Sawx is the latest movie in the very long franchise of Saw movies. There are a lot of movies in this never-ending tale of a man who is dying of cancer. All 18 of these movies (except for Sprial: Chris Rocks the Saw) take place in the last few months/days/years/whatever of Jon “Jigsaw” Kramer as he tries to help people by putting them in deadly traps and saying “Hey, if you die that’s all your fault, I’m just tryin’ to maim you.”
In Sawx, John Kramer and the Saw Squad take a trip to Mexico to go on an adventure. This is the Herbie Goes Bananas part of the franchise – they even get a little kid that helps them too. John is there to get a new cancer treatment from a shady group of doctors. They are going to give him “some surgery and a cutting-edge cocktail of drugs.” They say that a lot too – “a cutting-edge cocktail of drugs.” They have to hide out in the desert because Big Pharma is after them. They have guns and things to fight against the soldiers of Big Pharma. Yes, the Pfizer Footsoliders and Elite Legions of Eli Lily are a real thing, but we don’t really get to see them in this movie.
But like the American medical industry, these people don’t do anything but steal a lot of money from John. John doesn’t like that so he assembles his crew, calling up Detective Jigsaw from Saws 4-6, and Lady Jigsaw, Amanda from all the movies. Lady Jigsaw and John capture all the people from this fake medical group and they, well, they do the Saw thing.
Nobody needed this movie. It is all the same as the other Saw movies. “Let’s play a game” and then lots of blood. The universe of the Saw movies is a long and complicated web with the most confusing timeframe – not as confusing as the Legend of Zelda timeline but pretty close. Sawx just fits snugly in between some of those movies, not totally sure where though. It doesn’t talk about things that happen in the other movies, so this doesn’t do anything for the vast web of Saw movies connecting to each other. Sawx just exists and it’s there. John and the Saw Squad are there but they don’t even say things like “Hey, you remember the time you chained those guys up in a basement?” or anything like that.
Tobin Bell is very very old. In his 80s, and he’s been doing Saw movies all of his life. In this movie, I truly believe that this old man is dying of cancer. He is so old, so feeble. What will they do when this fragile old man dies for real? Will they keep doin’ the Saw thing with another old actor? Will frail, elderly Ellen Burstyn take over?
Sawx is a movie but a totally pointless one. I give it 12 out of 42 stars – mostly because the gory stuff looks neat. Kontributor OUT!
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