Review

Serial-killer Jigsaw is back to his old tricks. Allowing himself to be captured by Detective Eric Matthews, he introduces him into a deadly game of Ten Little Indians, being played out over a video-link. The catch is that Matthews' son is one of the Indians, trapped along with a bunch of disposable characters in a house that is filling with nerve gas. Can Matthews rescue his son (oh, and the others in there with him) without letting Jigsaw go?

Wow. Has it been a long time or what? Some of you were probably wondering, where the hell did Outsider go? Did he give up? Did he quit us? No, no, no. I have to stay faithful to my many numerous viewers in China! I cannot fail them! I was doing tons. Buying a new house, planning a new marriage (still in planning stages - women!) among numerous other things. In other words, I actually had a life. Well, now things have settled and I am back to bitch and moan about the entertainment world, as well as offer you my reviews of quality films like Saw II. I also happened to finally see Serenity, the one flick I had hyped all year on this damn site and it ROCKED - and also flopped. Therefore I will wait until DVD to give you my full take on that wonderful little gem of the season. So now, without further ADO.

Saw II. Hmmm, where do I begin? Did I hate it, like it, love it?? Did I think it was simply an exercise in gruesomeness and vulgarity? Did I actually think Donnie Wahlberg did well? Well, the answer to all of those questions is YES.

Yes, I loved parts of it, hated others, and only liked a few others. Yes, this was just an exercise and an excuse to pump a few more bucks from us poor flick goers. Oh yeah, former New Kid on the Block dude wasn't half bad. Half bad, I say. All in all, I'd say it was right on par with the first one. The ending wasn't as surprising, but it also didn't require the leap of believability the first one did. Like I said, on par.

More blood, more dismemberment, more of the same

So what the hell was this one about? Besides amputated body parts of course? Think Saw 1 crossed with Ten Little Indians. That is kind of how it plays. The film starts off with Donnie Wahlberg's character, Eric Matthews, being enticed by the Jigsaw killer (Tobin Bell), named for the jigsaw pieces he carves off of each of his victims. Eric has a pretty crappy relationship with his son, and he hasn't always been the best cop on the force. Jigsaw keeps luring Eric into his trap, and finally, Eric catches the SOB right where he hides. Of course, this is the first fifteen minutes of the movie, so you know there is a ton left to do.

Once captured Jigsaw clues Eric into his newest trap, eight people are trapped in an abandoned house with no exits and a slow acting poison filtering through the air ducts. If each of the people inside does exactly as they're told, they will get an antidote for the poison. Which means everybody has to basically ignore that advice if the movie is going to be any good. Oh yeah, and each vial of antidote has to be inside some elaborately disgusting device. Hey! The man's trying to teach a lesson here! You can't expect that lesson to come easy, can you?

One of the eight also happens to be Eric's distant son. Come on, like you didn't see THAT coming?? Once Eric finds out about that, he gets all peeved off realizing that he wants to kill Jigsaw, but first, he has to try playing by his rules. Jigsaw makes it clear that if Eric sits and listens to what he has to say, Eric's son will live. Yeah, I wouldn't buy that either. But Eric does his best to hear Jigsaw out before his patience runs out.

Also along for the ride are two carryovers from the first one. Dina Meyer returns as Kerry, the one cop who's dealt with Jigsaw before and knows how these things work. And Shawnee Smith returns as Amanda, the poor girl with the bear trap face of the first movie. Apparently she went off the wagon and Jigsaw needs to remind her what is what. That's just wrong.

The best part about the whole film is Tobin Bell as Jigsaw. In the last film, he was nothing more than a dead guy lying around a disgusting bathroom floor - and an almost never seen psycho killer. In this film, he is front and center. Jigsaw is not your typical serial killer. According to his warped logic, he is giving choices: Do what you must to survive and appreciate your life or die. That simple. The way Bell plays it is refreshing. He is always calm and always has double meanings behind his words. He never goes for the chewing of scenery or over-the-top actions most killers in this genre would try. Very creepy and very sadistic.

So, overall, the flick is just as gross and manipulative as the first one. It just tends to be a tad more "believable" than that go-for-broke ending of last year. The acting and the story is not why you go to see a flick like this - you're going for body count, or more appropriately, appendage count and this film has plenty of both. The deaths are imaginative and the ending does, of course, have that OH SHIT feel to it. Though like I said, it was not the quantum leap the original required. The only thing missing from this flick was Tobin and Donnie joining together for a group rendition of "Hangin' Tough"! Now that would be some kickass entertainment!