Saw: Cary Elwes Says “Never Say Never” to Franchise Return

Ever since Cary Elwes took the titular saw in Saw and sliced his foot off in the original film horror fans were eager to see him return. Each subsequent year after that film’s release saw another sequel debut and though many featured references to Elwes’ Dr. Lawrence Gordon he wouldn’t actually return until the seventh (and at the time final) film, Saw 3D (formerly Saw: The Final Chapter). Despite the clear ending intended for that movie, the series continued, producing two more movies including the most recent Spiral: From the Book of Saw, so is there a path for Dr. Gordon to come back? When asked if he’d ever return to the part in the horror franchise, Elwes didn’t rule it out but also revealed he didn’t think there was much left for that character to do.

“I never say never – but I pretty much feel like I have explored that character as far as it can go,” Elwes told The Hollywood Reporter. “I am open if the filmmakers wanted to discuss it, but I feel we have run the full gamut of Dr. Gordon’s life. We made that picture in 18 days. I was averaging 12 to 16 pages of dialogue a day, which was a great challenge. We never sat down, there were no chairs on the set. We never put the camera on a dolly or a tripod, it was on our wonderful cinematographer’s [David A. Armstrong] shoulder for the entire movie. So when we set up shots it was like, ‘OK move the camera here and roll.’”

Elwes’ return as Dr. Gordon in Saw 3D ended up closing a major loop, and confirming a long-recurring fan-theory at the same time, revealing that after he escaped the iconic “Bathroom Trap” from Saw that he was secretly working with Tobin Bell’s Jigsaw the entire length of the franchise. A montage at the end of the film revealed how he’d helped Jigsaw not only pick some of his victims but also aid in the creation of some of his sinister and deadly games. The film concluded with the reveal that Jigsaw had asked Gordon to help him with one last task, the elimination of his rogue apprentice Detective Mark Hoffman (Costas Mandylor), whom he locked up in the first film’s bathroom for a slow death in the darkness.

From the perspective of where the franchise went after Saw 3D, 2017’s Jigsaw and 2021’s Spiral, there could in theory be a way to bring Gordon back into it all, and since the continuity is already hamfisted from the start, why not try it? Jigsaw concluded with Logan, another unseen Jigsaw apprentice that was apparently there from the beginning, revealing that he’d be carrying on the legacy of John Kramer, only for a sequel to that film never happening and Spiral bringing in an all-new, unrelated-to-Jigsaw mastermind. 

Longtime franchise director Darren Lynn Bousman previously alluded to the Saw franchise being on two paths moving forward, with sequels to Saw proper and sequels to Spiral happening alongside each other; all of which would be followed by a combination of the two series in a crossover film. Though it seem unlikely that will occur now, it also seems like the best place for Dr. Gordon to show up, should the producers at Twisted Pictures chose to break that glass once again.