Saw VI

The continuing (and seemingly never-ending) stories of John "Jigsaw" Kramer find a minor return to form with the latest blood-soaked offering of the franchise.

Throwing the audience straight into the melee with an incredibly gory trap, the snaking plot of Saw VI (which of course flashes-back to allow Tobin Bell to continue to carry the can as the only constant) is nigh on impossible to follow were you not to have seen the previous installments. Special Agent Strahm, who had been on the tail of Detective Hoffman, has met his limb-shattering demise and so we are left with a new successor to Jigsaw's legacy. However, as the net begins to tighten on him (even at one point entirely revealed to a soon to be dead forensic team) Hoffman sets into play what is thought to be Jigsaw's last fiendish plan.

John Kramer's crooked insurance broker William, who denied Kramer and his wife potentially life-saving treatment on a red-taped technicality, is put through the typically grueling mill of tests involving his co-workers. This vacillates between flashbacks which flesh out a number of previously foggy loose strands from nearly all the previous sequels and is suitably satisfying in delivering the blood-lust bravura set-pieces that are expected. The children's roundabout will certainly never seem the same again.

Director Kevin Greutert threatened that this would be his last Saw outing, before being persuaded (or contractually obligated against his will, if rumours are to be beleived) back to the director's chair for Saw VII, which arrives this October (in 3D no less), and that's no bad thing since in his hands there is at least hope that the tension will continue to ratchet as the death throes of the series start to convulse.



Released on DVD and Blu-ray on 8th March 2010 by Lionsgate Releasing.

Written by Simon Cole.