limited screen time screams the most Massachusetts and Bahstahn guy there is minus a Wes Welker jersey.  His quirky nature and just fun personality makes him easily the most memorable character in the movie somehow minus what Patrick Dempsey brings.  Not making the movie unwatchable, but it is a bit odd how you don’t seem to super care about these characters minus the 4th wall break of wondering if Addison Rae will be alive at the end.

-The ability for assumingly 1 killer to abduct 4 people, albeit in the chaos of a public murder and smoke bombs all over the place, all of that at a public parade, I still really believe there has to be more than 1 killer and with that sequel I really think there is one from this movie still alive in the shadows waiting for the sequel.

-So once again, this was a scene direct from the fake trailer, but cooking someone alive, was pretty fucking gross.  This was easily one of the best chase scenes, like easily the most tension wandering around the house and hiding and finding other dead bodies.  Shoot, this stepmother, who had no business having this cool of a chase scene, and she had a moment where she almost got the dub.  But actually, cooking her alive and like ‘serving her’ to her husband, like that was so so gross.  That scene alone could get people to not want to watch this movie.  This also has someone wine corked in their neck to fill a glass up.  I knew, or really really though and was confident this was not a cannibal movie, thankfully I was right.  This isn’t Walking Dead, the show or the good video game from Telltale.  Not this new that rumor has it is, not so good.

-The poetic justice starts coming here with moments of the initial livestreamer of the Thanksgiving fatality-fest.  Evan gets his head meat tenderized to death on would you believe it, a live stream.

-Our final girl Jessica finally flaps her wings getting out with a ring with a knife thanks to the once again, Bostonian icon of the movie, McCarty.  After a long chase scene, sheriff Newsome, or sheriff mcdreamy, is found injured AF and her baseball boyfriend with the broken arm looks like the killer with a mask on.  

-But let’s be real, we have seen this killer, her boyfriend is a short king with an injured wrist, which precedes a javelin type throw scene, so no way is he the killer.  A killer who has great planning, Thanksgiving references for days, and some sort of tech skillset to go with the physical killing skills.  So who could it be?

-Well in the same way where Neve Campbell thought this detective played by Patrick Dempsey in Scream 3 was the killer with some clues, he was not.  In this movie, Patrick Dempsey is discovered to be the killer by giving those same vague ideas about how they make mistakes, and he made one with the nature he tracked in with him

-It is great when the killer is revealed that Jessica gave the killer footage to find out who else was responsible for killing the love of his life (married to someone else) and their unborn kid.  So many good details from the always fun second watch of a slasher to see where the subtle teases are.  Like besides the obvious ones, some of those people might have not been targeted by mcdreamy if that private security tape was not handed over to the killer.

-And after this the final battle with the killer is on after outing the killer on a different livestream, and at this point it is all hands-on deck to kills some guys and gals.  And the lovely tease of our now in true final girl mode Jessica uses he skillset firing an air musket to shoot an inflating balloon to set of a huge explosion seemingly killing Dempsey.  

-This is highly teased as not being the case and I super expect him to be back in a sequel, with him maybe sneaking out in a firefighter outfit looking at the crime scene.  And I have a theory of a second killer here.

-Since no shot it is Addison Rae, and I would be shocked if it was Jessica’s baseball boy.  I really think, the guys she ends up with, not the baseball boy who disappears from the plot for so long, Ryan played by Milo Manheim.  He is my prediction for Thanksgiving 2 to be the other original killer.  He has tech skills and has motivations that he barely explains away when brought up in the first one.  So that is my take on the current movie and a little tease to the future.  A future that I think is bright and honestly, the present is pretty bright too.  But how bright is this star of a thanksgiving/horror genre blender that would put a turducken to shame?

-Letterboxd ratings:

- Thanksgiving – 3.5 stars

-wrap/call to action

-So, there it is, one of those movies that I came in with low expectations and ended up pleasantly surprised.  I feel like this was sort of the mindset I had watching The Black Phone on a random day but I had a bit more built up investment going into this.  It was funnier than expected, there was nothing supernatural at all, which I like from these kinds of slashers.  And while I probably had more seasonal fun with Violent Night.  The winter holiday movie market is saturated overall with hallmark popping out quantity over quality, the classics we all grew up with from Disney and Elf, and even scary things like Black Christmas and Krampus.  

-This movie stands alone for a holiday that lacks movies overall for Thanksgiving.  And this could easily become a seasonal rewatch on some streaming service that I would be happy to dive into for seconds year after year in the Fall to bridge the spooky season abundance of Halloween movies into the winter and the new year.  And there will be leftovers now with the announced sequel, that movie tagline LIED!!!

-Was Thanksgiving, the movie not the holiday, satisfying for you like it was for me?  Let me know if you are thankful for this on social at either @NickNackMovies or @NickNack_IC on Twitter.  I’m still not calling it dad.  X I mean, X, not dad of course, that would be weird.  Any hoodle, we are also on Instagram, Tik Tok, and of course Letterboxd.  So, cheers, and have a lovely day with seasonal foods, football, and a brand new spooky movie to break up any potential tension at the family dinner table.  

-If you need more, just watch the other seasonal traditional Thanksgiving movie, Spider-Man, and wonder together, just when we will have a physical release to see Tobey once more in the Spider-Man: No Way Home’s More Fun Stuff Version.  But see you next time right here and wherever you listen to podcasts loyal listener.