Juror #2 Ending Explained: What Happens To Justin Kemp

In 2024, Clint Eastwood delivered what turned out to be somewhat of a sleeper hit with a film that could — and arguably should — have been a much bigger deal. Courtroom drama "Juror #2" is vintage Eastwood, proving the legendary star and director still has it at the age of 94. The icon's 42nd (and likely final) movie is an intense thriller that keeps viewers engaged with its story of a man serving jury duty on a case in which he might very well be the real culprit. But it's also an examination of the U.S. justice system and the very concept of justice itself.

Eastwood turned down directing one of 2024's most controversial movies to helm "Juror #2," which investigates where truth, morality, and justice overlap. More specifically, it asks whether these are indeed separate constructs, or whether — especially in the case of truth and justice — they are expressions of the same fundamental ideas. Should truth and justice be the same thing? How, when it is administered by flawed human beings, can justice be truly impartial? And will attractive man Nicholas Hoult abandon his equally attractive wife for jail time to appease his guilty conscience?

These are all questions that "Juror #2" prompts in the minds of its viewers before wrapping up with a frustratingly ambiguous ending that leaves the job of actually answering these questions to the viewer. But perhaps you prefer a little more clarity with your tense, cerebral legal thrillers. If so, the following breakdown of the ending of "Juror #2" is likely just what you're looking for.

In "Juror #2," one of 2024's most underrated movies, Nicholas Hoult plays writer and reformed alcoholic Justin Kemp, whose wife, Allison (Zoey Deutch), is expecting. The couple prepare for the arrival of their first child just as Justin receives a jury duty notice. Despite his attempts to get out of it, he's selected for the jury in the case of James Sythe (Gabriel Basso), who's accused of killing his girlfriend Kendall Carter (Eastwood's daughter Francesca Eastwood). Very quickly, however, Justin realizes that he himself is likely responsible for the victim's death.

Having left the very same bar in which Sythe and Carter were arguing on the night of her apparent murder, Justin drove home in a storm and believed he hit a deer while crossing a bridge. As the case unfolds, however, it becomes increasingly obvious that he likely hit Carter and sent her over the edge of the bridge. The rest of the film sees Justin wrestling with his conscience as he tries to sway his 11 peers towards finding Sythe not guilty, despite their immediate impulse to convict.

As things become increasingly convoluted, Justin is caught between the prospect of turning himself in and clearing Sythe's name but potentially losing his own freedom, or maintaining his silence and staying with his wife and child only for an innocent man to go to jail. But Eastwood makes things much more complex than that. Sythe, for instance, is far from an innocent man in many other respects. Likely a gang member with a history of violence, his past complicates Justin's crisis further. That goes double for the other jury members, who are willing to convict for reasons as simple as wanting to get home to their children or their own experiences with domestic abuse.

Meanwhile, prosecutor Faith Killebrew (Toni Collette) is eager to get a conviction to help her bid for District Attorney, while defense lawyer Eric (Chris Messina) appears genuinely convinced of his client's innocence. Ultimately, Justin is unsuccessful in his attempts to sway the jury and Killebrew wins out, with Sythe being convicted and receiving life without parole.

After Justin seemingly manages to dodge being implicated in the death of Kendall Carter, Faith Killebrew starts to put the pieces together, ultimately realizing she has jailed the wrong man for the death of Kendall Carter. James Sythe is sentenced and a newly-elected District Attorney Killebrew finds Justin sitting outside the courtroom in front of a statue of Lady Justice — a symbol to which Clint Eastwood cuts throughout the film.

Here, Justin all but confirms Killebrew is right in her suspicion that he killed Carter, with the attorney saying, "Sometimes you try to do the right thing only to realize you got it all wrong. When you figure things out, you realize the guy you're after isn't some psycho. He's not even really a criminal. He's just a regular guy." She then asks why she shouldn't pursue real justice in this case, with Justin urging that he's "a good person" who's "caught in terrible circumstances." This penultimate encounter between the two sums up all of the tensions at the heart of the film, with Justin maintaining that "Sometimes truth isn't justice." After he lays out what will happen if Killebrew tries to have him arrested, Justin walks away leaving the lawyer conflicted as the scales of Lady Justice sway in the wind. A bit on the nose? Yep. But the point about justice being an elusive and complicated idea is made nonetheless, and the film remains one of Eastwood's best directorial efforts of recent years.

The final scene of Juror #2 sees Justin playing with his wife and newly-born child in their living room, before a knock at the door interrupts them. Justin then opens the door to reveal Killebrew standing there. Neither of the two say anything, simply staring intensely at each other before the film cuts to black.

Though Faith Killebrew is depicted as somewhat of a careerist, intent upon winning the case against James Sythe and being elected as District Attorney, she's also shown grappling with her own personal crisis at the end of the movie. After figuring out Justin's involvement in the death of Kendall Carter, Killebrew is visibly uncomfortable with her triumph in the case. As such, when Justin opens his front door at the end of the film, we are at least supposed to infer that things aren't over for him.

