SAW II: Stereotypical Sequel
SPOILERS: Or rather, I write this assuming you’ve seen the movie, so if the thread is a little hard to follow, tough. I write these for me!
I don’t hate on this movie as much as other fans of the original do. It certainly has its flaws and it is by no means as much of a “character study” as Saw was, but has it’s strengths.
To get most of the negative out of the way, this movie suffers from the same affliction that damns a lot of sequels: Bigger and Better! At least, that’s what the writer, director, and/or studio were going for. If we add more deaths, more gore, more action, more people will love it! We have the theater-going public to thank for this though, because the box office dollars show that huge spectacles normally make more money…but that’s another topic entirely.
One thing that most people do not give this movie enough credit for are the “traps.” Yes, this is different than the individual forms of torture that we saw for most of the first film (and this one’s opening sequence). However, the entire set up from the first Saw movie was a multi-player scenario. Also the traps set up in Saw II could have been avoided almost entirely. The gun at the peephole could have been side stepped by simply following the directions on Jigsaw’s note. The furnace would not have activated if the chain wasn’t pulled. The room of needles would not have had it’s timer start if it was entered with a little more grace. Hell, the hanging box with wrist blades was accessible with no risk of bodily damage on the opposite side! Anyone truly trying to follow John’s game could have escaped this test fairly unharmed.
GRIPES: The fact that the events in the house happened before the police find Jigsaw’s lair is complete bull! When the camera seamlessly moves from one location to the other through the monitors, they are telling the audience they are occurring simultaneously! There is nothing wrong with misdirection, but this is outright misrepresenting the scenario…not the same thing!
PRAISE: I love that Detective Matthews gets trapped in the bathroom that was Adam’s fate from the first film. And even though it was pretty obvious, I loved Amanda being in on the game from the beginning!
All in all, I wish (at least currently) that this was the end of the franchise. As I recall (I haven’t seen these since they came out) that I didn’t like the next one, gave part four a shot and ended up enjoy the way they got the series back on track, but then hated the fifth installment. I gave up on the Saw movies at that point, so this is take two for me. About to watch Saw III. Wish me luck…
s-u-f-j-a-n-s-t-e-v-e-n-s
jimmyeatworldofficial
theartofmadeline
dailybridgerton
discoholicmusic
2087