Rating: 5/10

Writers: Marcus Dunstan, Patrick Melton
Director: Kevin Greutert
Cast: Tobin Bell, Costas Mandylor, Peter Outerbridge, Betsy Russell, Shawnee Smith
Studio: Lionsgate

The annual installment of the series, SAW VI takes us on yet another killing spree led by our tour guide Jigsaw (Tobin Bell). Once a child obsessed with the board game Mousetrap, he grew up to be the artist of self-execution we all know him as today. Disregard that fact that he met his own untimely death two films back, in SAW IV. Those are just small details in this bigger picture. And, with Jigsaw, there is always a bigger picture!

The latest chapter continues where SAW V left off, as detective-turned-apprentice Mark Hoffman (Costas Mandylor) picks up the pieces left behind by Jigsaw to finish the puzzle. With Agent Erickson (Mark Rolston) and the rest of the FBI picking up his scent, Hoffman begins a new game involving a life insurer (Peter Outerbridge), a man who decides who lives and who dies on a daily basis. However, as we know with Jigsaw, nothing is as it seems as his game is a complicated one with many twists, turns, and, of course, traps.

Unfortunately, these twists and turns are ones that we’ve seen from the series time and time again. SAW VI really fails to bring anything new to its on-going story line and not much in way of a big reveal moment is delivered, despite what the above poster’s tagline may lead you to believe. Along with that come the faults of the previous films, including the over-the-top acting we have come to know and look past with this series, in exchange for yearly surface level enjoyment. SAW VI also lacks something the first film had and not many of the others have, that being a distinguishable style and look, a quality most horror films have if they have nothing else. Instead, the production value here feels like something out of a modern day haunted house (this film’s game takes place in an abandoned zoo).

With SAW VI getting a new director in former editor Kevin Greutert, who edited all 5 previous films, it is apparent that he merely tried to make a film that fit with the others of the series instead of taking it up a notch. The problem being that, in doing this, Greutert made a SAW with an okay story and a low-budget feel to sit right there on the shelf with the others that mostly share these same qualities.

Where the film does attempt to be different is its commentary, which is now taken out of the subtext and inserted right into the mouths of its characters. Particularly Jigsaw himself who, in one key scene, declares that the real enemies are not the government or the doctors but the insurance companies themselves. It is a moment of sheer over-exposition so blatantly obvious in its message that Jigsaw might well have been staring straight into the camera (he almost was for that matter). There has been no denying that the SAW series could be interpreted as intentional social commentary on the health care system, but if there was any doubt before, let SAW VI put your mind at ease. Just as there will be blood, it turns out there will be bleeding hearts.

Chances are by number six, you have made up your mind either way on SAW. Either you gave up long ago or you keep coming back year after year, despite knowing that you are essentially getting the same old product in new, not-so-shiny packaging. If you’re the former, then you also probably didn’t make it past the synopsis (if you’re still with us, thank you). If you’re the latter, just know that SAW VI won’t let you down if you go in expecting what you got out of the previous films.

As a side note, SAW VI does have one of the best torture devices of the series, involving a shotgun, a carousel and six unwilling people in a Russian roulette-esque game. Spoiler alert: people die.