Tag: psychological

I’ve just finished watching the third Saw movie and am slightly confused. I am somewhat happy with the story, but there’s more… First, this movie is definitely not for the squeamish, as the body horror is very hard to stomach, and it should come with an epilepsy warning. Also, my theory from the last movie was both correct and wrong. I just knew there was something weird about the second movie, and I was smart enough to pick up on it even though I didn’t know what. It was somewhat explained toward the end. Also, this movie kind of pissed me off.

While this movie does include an escape room for someone to escape, I feel that this person is the worst. He stands there. Where people in the other movies were trying to figure out the puzzles or freaking out, this guy just stands there. In fact, there are no puzzles; he just has to do something and fast. In horror movies, I sometimes get mad when people do stupid things, but at least they are doing something. I have never been so mad at a horror movie “protagonist.” Can I even call him a protagonist? No one really is in these movies, except Kerry; she’s awesome.

The last thing that confuses me is that this movie feels like it is the perfect ending for the series, yet there are more movies. At this point, we have reached a suitable stopping point, especially as it appears to be shifting from a psychological thriller to a more gory horror. I’m going to watch the fourth movie to see if it’s even worth commenting on the rest series. I know it’s a classic, but at a certain point, too many sequels spoil the franchise.

I’m back after watching the second movie in the Saw franchise, where instead of two people stuck in an escape room, there are seven. The puzzles were back and still blew my mind. I did get some of them, then there were others that were head scratchers, and I was still piecing everything together at the end. (Is it weird that I was slightly proud if I solved a puzzle before the characters? They technically have more time to figure things out than I do.) The other interesting thing was that there is a converging outside plot line that really kept the intensity high.

This movie was interesting in that it introduced a group dynamic to everything. Not only did they have to worry about solving the puzzles, but they also had to worry about others. While the puzzles were still surrounding human desperation, I’m not too sure that that’s entirely true. Probably just part of it. Connecting back to everything in the first movie, and all that we learned in this one, I’m suspicious of some of the motives. It will be interesting to see if my theories turn up with anything, or if it’s just the writers messing with our heads. I could have done with more of the type of body horror from the last movie, where you didn’t really see anything, you just knew it was happening because of the context and other character interactions. So, if you are squeamish, this probably isn’t the film for you.

Happy Spoopy Month, everyone. In honor of the best month of the year, I have started my annual rewatch of the English dub of Ghost Stories, and more importantly for you, I’ve decided that I would begin to watch that famous series Saw, starting with the first one and then slowly working my way through the movies available to me. Spoopy Month is the perfect time to willingly terrify myself for the fun of it, so let me begin making my way through this classic series.

Even though this movie was made upwards of two decades ago, it is still beautiful, in a horrifying, hiding part of the screen with my hands, and needing to pause sometimes type of way. Watching it, I know why it is considered a classic. While it doesn’t evoke the stereotypical monster or supernatural horror vibes, I would definitely classify this as a psychological, ‘is this even real?’ horror. For those who don’t know, and without spoilers, Saw follows two guys in an escape room, and they’re not having fun. Everything is, unfortunately, at times, very grounded in reality as you delve into the depths of human desperation. At all times, I was wondering if there was another choice for characters to make. Some, yes. Others, no. I’m very interested in how the rest of the series unfolds, as it seems that the horror is not necessarily in the puzzles, but in the extent and desperation of the will to live. Also, as a Criminal Minds fan, I’m very interested in how the victims are decided. It feels like there should be more exploration of that and I can’t wait to see.