Jigsaw: Let the Games Begin — Part 1 of 8

I’ve had seven years to solidify my opinion on the ranking of the first seven SAW films. With one month until the franchise’s return, I start with the worst film in the franchise… so far. And ending with a relatively hot take of the newest film.

This series will summarize each movie’s plot / interesting points, with some commentary about why it’s silly or cool, etc.

We start with the worst film, and the “final chapter” when it was released…

VII. SAW 3D: The Final Chapter

It’s Saturday, October 30th 2010. I’ve been taken a painkiller, and am in the back of my mother’s Honda Pilot, driving to Worcester Polytechnic Institute. Now, first off — some context- why am I taking a painkiller and being driven to my university?

Well, about five weeks earlier I broke my leg playing soccer in a class for PE credit. I’ve been mostly sedentary since then save for bouts of PT every few days — I had surgery and have some metal and a gash that Jigsaw would be proud of (not really, he “abhors” violence) in my leg. I’m mostly getting around in a wheelchair.

Okay, so we pick up my friend and go see the movie — my friend, you see, she’s a huge SAW fan and we saw SAW VI upon returning from October break the year prior. She is in charge of making sure nobody bumps my leg / pushing me around.

This is the first (and only) 3D film in the franchise. A franchise slowly focusing more on the grisly violence and less on the weirdly, and increasingly, complicated backstory of the “Jigsaw killer” we got to learn more and more about since SAW II. It’s also the “final chapter” — after 7 years of movies, diminishing returns on SAW VI (thanks in part to Paranormal Activity being the same general release window) the planned 8 movie franchise is getting cut short. Oh, also of note? Doctor Gordon is back.

If that means something to you then you’ve a) seen SAW and remember Cary Elwes sawing his leg off and dragging himself out of a “literal shithole”, b) you know that we have no idea what happened to him after that. There are countless fan theories, and enough winks in the prior movies (despite directors saying otherwise) to support said theories, and lots of fan fiction endings on message boards having the franchise end with Dr. Gordon being key.

Those fanfic also should probably be listed in the credits. It happens pretty much as was guessed.

That’s the first issue with SAW 3D’s narrative. The big thing it has is closure on this unknown fate from the first movie but it doesn’t surprise you with it if that’s why you want to see it, you have a good guess — he’s another secret apprentice and likely was nursed back to health after the first film. I mean, how else could Jigsaw surgically put a key behind a dude’s eye, have all this medical equipment, have his apprentices easily sneak into hospitals, and so on?

By having an actual Doctor help him, duh.

The ending being as thought isn’t inherently bad but it’s also a weird marketing ploy for those hardcore fans who still expect a narrative that has any attempt of being interesting — We see him in 2 scenes prior to the obligatory twist ending where a “Hello Zepp” remix plays (this time “The Final Zepp”). One is at the very beginning — he crawls out of the bathroom and cauterizes the wound. Then he briefly shows up and is really creepy at a “Jigsaw Survivors” support group. Then nothing, until the ending.

Remember me saying the painkiller and all? I think I enjoyed this ending while it happened because I wasn’t entirely present. This is a bad movie. Even by throwaway, yearly sequel to a generally poorly handled series bad. It’s the worst film by far, and the next film on this list is also REALLY bad.

Saw VI ends with “evil” Jigsaw apprentice (bad? rogue? maybe rogue, let’s use rogue) Detective Hoffman barely surviving a reverse bear trap from Jigsaw’s ex-wife, Jill. Hoffman is a terrible character. He’s uninteresting, poorly played and seems to exist only to have more than one twist at the end of SAW IV while also showing how the franchise continues on without Jigsaw (or Amanda) being alive.

SAW 3D starts with a “clearly meant for 3D” trap that has two boyfriends judging the fate of their cheating girlfriend — these two dudes are only just learning they’re seeing the same women, while in this trap. They make a cheesy line before deciding to let her die instead of either of them something like “I think we’re breaking up with you!” and an organ splatter happens in 3D. Like, you think a liver is flying at you.

This actually a cool scene, cheesiness aside. All previous entries have focused on traps that are isolated and in dark, dingy rooms / seedy abandoned houses. This trap? There’s an audience. People recording with their iPhone 4’s or whatever Android phone was relevant at the time.

It seems to bear no relevance to the rest of the film, however.

The main “victim dealing with series of traps” plot involves the former Boondock Saint who isn’t a crossbow wielding walker killing machine being a fraud who used Jigsaw’s infamy to get rich and famous.

