Saw VI No Match for Original

Critics agree: Whatever you think of the first film, it was better
By Harry Kimball,  Newser Staff
Posted Oct 23, 2009 2:09 PM CDT

Most critics find themselves in the tough spot of praising the original Saw to put down the sixth installment. They don't make 'em like they used to. Some opinions:

  • "The film goes all trendy in its selection of victims," opting for the likes of insurance adjusters and bypassing the "classicism" of those who squander the gift of life, Mike Hale writes for the New York Times. And "one test involves dodging hot steam. That’s quite a comedown from the good old days of being drowned in liquefied hog carcasses."

  • Watching the Saw films has just gotten too hard, writes Peter Sobczynksi of eFilmCritic. "Between the relentless flashbacks and cross-cutting, I probably couldn't give you an adequate summary if you demanded one at gunpoint."
  • Saw VI just doesn't "play fair with the audience," Chris Hewitt writes in the Pioneer Press. What's the point if "even the guy who is definitively dead—Jigsaw himself —spends most of VI blathering ideas that no longer make sense and planting the seeds for his dead-but-still-alive-in-flashbacks appearance in next year's inevitable Saw VII?"
(More Saw VI stories.)

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