Perhaps calling the second movie in a franchise formulaic is jumping the gun on my part, but follow along with me.
Spoilers for both “Saw” (2004) and “Saw II” (2005) ahead:
I’ll gloss over what happens after step seven because the traps are different in each film, so the characters’ experiences in them will be different. But what is important is that near the end of the films, a character “escapes,” we learn about Jigsaw’s accomplice, and are hit with a massive plot twist.
In the first film, we are led to believe that Gordon (Cary Elwes) escaped (in the second, we see his dead body), we discover that Zep (Michael Emerson) was being blackmailed into helping Jigsaw (Tobin Bell) and the plot twist is that the man we thought was a previous victim of Jigsaw, you know, the dead one lying on the floor, was Jigsaw himself.
In the second film, Amanda (Shawnee Smith) and Daniel (Erik Knudsen) think they are escaping through a trap door in the floor, but in reality, they are running to the same bathroom Gordon and Adam (Leigh Whannell) died in. We learn that Amanda is not only Jigsaw’s accomplice, but protegee, and that Detective Matthews (Donnie Wahlberg) was the real target all along. Since the live stream of Daniel’s trap was actually a recording, Daniel winding up in the safe when the timer ended, instead of dead in the house, could also be considered a plot twist.
The films then end on a vague note.
If I’m onto something, and not just wearing a tinfoil hat, then the third Saw film will begin with a victim in one of Jigsaw’s traps. We’ll cut to a scene intended to provide us with background and context. The audience will then learn more about the police and detectives working on the case. Amanda and Jigsaw’s lair will be found. Someone will get hurt. We’ll see traps that are even gorier than what we have seen before. Someone in law enforcement is going to die. Their coworkers are going to want revenge and be extra motivated to catch Jigsaw. They’re going to bend and break the law. Detective Matthews is going to try to escape his trap. He probably won’t; he wasn’t an especially compelling character, so I don’t think they’ll be that determined to keep him alive. Then, some unpredictable plot twist is going to happen before the film ends on a note that leaves plenty of room for a sequel to start with.
Calling a show/film/etc. formulaic can be a pretty scathing thing to say; however, and I say this very cautiously, “Saw” has not gotten stale… yet.
Part of what has kept it fresh has been the almost completely new cast of characters, the new traps, the increase in intensity and the fact that the plot twists really are shocking.
As much as I love Sherlock Holmes, I will be the first to criticize his creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, for his way of writing a plot twist or a revelation. Doyle provides the audience with almost none of the information that the audience needs to solve the puzzle. Of course, Holmes can figure things out that the audience can’t; he has significantly more information than we do.
“Saw,” on the other hand, provides us with at least some of the information. They manage to toe that line of giving us what we need while still having the conclusion be surprising.
Because of that, I am interested in what “Saw III” will bring to the table, even if it follows all the same steps as its predecessors.