Just what Killebrew intends to do in this instance remains ambiguous, but there's a reason Clint Eastwood focuses on her post-case consternation. She's clearly not at peace with having jailed someone for a crime they didn't commit, so when she shows up at Justin's house, she almost certainly isn't there to follow his advice and leave him to his quiet family life. As the camera slow-zooms on both Killebrew and Justin's faces, we're also given the sense that the two are being brought inexorably back together, and Justin's expression in particular doesn't portend anything good for him.

Considering the film's core themes and its interrogation of justice and the U.S. justice system, that closing scene could be interpreted as Eastwood making his final statement on whether truth and justice are, indeed, the same. At least, the director seems to be making a statement about the immutable link between the two. Killebrew could very well have left Justin to his life, and there would have been the appearance of cosmic balance. A likely gang member with violent tendencies would have been locked up. A mother and child would have their husband and father present. And a District Attorney would maintain her untarnished career. But Killebrew's appearance in these final moments shows she cannot live with her decision, and is thereby an emphatic statement about the ineluctability of truth. Or perhaps more specifically, the undeniable link between truth and the film's other big theme, morality. Things might seem okay on the surface, but as Eastwood sees it, truth and justice aren't about how things seem, but are tied to a universal morality that keeps score regardless of whatever casuistry humanity uses to let themselves off the hook. It's the film's grappling with such important ideas as this that are part of the reason "Juror #2" should have been a big box office hit and not relegated to the annals of streaming history.

Though it is arguably one of 2024's best streaming releases, there are quite a few things in "Juror #2" that require the suspension of disbelief. For instance, you have to believe that Justin was not only called for jury duty on the exact same case that involved him, but also that he would make it all the way through jury selection to actually hear the case. While the movie sometimes strains credulity, however, it makes a concerted effort to adhere to reality in more important ways as well — i.e. the complex nature of its core themes.

Throughout "Juror #2," Clint Eastwood throws more and more mitigating factors into the mix. Yes, James Sythe is innocent, but he's also guilty of other things. Yes, the jurors should be unwaveringly impartial, but they are all humans with needs outside the courtroom and flaws that impede their ability to remain truly balanced. It's also worth noting that, throughout the film, Justin's guilt is never confirmed. It seems almost certain that he was responsible for Carter's death, but there's never any irrefutable evidence of it. As Nicholas Hoult himself told Entertainment Weekly, "I was always playing with the idea that he still believed that it could not have been him [...] as a human, you always give yourself any possible little glimmer of out that you could in that scenario to help yourself sleep at night." So, while it seems incredibly unlikely that Justin actually did hit a deer in the exact same spot Carter was found, Eastwood seems to be leaving enough reasonable doubt here to complicate things further.

Stars Nicholas Hoult (who will soon play Lex Luthor in James Gunn's "Superman") and Toni Collette spoke to Entertainment Weekly about the ending of "Juror #2" and confirmed that Clint Eastwood intentionally left things ambiguous in the film's closing moments. The final scene of the film, in which Justin and Faith Killebrew stand face-to-face at the front door, was actually the first scene the pair shot together, having reunited 22 years after first starring together in 2002's "About a Boy." Discussing the scene, Hoult noted, "Clint likes to not over explain. One of the things that makes him masterful as a director is that he gives space for the audience to think and work a little bit for themselves. It's not spoon-fed to them."

That said, both Hoult and Collette see the appearance of Killebrew in these final moments as proof of her intention to not let Justin off the hook. Hoult continued to explain how his character "sees his world crumbling" in this moment, and is mentally "grasping at straws" to figure out a way to spin this latest development and keep himself out of custody. The actor described his character's worried look in the final shot as his bran "going into overdrive along with panic."

Meanwhile, Collette confirmed that her interpretation was that Killebrew was there to enact true justice, saying:

"This woman's dedicated her entire life to justice and doing the right thing. To uncovering the truth. And there's so much at stake for her. There's actually a lot that will be compromised, and she may lose a lot, but she still has to do the right thing. That's just an innate part of her."

Though it seems highly likely Faith Killebrew intends to pursue Justin in some way at the end of the film, we never actually learn what her plans are. Is she there to take him into custody? Tell him the case is being reopened and he's a suspect? Or merely talk to him about how she and him can ensure justice is served while protecting his family and her reputation? Again, Clint Eastwood leaves this intentionally vague, but it seems some clues as to his approach can be found in unused alternate takes from "Juror #2."

According to Nicholas Hoult (via Entertainment Weekly), Eastwood actually shot multiple different versions of the final doorstep scene with Justin and Killebrew. As the actor explained it, "One was just [Toni], one where [Toni] had police officers on either side, one where there was police cars behind her." It seems, then, that Eastwood came close to making the ending a little more clear, as the presence of police would imply that Justin was being taken into custody and that Killebrew had already started the process of retrying the case. But as Hoult put it, "The [takes] that are more mysterious are the ones that work better because the audience can then sit there and be like, 'Okay, what is going to happen next?' And, 'What is the right thing to happen next?'"