Every Saw Movie Ranked Worst To Best

Spiral: From the Book of Saw is a strange ol' movie.

On one hand, there was plentiful excitement ahead of Spiral's release, with Saw II, III, and IV director Darren Lynn Bousman returning to the franchise, and the promise of a new direction for a series that had clearly long become stale by this point. With Chris Rock and Samuel L. Jackson announced to lead the charge as father and son, hope was high for this one.

Spiral was just about okay, and part of the problem with the feature was how it still felt a little too bogged down by the traditional tropes of the franchise. It was trying to present itself as new and fresh, yet couldn't fully be new and fresh due to how much it fell back on the familiar clichés of the series.

For once, though, we didn't have Jigsaw or one of his apprentices at play, and instead the villain here was a Jigsaw copycat as Spiral brought an element of whodunnit mystery to the table. That mystery had Rock's Zeke Banks as a detective who has plentiful ties to the victims of his new killer, which in turn frames him as a prime suspect.

While the setup of Spiral largely works, the big reveal sadly falls flat and is almost comedic at times as we see Banks' rookie partner Schenk revealed as this new Jigsaw. Also, the underutilisation of Samuel L. Jackson in Spiral is borderline criminal in and of itself.