Leigh Whannell — Michael CavaciniMichael Cavacini

If you know me, you know my complicated, obsessive love affair with the SAW franchise. I’ve seen every single movie multiple times. I rewatch them, analyze them, and unabashedly adore them—even though they remain the only horror movies on the planet that genuinely make me want to cover my eyes because of how stomach-churningly grotesque some of the traps and deaths are (a fact I reflected on when revisiting the original film).

Naturally, when I heard about SAW The Musical: The Unauthorized Parody of Saw at the Walnut Street Theatre, I had to go. However, what I wasn’t prepared for was to walk out of the theater with a gigantic smile on my face, covered in stage blood, and completely blown away by this incredible show.

It is, without exaggeration, one of the best musicals I have ever seen.

Continue reading →

If you haven’t already read them, make sure to check out my retrospective pieces on Saw and Saw II. Today, I’m going to revisit Saw III. The story of Saw II was repurposed from a script by director Darren Lynn Bousman entitled The Desperate. It wound up being a fantastic sequel that features the most unnerving trap in the entire franchise — at least for me — in the form of a pit of needles. For Saw III, Bousman is back in the director’s chair. However, this time, Leigh Whannell, one of the original creators of Saw, has returned to write the screenplay. What follows is a spoiler-filled review of the movie. Make sure to read this after watching the film.