Spiral Director Weighs in on Possibly Returning for More Saw Sequels

The upcoming Spiral: From the Book of Saw might serve as a revival and reimagining of the Saw franchise, but it enlisted familiar filmmaker Darren Lynn Bousman for the project, having directed Saw II, Saw III, and Saw IV, who admitted that he had previously never considered ever returning to the franchise, but after having worked on Spiral, he now has a rejuvenated interest in the mythology. Spiral was originally slated to hit theaters earlier this spring, but the coronavirus pandemic saw the film delayed until next May, though fans can check out Bousman's film Death of Me in theaters, On Demand, and on Digital HD on October 2nd.

"A decade ago I said I would never come back, and I think you can find maybe 6,500 interviews of me saying I'm done," Bousman shared with ComicBook.com about returning to Saw. "So one thing I've taught myself is never say never because you might come back. So I will say this: there is something magical about the Saw universe and there is something that is so undefinably special about Saw that I can't articulate it. Part of it has to do with the time and memory of when I was 24 years old flying to Toronto for the first time on a flight, having no idea what the f-ck I was doing and stepping off and meeting Dan Heffner, who is the line producer, now the producer, of the Saw franchise, and meeting all of these people for the first time. And there was this boyish wonder of, 'Oh, dear God, when are they going to find out I'm a fraud?'"

He added, "But now, as a 41-year-old man stepping off that flight, being greeted by Dan Heffner, seeing those exact same people, it's such a weird nostalgia that it's filled me full of this, again, childlike wonderment of, 'Holy sh-t, I'm back.' So it becomes a drug. And I think that if you would've asked me two years ago, I said I would never do it. I would still say, 'I'm never doing this Saw movie again.' Now, if they call me back and said, 'Hey, we're doing the next one.' There's no telling. I'd probably be on a flight meeting Dan Heffner again. There's just something so magical about those movies."

The filmmaker went on to detail what drew him to the mythos so strongly, despite some audiences dismissing them as nothing more than an opportunity to deliver viewers gruesome violence.

"I think that why I always loved the Saw franchise was that it was more than a horror film. It was more than a slasher film," the filmmaker detailed. "It was something that was based around characters and people love to write those movies off as being torture porn, but watch the film. It's not torture porn. It's a story and, in a lot of respects, it's a love story, the first few, between Tobin [Bell] and Shawnee Smith's character, Amanda, and this tragic story on top of that. So, I don't know. It was a great feeling coming back. I'm obviously just distraught that it was pushed, but also, that was the absolute right decision given where we are in the world right now."

In Death of Me, "Vacationing on an island off the coast of Thailand, Christine (Maggie Q) and Neil Oliver (Luke Hemsworth) awake hungover and with no memory of the previous night. They find footage on Neil's camera, and watch, horrified, as Neil appears to murder Christine. With twenty-four hours until the next ferry and a typhoon threatening the island, Christine and Neil attempt to reconstruct the night's events—and are snared in a web of mystery, black magic, and murder."

Spiral: From the Book of Saw hits theaters on May 21, 2021. Death of Me hits theaters, On Demand, and Digital HD on October 2nd.

Are you hoping the filmmaker returns for more sequels? Let us know in the comments below or contact Patrick Cavanaugh directly on Twitter to talk all things horror and Star Wars!