Is Winchester Scary? The Verdict and the Whole Plot
Somewhat, 4 out of 10. It's a haunted house story built almost entirely out of jump scares, with very little blood.
🐱THE SCARE SIGNAL
SCARE SCORE
4 /10
🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱🐱
DREAD LEVEL
Low
It fades when the credits roll, apart from a lingering interest in nails.
DOG
Dog: fine
fine, no dog dies.
Ruling: It is a haunted mansion with a lot of jump scares and not much blood, so watch it before dark.
Winchester runs one hundred minutes and takes place in an enormous mansion that never stops being built. Sarah Winchester believes the ghosts of the people her family's guns hurt are living in the house, so she keeps adding rooms. A doctor is hired to find out whether she has lost her mind.
The premise, briefly
In 1906 a drug-dependent doctor named Eric Price is hired to assess whether Sarah Winchester, the widow of a gun manufacturer, is fit to run the company, and he stays in her ever-growing mansion.
How much do you want to know?
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The verdict above is spoiler-free. Everything below, including the ending, stays hidden until you pick a depth.
🐱CUT TO THE CHASE
How it ends
Eric uses a bullet that once killed him to banish the ghost of Ben Block from the house. Sarah is declared sane, and she announces she will build more rooms for more spirits. In the final scene, a nail falls out of a board sealing one of the rooms.
The scene you're dreading
The possessed Henry points a rifle at Sarah in the middle of the movie, and Eric and Marion stop him before he fires.
The dog
No dog dies in Winchester.
Winchester is mostly jump scares in a big old house, and knowing a single bullet is what banishes the main ghost takes the edge off.
THE SHORT VERSION IS HIDDEN
How it ends, the scene you're dreading, what happens to the dog, and the bottom line. About twenty seconds to read.
What actually happens
A house with no finish date
Sarah Winchester is the widow of William Wirt Winchester, the gun manufacturer. After the death of her husband and their child Annie, she is convinced that the ghosts of everyone killed by Winchester firearms have cursed her. On a medium's advice, she spends her twenty-million-dollar inheritance on a giant mansion in San Jose, California, which later becomes the Winchester Mystery House. The construction never stops. Her niece Marion lives there with her son Henry, and after dark Henry falls under the control of an unknown presence.
The year is 1906, and the Winchester company hires Doctor Eric Price to live in the house and evaluate Sarah, since it suspects she is too unwell to keep running things. Eric is grieving his wife Ruby and depends on drugs. When he arrives he sees a ghost and assumes the drugs caused it. Later he spots another in the basement, and he sees the possessed Henry jump off the roof and saves him. Next day he starts his assessment, and Sarah admits she is afraid of ghosts and thinks she can help them move on. She also knows about his drug problem and takes his laudanum. That night he watches a seemingly possessed Sarah sketch plans for a new room, and an entity startles him back to his room. Sarah shows him her records of people killed by Winchester rifles, and explains that thirteen nails seal a spirit inside a room. Eric had once been shot dead by a Winchester rifle before he was revived, and he keeps the bullet with him.
Henry's chosen weapon is a rifle
This is the scene people dread most, and it comes in the middle of the movie. The possessed Henry tries to shoot Sarah with a rifle, and Eric and Marion stop him. The spirit's violence convinces Sarah to send her staff away and deal with the ghost personally. Eric meets a butler who turns out to be a ghost. He and Sarah work out that the spirit is Benjamin Block, a Confederate soldier whose two brothers died in the Civil War from Winchester rifles. Ben shot up a Winchester office and massacred the workers before police shot him dead. He is the one possessing Henry, and the room full of Winchester guns is where he was killed.
An earthquake shows up uninvited
A violent earthquake hits and wrecks the house, splitting Eric and Sarah apart. The possessed Henry escapes, and Marion chases him. Eric runs into several ghosts, including Ruby's. She could see and hear ghosts, and Eric had misdiagnosed her as delusional. The unstable Ruby shot Eric and then herself with a Winchester rifle. Her ghost comforts him and gives him the push to help Sarah. He finds Sarah, and together they trap Ben in the room. Ben's brothers corner Marion and Henry. When Ben tries to attack Sarah, they realize he is afraid of the bullet Eric kept, because Eric can see the ghosts only since that bullet killed him. Eric loads it in the rifle Ben used for the shooting and banishes him.
The ending, explained
Eric banishes Ben with the bullet, and Henry and Marion are saved. The other spirits go back to their rooms. Eric declares Sarah sane, which means she can stay in charge of the company, and she says she plans to build more rooms for more spirits. As the house is repaired, the camera returns to the hallway of sealed rooms and shows a nail dropping out of the boards over one of them.
The post-credits ruling
Nobody has confirmed whether there is a scene after the credits, so staying to check is your call.
✓ Spoiled safelyDog status: fine, no dog dies.
Questions people ask at 1am
Is Winchester scary?
Somewhat. Winchester is a 4 out of 10: lots of jump scares in a haunted mansion, low dread afterward and very little blood.
How does Winchester end?
Eric banishes the ghost of Ben Block with the bullet that once killed him, and Sarah is declared sane. In the final scene, a nail falls out of a board sealing a spirit in a room.
Does the dog die in Winchester?
No dog dies in Winchester.
Is there a post-credits scene in Winchester?
Nobody has confirmed either way, so Winchester may or may not have one.
Why does Sarah keep adding rooms to the mansion in Winchester?
In Winchester, Sarah believes the ghosts of people killed by Winchester guns haunt her, and she thinks she can help them move on. She builds more rooms to help them, and thirteen nails keep spirits sealed in the rooms.
BLURRED FOR YOUR PROTECTION
The whole plot of Winchester is hidden, ending included. It stays that way until you ask.
You can find out how Winchester ends without walking through the mansion at night. Install Scaredy Cat and it will blur horror before you see it.
