Eric Stevenson I might have been too kind to "Saw III" but keep in mind that I won't be like that to this movie. The part I found to be strongest in the previous movie was Jeff having to go find his daughter. In this movie, he's eventually shown dying so the whole thing was pointless. That movie had two stories that connected but this one seems just a mess. Not even Jigsaw dying could stop the series. He's still credited as the main character!He appears through a ton of flashbacks. It does just seem like this movie was made for no reason other than to show more gore. Like my friend and mom said, there's enough bad stuff in the real world that we don't have to contribute to it. I admit the premise is still pretty good and the series is fairly creative, but it's just not rewarding. They should have probably just ended this after the third. Tobin Bell's a pretty good actor though. **

SnoopyStyle The coroner is performing an autopsy on the body of John Kramer. A tape is found in his stomach and police detective Hoffman is called in. Elsewhere, a man with his eyes sewn shut is chained to a man (Louis Ferreira) with his mouth sewn shut attached to a machine. Hoffman and Lieutenant Rigg lead the SWAT team to find detective Kerry's dead body. Later, Rigg is attacked at home and wakes up to find himself in one of Jigsaw's games.The franchise do two things excessively to the point of distraction. The first is the jumping around with time, places, and protagonists. It's an annoying aspect of the franchise that they like to make a jigsaw puzzle out of the plot. The other is the flashy jump edits during the gruesome reveals. It's both cheesy and limits the actual shock. It's more horrifying to slowly linger on the bloody torture. We should leisurely enjoy the grotesque reveals. Despite all that, I really do love the idea of a dead Jigsaw while his games continue and the first torture is really sweet. The first half is great with that female victim but the movie slowly drifts away from me until I stopped caring somewhere in the second half.

TheLittleSongbird Finally saw all the 'Saw' films prior to seeing 'Jigsaw' (as part of my wanting to see as many 2017 films as possible this year, during a quieter and less intensive period). Heard a lot about the films, good and bad, but wanted to see them for myself to know what to expect.The films as an overall series are a very mixed bag. The original 'Saw' had a great premise and while it was problematic it was still pretty good and one of the best in the series. 'Saw II' had its own problems but it was still one of the few follow-ups to be just as good and have what made the first click as well as it did. Things did go downhill with the overblown and confusing 'Saw III', which was suggestive of not just the novelty wearing off but done to death. 'Saw IV' improves on the third instalment and is among the better sequels, but not up to the level of the first two films. It's neither great or terrible, more uneven, but unlike the third film there is at least a sense that it's remembered what made the first two films work.Lets start with 'Saw IV's' strengths first. The traps, tortures and such are closer in spirit to the suitably diabolical and inventive ones of the first two, almost like medieval torture, and there are a few clever, if not exactly bold, twists and turns. It's scarier and more suspenseful than the third film, being not as rambling, a little more cohesive and not being as over-reliant on what the third film overblew distastefully.Production values, apart from the haphazard editing, are slicker and not as amateurish here and the music score is suitably eerie. The opening sequence is the single most disturbing opening of the whole series and one of its most disturbing scenes full stop, despite being dead Jigsaw still has what makes him an interesting and quite unique character and the seeming frailty of the human condition, done in a way that's pretty embittered, and Jigsaw's moralism being painted seemingly sympathetically is just as creepy as the traps and torture. Tobin Bell looms ominously and Donnie Wahlberg makes much of little.On the other hand, the story is still very flawed. It is more atmospheric and eventful than the third film, but there's not enough to hide that it's more of the same stuff that does try to do too much and doesn't have enough original material to set it apart. Also, structurally with the back and forth and with laudably trying to tie up loose ends from before (but unsatisfyingly) it's still not easy to follow, culminating in one of the most perplexing head scratcher endings of any film from the 2000s from personal view. It's not just cohesiveness the film struggles with, credibility also goes out of the window.'Saw IV', while not as much as the third film, still goes too far with the gore and violence (the latter almost pornographic level) which is not handled with much taste or subtlety. At least one doesn't feel as exhausted or find themselves trying not to laugh here though, which is an improvement, just that one doesn't have a good taste in their mouth after. The script is still flat and contrived and Jigsaw is the only character that interests the viewer and doesn't leave one feeling bored or frustrated. Bell and Wahlberg aside, the acting is nothing to write home about with Lyriq Bent's performance being one of the series' low points.In short, watchable but not entirely satisfying. 5/10 Bethany Cox

Smoreni Zmaj After watching Saw IV I thought that story is overall decently intelligent, but it essentially does not bring anything new on the table and it needlessly uses outworn horror clichés. Franchise becomes pouring sand in the desert and, honestly, I was bored. If this was TV show with weekly episodes that might even work, cause we would be caught by first episode and just go with the flow in crazy ride until it ends, without having too much time to analyze flaws. But stretched to decade every movie stands for itself, and not being under influence of brilliant Saw I and II since long time ago our eyes are open to see the rest of franchise for what it really is - lousy and boring attempt to keep comatose idea alive for as long as possible, or more precisely, for as long as audience is stupid enough to pay for it in hope it will revitalize to what it once was.5/10