Red Christmas (2017) Timeline Explained – Every Event in Order

Cletus is revealed to be the son of a religious fanatic who bombed the abortion clinic where Diane went 20 years earlier. When Diane attempted to terminate her pregnancy, the bombing thwarted her plans but left Cletus scarred and without a family. He has returned to exact vengeance on Diane and her entire family for the loss of his own.

Foreshadowing: The contentious conversation about abortion that Cletus initiates at dinner hints at his personal connection to the clinic bombing.

• cletus
• revenge
• abortion clinic
• bombing
• diane

Twenty years before the Christmas gathering, Diane traveled north to end her pregnancy at a clinic. A religious fanatic associated with Cletus's family bombed the clinic, killing many including presumably Cletus's father. The bombing prevented Diane from getting the abortion but left her family with a thirst for vengeance that has festered for two decades.

Foreshadowing: Cletus's ominous warning that if he returns, it will be 'a matter of life and death' hints at the violent reckoning to come.

• abortion clinic
• bombing
• 20 years
• diane
• religious fanatic

Cletus views every member of Diane's family as complicit in the events that destroyed his own life twenty years ago. He shows no regard for innocence, having already killed Hope and other family members without hesitation. The newborn represents the continuation of the family bloodline that Cletus is determined to eradicate completely.

Foreshadowing: Earlier kills demonstrate Cletus's complete lack of mercy, he murders Hope with an ax and strikes down Suzy with an umbrella without provocation.

• cletus
• newborn baby
• killed
• suzy
• umbrella

During the chaotic violence when Cletus is hunting the family through the house, Diane fires her gun in a panicked attempt to defend herself. The bullet misses Cletus and strikes Jerry instead, killing him unintentionally. This tragic accident adds to the senseless loss of life throughout the night.

Foreshadowing: The mounting panic and confusion as family members are picked off one by one creates the chaotic environment for this accidental shooting.

• diane
• jerry
• accidental shooting
• gun

In the final confrontation, Diane grabs a decorative anchor hanging around her neck and plunges it directly into Cletus's torso, killing him in a moment of desperate retribution. This act represents her attempt to finally end the cycle of violence that began twenty years earlier at the clinic.

Foreshadowing: The anchor, prominently displayed around Diane's neck throughout the gathering, foreshadows this violent payoff in the climax.

• diane
• cletus
• anchor
• kill
• retribution

The newborn survives because Cletus, after stabbing the infant, leaves it on a table rather than finishing it off, possibly due to the chaos of the moment or perhaps an oversight in his killing spree. When Diane leaps from the window and becomes entangled in the chain, she dies, and no one else remains alive to stop the infant from being found by authorities later.

Foreshadowing: The brutal scene of Cletus puncturing the newborn's back suggests he intended to kill it, but the child's survival remains ambiguous in the film's logic.

• newborn
• sole survivor
• cletus
• diane

Cletus initially leaves after the heated argument about abortion, warning the family that if he returns, it will be a matter of life and death. He returns because his purpose is revenge, not for the argument itself, but for what happened twenty years ago at the clinic. The confrontation serves as the catalyst for him to begin his killing spree.

Foreshadowing: The letter Cletus reads about abortion is deliberately provocative, designed to provoke the family and escalate tensions before his true violent intentions emerge.

• cletus
• christmas gathering
• return
• kills
• abortion argument

The killings begin after Cletus's confrontational departure and return. Though the exact moment is not detailed in the summary, his mission is clear: to punish Diane and her family for the clinic bombing that destroyed his family twenty years prior. His first victim is Hope, whom he strikes down with an ax, marking the official start of the massacre.

Foreshadowing: Cletus's grim warning about returning sets the expectation for violence, and his ominous presence during dinner establishes him as a clear threat.

• cletus
• killing starts
• hope
• ax
• family massacre

After killing Cletus with the anchor, Diane attempts to escape the house by leaping from the second-floor window. However, she becomes entangled in a chain connected to an anchor or decorative fixture outside. The chain catches her body and tears her apart, causing her gruesome death in an ironic twist, using the same weapon that killed her attacker.

Foreshadowing: The anchor around her neck that she uses to kill Cletus also becomes the instrument of her own death through the chain entanglement.

• diane
• window
• chain
• anchor
• death escape

During the chaos when Ginny gives birth, Cletus attacks Suzy by stabbing her with an umbrella. The brutal nature of using such an innocuous, festive object as a murder weapon underscores the film's themes of Christmas violence and the perversion of holiday cheer into terror.

Foreshadowing: The umbrella appears during a moment of supposed hope, the birth of new life, making its use as a murder weapon particularly disturbing.

• suzy
• umbrella
• stabbed
• cletus
• birth