SAW V

Time for Saw V, released October 24th, 2008. Starring Tobin Ball, Costas Mandylor, Scott Patterson, Betsy Russell, and joining the fun for this one Julie Benz, you might know her as Rita from Dexter or from the new show No Ordinary Family, and also a bunch of people I've never heard of. This time around directed by David Hackl, so Darren Lynn Bousman had apparently had enough, Saw V grossed 56m domestically and 113m worldwide, continuing the downward trend.

0:00: Lionsgate, twisted sister, blah blah whatever.I don't really remember a ton about this one, pretty sure this the one where it really starts to drop off. I'm pretty sure we still get a bunch of flashbacks. Hoffman is the man running the show now, can't really remember there being too much of a twist in this one, but I might be wrong so here we go

0:02: So, we start off with a random guy in a trap, we've seen this before, lets just get one out of the way I guess, pretty good trap setup here, lose your arms or get cut in half sounds like a sweet deal. Meanwhile I have no idea who this guy is, so who really cares, random killing, seemingly, and kinda BS, he pushed the buttons crushed his hands, and still got cut in half, that's no right, if jigsaw was still alive, that wouldn't have happened.

0:06: We go back and review the ending of IV, or III I don't know, both sorta. BTW, we still haven't found out what happened to that couple's daughter, have we. Now, I don't remember if they cover it, but that's the kinda thing that would have made this a better TV show, I'm supposed to remember that 2 years later?

0:08: And now Strahm gets pig masked, what I call when someone gets attacked and then put in a trap, and now is head is in a glass box filling up with water, Thar's a fun time. So he preforms his own tracheotomy, wow, that's impressive.

0:11: And there's the girl, Hoffman saves her and looks like the hero, but he's pissed Strahm is still alive after the tracheotomy trick.

0:15: Ok, why on earth would jigsaws ex-wife just happen to be wearing the key to the random box that he left her, that makes a lot of sense.

0:17 Gotta say, and maybe this is just me, but this Hoffman just looks like a scumbag, I wonder if that was a factor for them casting this guy, but he just looks scummy.

0:19: Something tells me that this power struggle between Hoffman and Strahm isn't going to end well.

0:21: So is the trend of people wearing those stupid bluetooth things in their ears all the time over, I don't seem to notice it as much, probably has a lot to do with the iPhone, people just have the earbuds in instead.

0:23: Ok, now I'm starting to remember this one, it's alot like II, a bunch of people all captured and put through a series games, which seems cool, but really it just makes it tough to follow and get to know the characters or care. Strange seeing Julie Benz as a Brunette. Also nice to see Chloe's husband Morris from 24 in here

0:28: Well, there's 1 dead, guess it didn't matter why she was a fire inspector or why Morris knew what she did now.

0:30: Now we get some of Hoffman's background, his sister was killed by her boyfriend, which apparently was the guy at the beginning that got cut in half despite winning the game. death was credited to jigsaw since it was before he was dead, but it was Hoffman, and now Strahm knows, there is a showdown coming, I can feel it.

0:36: Doesn't really seem to make sense that these games are designed so that one person has to die, doesn't really seem fair. Jigsaw always atleast gave people a choice, but guess he isn't running the show anymore. And number 2 is dead. so long Morris.

0:40 Flashback time, and we find out how Hoffman and jigsaw met. and the game that Hoffman played to earn jigsaws respect.

0:45: Tempered steel, good advice.

0:47: So, I guess this really wasn't much of a game, there's was never any real danger for Hoffman, gun wasn't loaded, so this was just a recruiting meeting, unlike with Amanda. Or maybe not, the gun was loaded? I'm confused.

0:52: Pretty sure that 2 people could have fit into one of those chambers, I'm not sure that someone had to die there, but clearly noone was willing to share, bad people I guess.

0:55: Another flashback, this time to the fat guy who got killed in the barbwire in the first one, not really sure that was necessary, didn't really care too much about him, but I guess it was jigsaw and Hoffman's first game together. Oh, and by the way, they are doing that thing with the person being in the scene but not really in the scene thing again, annoying.

0:58: So, it appears that Hoffman was helping jigsaw out all along, didn't really seem that way when they were flashing back to Amanda helping out jigsaw in the other films, but I guess they wanted it to be a surprise, or else they hadn't planned that far ahead.



1:06: More flashbacks, but this flashback is setting up the game for this one, and helping Strahm figure out what was happening in III and IV, see, wouldn't this have worked better as a TV show at this point?

1:11: Hoffman is setting it up to make it look like Strahm is the one behind these people getting killed in the games, seems like a pretty scummy thing to do, not sure how it in anyway in connection to what jigsaw would have done.

1:13: And now they figure out that they needed everyone to win all the games, so they should have worked together and noone needed to die, even mentioning the thing I said about the chambers being big enough for more than 1 person.

1:17: Now we find out how all these people in the game are connected, they all set in motion something that killed and covered up the deaths of 8 people, so much like all the other movies, they are in some way, shape or form terrible people who probably deserve to die.

1:21: Yeah, severely cutting your hand to fill up a jar with blood, that would really suck

1:22: Ok, so clearly that recording was not jigsaw and was actually Hoffman, i mean I know it's supposed to be distorted and all, and Strahm probably hadn't heard enough of the other recordings to really notice the difference in the voices, but clearly not jigsaw. The Message was pretty clear though, get in the glass box was the only way to get out alive, despite enduring some pain.

1:27: So, there wasn't really too much of a twist in this one, I mean Hoffamn setting up Strahm, then the box lowering out of the room and the room crushing him, not really a big twist, tape recorder said he needed to be in the box, he should have been in the box.

Ok, so that one was pretty bad, not really clear if Julie Benz or the other guy end up dying or what, but in the grand scheme of things, doesn't really matter, they were somewhat inconsequential to the real story line. Strahm who was the closest to figuring everything out is now dead. Hoffman is still in control and running things for Jigsaw, maybe not exactly the way he would have done it, but still. I would say that out of all of them so far, this is probably the worst, and I don't think VI gets much better, but I will press on, check back later for SAW VI: Porky's Revenge with an Electric Boogaloo.