By mutilating himself just enough, saying he survived a trap from the killer, and writing a memoir about it. He runs the support group that Dr. Gordon briefly appears in. His fellow victims are PR agents, and other people who lied about it on his behalf and the final victim… his wife. Who didn’t do anything wrong other than believe her husband wasn’t lying. She dies, they all die.

At this point in the franchise, a contained story like this isn’t new. This one though, stretches it to an extreme. SAW VI did the same general thread — “corrupt successful guy gets his comeuppance” much better, and even tied into the overarching Jigsaw mythos nonsense way better.

Of course, the overarching narrative has to come to a conclusion. So there’s lots of torture that ties all this together. Including a dream sequence where Jill dies at the hands of a mining cart with a spear from Detective Hoffman. Beyond that, Jill get the uh… “honor” of being the first person to die from the infamous “Reverse Bear Trap” that adorned many a Hot Topic t-shirt (no joke, I had one and I got it at Hot Topic) and promotional poster for the first movie. It’s also very gross with 3D cause we see it as if we’re sitting there, watching her look at us while it happens. It’s SAW at its worse — needlessly violent and hopeless, making us indulge our most perverse sense of voyeurism. But, so does much of the violence in the film — including the scene featuring (recently passed) LINKIN PARK vocalist Chester Bennington. Bennington was a vocal fan of the franchise (his other band, Dead By Sunrise has a song on this film’s OST) and plays a Neo Nazi gangster who has their back like… gorilla glued to a car that’s going to drive into a thing of spikes if he doesn’t reverse hard enough while someone his gang has targeted does something to make it harder for them for their sake… or something?

It’s a shitty scene that’s gross but Bennington’s trademark screaming from LINKIN PARK works really well for someone in a Jigsaw trap, fucked up as it is.

This is a terrible ending to the series, as it were. You get closure on the one big question from the original film (or two… if you’re a sadistic twat) but it’s terribly done and rushed. You get to watch Hoffman have his ass kicked as a result of said closure, and finally get some fly by reveals of random questions from movies past.

There’s one good thing though. The final moment — Dr. Gordon slamming the door on Hoffman? It’s a very effective image for the final shot of the final movie, you see the door close in each film prior — Amanda on Eric Matthews, Jigsaw on Adam, etc.

Also the use of “Hageshisa To Kono Mune no Naka de Karamitsuita Shakunetsu no Yami” by DIR EN GREY on the OST almost feels as great as X JAPAN’s first song in over 10 years being the closing theme for SAW IV back in 2007.

You see, this movie was a somewhat last ditch effort to end this series on a successful note. 3D was used because it was the rage (Avatar was still 10 months old, remember). Also horror is an easy sell when gore is involved in 3D. SAW VI “underperformed” and Paranormal Activity did really well. So, not only was the now cut short series going to have to go out with a decent return, it had to be able to withstand witches/ghosts/whatever. But that’s not all. SAW VI’s director was attached to direct PA2. Lionsgate pulled rank/contract and forced him to do this last film because SAW VI was actually kinda good, and a lot of people who like these movies after II or III will probably agree it was better than it should’ve been.

Watching interviews about the movie, it’s clearly a weird product — parts of the plot were added to compensate for SAW VIII being killed, such as explanation for the public trap, more info on Gordon and the two Pigface masked people helping him. And you can tell. The story bites off more than it seems to plan on chewing, spitting in the faces of the niche who actually cares and pandering to the people paying for scares while reinforcing the negative connotations of “torture porn” — which the franchise wasn’t always about. Seriously, rewatch the first movie or even the second one. They’re not that grisly. Fucked up? Yes but not to the degree of III onwards.

It’s also such a bastardized take on what the original film was. Red carpet interviews with franchise creators (and EPs) James Wan (who is now working on Aquaman and did Furious 7… aka he is doing real well) and Leigh Whannell (who collaborated with Wan on Insidious 1/2, and directed 3, and is working on the upcoming fourth film) definitely view it as a different beast. And that’s especially interesting since the latter wrote the scripts for II and III.

After seven years, it’s a tepid ending to a franchise. Soon we will see if Jigsaw can make good on “SAW for 2017”- its directors definitely have some chops, so we shall see.

But, tune in again for the much better but still bad, SAW V.

The list so far:

1. SAW 3D: The Final Chapter
2. SAW V (next!)
3. ???
4. ???
5. ???
6. ???
7. ???

(Sorted from Worst to Best)