Jigsaw (Tobin Bell), the self-righteous serial killer of the long-toothed franchise, may have succumbed to cancer a few films back, but he remains very much alive in plot and presence. Here, working through the compromised detective Hoffman (Costas Mandylor) and Jigsaw’s widow Jill (Betsy Russell), he’s after the health-care exec (Peter Outerbridge) who denied Jigsaw’s real persona, John Kramer, experimental treatments.
The plot cuts a bit deeper than previous installments, even if the ghoulish games (iron maidens and the merry-go-round from Hell) are the kind of “saw”-off-your-arm-or-die death trap that’s become the series’s signature. Editor-turned-director Kevin Greutert shows confidence behind the camera — still, one can only hope that Jigsaw’s gruesome Pecksniffian pedagogy gets a taste of its own blade soon.
