Now I haven't done a review since I was a teen. But I just finished watching 'JIGSAW' and I felt overly compelled to share my two cents - speaking of which, 2 cents may have been the budget for this film - moreover, 2 cents is what the writers, director and producers deserve for grinding the already over saturated Saw series into complete dust.
In my opinion, the John Kramer aka Jigsaw story should have ended at Saw III - which was awesome despite what most fans of the series say.
Saw IV - Saw VIII (3D) were not quite up to par as the first three films, but they held up well by continuing on right where the previous film left off and giving the audience great insight to John Kramer's life - why he became the jigsaw killer, and how he accomplished most of his 'traps' in the first three films.
Now, there is a hundred and one plots the writers could've chose revitalizing the series with this installment after a seven year gap. Why they went with the story they did is beyond me. I'm honestly shocked it got the green light, this film borderline tarnishes the reputation of the Jigsaw character that the original Saw films created.
I won't spoil it for anyone but if you're expecting to find out more about John Kramer's life - this film does not do that. To be honest, I'm not sure what it was trying to do. The ending leaves you really dissatisfied and instead of filling the holes for questions the previous films may have raised, this film just raises a thousand more.
I too did not want another saw film carrying on from the final events in Saw III, after all, we had four films after that jumping back n forth from Saw I to whichever sequel you were watching - all in a continuous timeline ( I think). But I sure as hell would prefer a sloppy attempt by the old cast seven years later over this half hearted attempt.
Why not go with whole copycat plot? Why not have one of Jigsaw's survivors take over his legacy without being a former 'apprentice'. Why not have one of the Jigsaw's victims family member as the new Jigsaw taking vengeance on Kramer's family and associates. So many ideas, so many way this 'reboot' could've been amazing but nooooooooooo.
The 'game' being played had hardly any context to it, or at least not enough to make you invested in the victims. The victims (I guess the main characters in the film) were extremely one dimensional and you learnt nothing about them. In fact, they barely even played a game. And this was the A plot of the film! There was no thought out traps, a lot of occurrences relied on luck and not careful planning. The game sort of ended extremely quickly and took a sudden u turn - it seemed like they left out half of 'the game' to keep true to the 90 minute run-time, so they suddenly just did the 'let's just have a pig mask stab them and have them wake up somewhere else.' And the twist completely made this entire game pointless and their victims even more pointless.
The B plot pacing was horrible, it was hard to keep up with what's going on with most scenes being shot in a coroners lab. The 'detectives' too were extremely futile.
The writers of this film again closed the film off by connecting the previous films - a very stupid idea because it failed miserably doing so. And instead of going 'ohhh dammnnnn' like the original saw films had you saying after the twist reveal, you went 'what the... wait that makes no sense'.
The one salvation this unique horror franchise has that no other film can compete with is it's 'trap -game torture' scenes. There are many people who watch Saw just to see victims gets torn apart in unimaginable ways.
This film does not even deliver there, in fact the traps are so bad I'm not even sure they could be called 'traps', most of them were games involving more then two people and they lacked all the creativity - there is no gut bursting, spline rippling traps at all. The gore is heavily toned down for this film. There is no suspense if the victims will survive the traps. There is no quick shots of epileptic madness. There is no sixty second time limit to complete the test. There is no 'protagonist' going through trials and tribulations in one of Jigsaw's twisted games. There is no 'live or die, make your choice'. 'There is no game over'. There's certainly not one memorable trap from the movie.
I'm never critical on actors - but by god the performances were terrible, although they had a horrible script to work with so they can't take all blame.
There is a not a single character that makes any mark on the series, aside from the character Eleanor Bonneville, her story seemed interesting and looked as if it was going somewhere but alas it did not - instead the film scratches at the surface of her interesting personal life which doesn't lead anywhere in the end.
'Jigsaw' feels like a small studio trying to replicate the Saw series without trying to get sued for copying the originals. Though, there's nothing original about it - still they failed to capture the dark essence of one of the most epic horror villains of all time - Jigsaw.
The movie never felt like it was Jigsaw game being played. It felt like it was a psychopathic junkie copycat who's trying to replicate what his idol did ten years ago.
If you thought the opening trap in SAW 3D (2010) didn't make any sense, just wait until you see how ridiculously far they take the series seven years later. They missed the mark heavy with this one.
