It's a heavy-handed but not quite ham-fisted approach to something as complicated as police reform, considering Zeke continually contextualizes his profession for the audience. These Jigsaw victims have killed witnesses and suspects without cause, and then covered up for it relentlessly. Instead of punishing people for petty stuff (remember the time that janitor got his ribs crushed for smoking cigarettes in Saw VI?), Spiral's killer chooses their prey based on proven histories of corruption. Using Rock's talent for dissecting racism and systemic power imbalances, Zeke spends much of the film discussing what makes some law enforcement officers bad. You know, this time the sadistic murderer is kind of right. The only problem? Well, you know, this time the sadistic murderer is kind of right.
With the support of Metro PD Captain Angie Garza (Marisol Nichols) and rookie detective William Schenk (Max Minghella), Zeke begins a race against time to find the killer and bring them to justice. When another cop bites the dust, it's clear Jigsaw Jr. " That's why his tongue was at the courthouse," Zeke says, in one of many procedural-style scenes depicting our hero slowly unraveling this crime and its motives. But he's also troubled by the pretense of his buddy's demise. Jackson, Zeke was good friends with the now tongueless detective targeted by this evident Jigsaw copycat. The son of former police chief Marcus Banks, played by Samuel L. Will he cut out the tongue that wrongly put innocent people in prison, or is it now him "who will be railroaded?" Yeah, like I said, it's traditional Saw shit, and this idiot is about to get mowed down by a train.Įnter Detective Zeke Banks (Rock) and the baffling moral conundrum Spiral makes him address. That man, we learn, is a police detective with a lengthy record of perjury allegations. "That's why his tongue was at the courthouse."īased on a story by and starring Chris Rock, Spiral begins with classic Saw fodder: a man strung up by his tongue in a subway tunnel. There was just too much else to be excited about - too much else to haunt my nightmares and post-screening conversations. But leaving the theater (yes, an actual theater!), blood and guts were the least of my concerns. Going into Spiral: From the Book of Saw, I was thinking about the kills.