The Carpenter’s Son Ending Explained: The Final Revelation That Seals Satan’s Fate
Nicolas Cage and FKA Twigs’ The Carpenter’s Son is igniting a firestorm, pitting a Jesus-like Boy against a satanic Stranger in a temptation-fueled climax that’s splitting audiences and fueling fierce debate.
Quick heads up: this is full of spoilers for 'The Carpenter's Son'. If you have tickets in hand, maybe circle back after.
'The Carpenter's Son' has already been a lightning rod, and not by accident. The Boy is a clear stand-in for Jesus, the Stranger reads as Satan, and the movie tracks how far temptation can push someone who might be destined for holiness. The ending takes a pretty big swing away from typical scripture retellings, and that swing is where the whole thing locks into place.
So what actually happens at the end?
The Boy and the Stranger throw down in a vicious final fight. It is not a parable-style chat by the fire; it is a bruiser. The Boy resists the pull to the darker path, wins the battle, and then makes the surprising choice: he lets the Stranger live. Satan does not get wiped from the earth. He hangs around. That single decision becomes the movie's fulcrum.
Why spare the Stranger?
Early on, the Stranger tempts the Boy with a pitch to join the 'Brotherhood of Evil Messiahs' — basically, pick power, bend the world, serve yourself. By refusing to deliver a finishing blow, the Boy is not just rejecting that club; he is walking away from the whole self-destruction, conquer-and-control mindset it represents.
The mercy move is the point. It signals he will use whatever power he has for people, not against enemies, and definitely not to juice his own ego. That choice reframes the whole story in hindsight: the victory is not about domination; it's about restraint.
The movie's big idea: compassion is learned, not baked in
The film keeps asking one question: given what he can do, what path does the Boy choose? The Stranger keeps nudging, trying to tilt him toward the shadows, while the Boy wavers. The read the movie pushes is blunt: the Boy was not born perfectly serene or automatically divine in temperament. He has to wrestle with his wants. He has to learn kindness. He has to choose it, even when he is strong enough to crush his opponent.
Between the brutal fight and a run of visions that expose what he personally craves, he lands on a simple rule — use power for others, not for himself. That does tweak a few long-held assumptions about how these stories are usually told, and honestly, it is the part the movie gets right.
Quick stats if you're heading out to see it
- Directed by: Lotfy Nathan
- Cast: Nicolas Cage, Noah Jupe, FKA Twigs
- Release date: November 14, 2025
- IMDb rating: 3.1/10
- Rotten Tomatoes score: 36%
- Production: Spacemaker
- Status: Now playing in theaters in the U.S.