It is kind of crazy to think that Spiral is the ninth movie in the Saw franchise! I thought that the last one, Jigsaw was a lot of fun so I was certainly down for more Saw action. The thing is, Chris Rock is a guy that I love, but I just did not see how Chris Rock was going to be part of a Saw movie, but I have to say, he did a great job.
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The Movie Review
Now, if you liked any of the past Saw movies, you are going to have a fun time with Spiral. I say that because even though this is the ninth time we are in this world, nothing has really changed with the core formula. This is regarded as more of a spin-off from the main series, but at the same time, it is very much the same kind of movie.
Chris Rock plays a detective called, Zeke. He is not exactly well-liked in the department as he brought down some dirty cops, thus leading to him being kind of frozen out by his “brothers”. His role as a detective is made more complicated by the fact his father, Marcus (Samuel L. Jackson) was the police chief and tidied up the city by some extreme and less than ethical means.
The current police chief who has he has a bit of a strained relationship with assigns him a new partner in, William Schenk. Schenk is played by Max Minghella and he is an idealist, wants to do the right thing to save the world kind of guy. Zeke and Max end up on this case that appears to be the work of a copycat of the famous Jigsaw killer!
What starts off as a weird kind of case soon becomes very personal as it is like this Jigsaw copycat killer is going after dirty cops. Not only is he going after dirty cops, but there is also clearly a link to Zeke! It is done well enough, keeps you guessing throughout and there are some pretty gruesome traps!
While I like how there are many twists and turns and things that make you question who is involved. I have to say that at the end of the day, this is the same kind of Saw movie that you have seen eight times before this. It is done well enough and I think the actors and the special effects team did a solid job.
The thing that I took away from Spiral was that while it was clearly set in the same world as the Saw movies. Spiral is also trying to shock the audience and that is evident by the cliffhanger ending. These were great in the Saw movies as they kept you wanting the series to progress, but here I am not 100 percent convinced we will get to see what happens after this.
There are all kinds of weird things floating around about the future of the franchise. Some have said that the next movie will not be Spiral 2, but another movie in the actual Saw name! Others have stated that they would like to bring the world of Saw to a tv series. I think if they did not have a sequel greenlit, they should have offered a more definitive ending to this movie.
