In 'Saw X,' the Jigsaw Killer Is ... the Hero?

By Dustin Rowles | Film | October 2, 2023 |

By Dustin Rowles | Film | October 2, 2023 |

From 2004 until 2010, the Saw franchise was a largely critic-proof annual Halloween treat, right up until it wasn’t. Still, even the worst Saw films (specifically, 2010’s Saw 3D) were moneymakers — $136 million on a $17 million budget — so there was no way Lionsgate was going to leave well enough alone. Saws 8 and 9 Jigsaw Killer and Spiral were likewise profitable, although Chris Rock’s 2021 entry took a major hit because of COVID-19 (I suspect that it did well on home video).

It’s the Saw traps that have always been make or break for these films, and the more plot they attempt to cram in, the worse the movies are for it. The Costas Mandylor run was embarrassingly bad from a story perspective, in part because John Kramer could only realistically guide the actions of his proteges from beyond the grave for so long.

In Saw X, the action takes place between Saw and Saw II, when Kramer (Tobin Bell) was still alive, although both Tobin Bell and Shawnee Smith (who plays his first protege Amanda) are clearly nearly 20 years older than they were in Saw. That I can forgive. I’m more skeptical of the fact that Saw X positions John Kramer as the film’s … hero. The subtext in these films has always been that Kramer’s victims deserve their fates, but it’s more overt than ever in Saw X.

Recall that in the initial Saw, we discover that John Kramer has terminal brain cancer. In Saw X, which takes place soon thereafter, John Kramer is scammed by Cecilia Pederson and a group of colleagues who pose as a medical outfit in Mexico that can cure terminal brain cancer. Kramer falls for it, but the joke is on Cecelia and Co. because once he realizes he’s been duped, he recruits his original protege, Amanda (Shawnee Smith) — the only survivor of the first film — and they kidnap all those involved in the scam and make them play a deadly game.

As I said, the Saw movies are mostly about the games, and writers Pete Goldfinger and Josh Stolberg, as well as director Kevin Greutert — all veterans of the franchise — don’t hold back, particularly in the first big trap. In that one, Valentina (Paulette Hernández) is forced to use a Gigli saw to cut off one of her own legs and extract enough bone marrow from her stump to stop her own decapitation. I watched two or three moviegoers rock back and forth in their chairs during this sequence. Squeamish folks should avoid it at all costs.

Saw X is probably the best entry since the original, but the fact it sits at 85 percent on Rotten Tomatoes — the highest in the Saw franchise, by far — says more about Rotten Tomatoes and the state of criticism than it does the movie itself. I love the Saw films, but to suggest that this entry “has a surprising amount of heart” runs counter to a sequence in which a little boy is extensively waterboarded with blood and guts.* It’s a fine horror movie. It’s a good Saw installment. But it pales compared to Talk to Me, or even the latest Evil Dead< film.

The fact that the film has the audience rooting for a serial killer also leaves me uneasy, not for ethical or moral reasons, but because it’s silly. Spoilers but not really because we know he survives the film: John basically walks off into the horizon at the end of the movie holding the hand of a little boy whose bike he fixed earlier in the film. It is beyond parody. John Kramer is not supposed to elicit heartwarming feelings. He is responsible for the brutal, violent deaths of many people. Some of them may have been evil, but many of them were just people who made mistakes. The consequences for lifting a guy’s wallet oughtn’t to be the removal of one’s eyes.

*(I do not input movies into Rotten Tomatoes myself, but someone from the site will come by and count this one as a positive review — because it’s more positive than not — and I will inadvertently contribute to the film’s high score. RT is binary. It’s good or bad, and there is no nuance. This is a B-/C+ movie.)