{"id":50772,"date":"2025-11-28T00:51:06","date_gmt":"2025-11-28T05:51:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=50772"},"modified":"2025-11-28T00:51:06","modified_gmt":"2025-11-28T05:51:06","slug":"thankskilling-2008","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2025\/11\/28\/thankskilling-2008\/","title":{"rendered":"ThanksKilling (2008)"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nA group of college students are stalked and killed by a foul-mouthed Turkey during Thanksgiving break in a hilariously low budget horror comedy that just might become an annual tradition.
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\nThanksgiving movies are traditionally created as family friendly comedies, feel-good holiday misadventures, or children’s animated specials. If you dig deep enough, you’ll eventually find a small offering of horror films that take the festivities and twist them into slasher narratives. This is where films like 2024’s Thanksgiving or 2020’s The Last Thanksgiving come into play. However, if you keep digging, you’ll eventually find yourself looking at a 2008 film called ThanksKilling. The movie’s previews will pull you in with a Turkey puppet that has the kind of quality seen in Triumph the Insult Comic Dog. Stiff and cheap looking, yet intriguing enough to get you to watch.<\/p>\n

It should be said that ThanksKilling is NOT meant to be seen with the family. While a horror film featuring a cartoonish puppet may seem harmless at first glance, you’ll realize you’ve made a mistake putting it on when the opening reveals a single breast before panning back far enough to reveal a pilgrim running through the woods with her top wide open. Our mystery woman is promptly killed by the film’s evil turkey who quips, \u201cNice tits, bitch.\u201d like some sort of avian Freddy Krueger. This sets the tone for the remainder of the movie.<\/p>\n

In \u201cmodern\u201d 2008, a group of college students leave campus and go to celebrate Thanksgiving in the woods. Their bonkers idea of a holiday is interrupted by the evil turkey we saw in the opening act after a dog urinates on a sacred totem that was keeping him contained. As I write this, it occurs to me that Freddy Krueger was resurrected in a similar fashion during the opening act of A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream master, when a dog urinates on the ground in a youth’s dream. Unlike the New Line Cinema superstar, the evil turkey doesn’t have many motives for dispatching the college students. One of them may loosely be related to one of the pilgrims who imprisoned him in the 1600’s, but that narrative falls apart not long after its introduction when said college student is killed. The evil turkey acts out randomly, almost like flashback bits seen on Family Guy.<\/p>\n

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The attempts at gore are hilarious, but self aware. The camera zooms aggressively close to some intestines multiple times in one scene, allowing the viewer to clearly see that they’re stuff stockings covered in stage blood. At another point the evil turkey kills one of the student’s fathers and wears his face, Texas Chainsaw Massacre style. When the student comes home, she fails to see any difference and promptly introduces her friends to her \u201cfather\u201d. This kind of goofy humor pairs well with the low tier acting, flimsy lore, and poor quality that ThanksKilling would otherwise be plagued with. It all comes together in an oddly charming fashion.<\/p>\n

This was a passion project by film student Jordan Downey, who worked on ThanksKilling after coming up with the tagline, \u201cGobble Gobble, Mother-Fucker.\u201d Downey wrote it, directed it, and starred in it as the voice of the evil turkey, which he also puppeteered. He even made the puppet by hand in his apartment. Co-writers included Brad Schulz and Kevin Stewart. Shultz would later do the Game of Thrones parody, Gay of Thrones, while Stewart would take on a career of cinematography. Jordan and Kevin worked together on future projects like the short film Critters: Bounty Hunter, a horror segment in 2024’s V\/H\/S\/ Beyond, and even ThanksKilling 3. Before you ask… No, There is no ThanksKilling 2. This is the kind of beautifully chaotic energy this team brings to the screen, and they did it all for roughly $3,500 on their first outing.<\/p>\n

Once you find out that the movie is a student project that gained a cult following, you’ll grow to appreciate its low-brow humor even more. At no point was anyone taking ThanksKilling seriously, and neither should the viewer. When you sit down for ThanksKilling you should expect something along the lines of Troma’s Toxic Avenger. It’s too immature for a classy crowd, but far too crass for a young audience. If you’re looking to get away from the stuffing, cranberry sauce, and family banter for something dumb and fun, be sure to fire up ThanksKilling and have yourself a laugh.<\/p>\n

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\nThanksKilling is currently streaming for free on Tubi.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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