The Final Saw?

I refuse to call this film Saw 3D, just because actually saying 3D pisses me off. So, I'll be refering to this as Saw 7. I saw this yesterday, NOT in 3D, and here are my thoughts, as the series wraps up, supposedly.

First of all, and saying this will make people laugh, but I consider the Saw series to be a real landmark in movie-making. Why? Can you name me another movie series that lasted 7 movies, had the same actors play the same characters, referenced all the previous films, kept the same tone, the same story structure, and delivered the same amount of enjoyment, year after year, movie after movie? Can you name the another series that has lasted this amount of time, and delivered the same amount of quality, every single movie? Even the vaunted Harry Potter had a mis-step at 5 (in my opinion), and the Harry Potter 7.1 wasn't as good as some of the other ones, either.

It's just a really, really solid series, up and down, front to back, year after year, I looked forward to the next Saw. I looked forward to the traps, the staggering leaps in logic, how it was all tied together, what the twist was...all of it was awesome. Except for this 3D crap, I watched all the movies in the theatre...and p.s., I had a friend tell me there was hardly any 3D in the film, and he saw it in the theatre, so even that's a rip.

I'm not reviewing the movie's storyline. There's a few games, a few traps. Someone thinks they have the upper-hand, they don't, Sean Patrick Flannery is the guy who has to go through the gaunlets of traps this time, there's some cameos from the past, there's some twists, and traps, and gore and more traps. Look, you know Saw, you know what you're going to get. It was one of the few franchises these days I could rely on to really please me, every single year. Spider-Man, Superman, Bourne, Pirates of the Caribbean, even Batman...have all disappointed me, in some way. Not Saw though. From beginning to end, this franchise has delivered the goods, and despite it not getting the recognition it deserves, I'm sure the fans of the Saw series are more passionate and die-hard than the "fans" who supposedly loved something like Iron Man since "day 1. "

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars.

Rating of series: 5 out of 5 stars.

- Stephenstein