My personal Saw ranking: SAW 1, SAW 3, SAW 2, SAW 5, SAW 6, SAW 4, SAW 7 (3D), JIGSAW
In my opinion, the John Kramer aka Jigsaw story should have ended at Saw III - which was awesome despite what most fans of the series say.
Saw IV - Saw VIII (3D) were not quite up to par as the first three films, but they held up well by continuing on right where the previous film left off and giving the audience great insight to John Kramer's life - why he became the jigsaw killer, and how he accomplished most of his 'traps' in the first three films.
Now, there is a hundred and one plots the writers could've chose revitalizing the series with this installment after a seven year gap. Why they went with the story they did is beyond me. I'm honestly shocked it got the green light, this film borderline tarnishes the reputation of the Jigsaw character that the original Saw films created.
I won't spoil it for anyone but if you're expecting to find out more about John Kramer's life - this film does not do that. To be honest, I'm not sure what it was trying to do. The ending leaves you really dissatisfied and instead of filling the holes for questions the previous films may have raised, this film just raises a thousand more.
I too did not want another saw film carrying on from the final events in Saw III, after all, we had four films after that jumping back n forth from Saw I to whichever sequel you were watching - all in a continuous timeline ( I think). But I sure as hell would prefer a sloppy attempt by the old cast seven years later over this half hearted attempt.
Why not go with whole copycat plot? Why not have one of Jigsaw's survivors take over his legacy without being a former 'apprentice'. Why not have one of the Jigsaw's victims family member as the new Jigsaw taking vengeance on Kramer's family and associates. So many ideas, so many way this 'reboot' could've been amazing but nooooooooooo.
The 'game' being played had hardly any context to it, or at least not enough to make you invested in the victims. The victims (I guess the main characters in the film) were extremely one dimensional and you learnt nothing about them. In fact, they barely even played a game. And this was the A plot of the film! There was no thought out traps, a lot of occurrences relied on luck and not careful planning. The game sort of ended extremely quickly and took a sudden u turn - it seemed like they left out half of 'the game' to keep true to the 90 minute run-time, so they suddenly just did the 'let's just have a pig mask stab them and have them wake up somewhere else.' And the twist completely made this entire game pointless and their victims even more pointless.
The B plot pacing was horrible, it was hard to keep up with what's going on with most scenes being shot in a coroners lab. The 'detectives' too were extremely futile.
The writers of this film again closed the film off by connecting the previous films - a very stupid idea because it failed miserably doing so. And instead of going 'ohhh dammnnnn' like the original saw films had you saying after the twist reveal, you went 'what the... wait that makes no sense'.
The one salvation this unique horror franchise has that no other film can compete with is it's 'trap -game torture' scenes. There are many people who watch Saw just to see victims gets torn apart in unimaginable ways.
This film does not even deliver there, in fact the traps are so bad I'm not even sure they could be called 'traps', most of them were games involving more then two people and they lacked all the creativity - there is no gut bursting, spline rippling traps at all. The gore is heavily toned down for this film. There is no suspense if the victims will survive the traps. There is no quick shots of epileptic madness. There is no sixty second time limit to complete the test. There is no 'protagonist' going through trials and tribulations in one of Jigsaw's twisted games. There is no 'live or die, make your choice'. 'There is no game over'. There's certainly not one memorable trap from the movie.
I'm never critical on actors - but by god the performances were terrible, although they had a horrible script to work with so they can't take all blame.
There is a not a single character that makes any mark on the series, aside from the character Eleanor Bonneville, her story seemed interesting and looked as if it was going somewhere but alas it did not - instead the film scratches at the surface of her interesting personal life which doesn't lead anywhere in the end.
'Jigsaw' feels like a small studio trying to replicate the Saw series without trying to get sued for copying the originals. Though, there's nothing original about it - still they failed to capture the dark essence of one of the most epic horror villains of all time - Jigsaw.
The movie never felt like it was Jigsaw game being played. It felt like it was a psychopathic junkie copycat who's trying to replicate what his idol did ten years ago.
If you thought the opening trap in SAW 3D (2010) didn't make any sense, just wait until you see how ridiculously far they take the series seven years later. They missed the mark heavy with this one.
My personal Saw ranking: SAW 1, SAW 3, SAW 2, SAW 5, SAW 6, SAW 4, SAW 7 (3D), JIGSAW
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