You can tell a lot about a person by their favorite Saw movie. Lots of people stick to the original, but there are plenty of interesting options. Maybe you like the team project energy of Saw V, the Dr. Gordon reveal in Saw VII, or the Uno-reverse twist of Saw X. But for me, the answer is clear: Saw II, because I’m a fan of Darren Lynn Bousman.
Bousman wrote a completely separate script called The Desperate that was rejected for being too similar to Saw. But when Saw producers heard wind, he was brought on to direct the hit movie’s sequel. He then went on to direct Saw III and Saw IV. As such a key part of Saw’s history, Inverse spoke with Bousman about the franchise’s recent troubles and what could lie in the future.
2023’s Saw X was supposed to be the start of a new era for Saw. But Saw XI just never seemed to materialize. First, it was scheduled to be released in September 2024, but then it was bumped a full year to September 2025. Then, it was bumped from the 2025 date, but this time, it wasn’t rescheduled, just taken off the schedule altogether.
But that doesn’t mean work hadn’t begun. According to The Hollywood Reporter, screenwriters Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan turned in a draft of the script in the spring of 2024, but didn’t heard anything back. “It’s stalled at a managerial level,” Melton said. “It has nothing to do with the creative or anything else. There’s higher-level things at play.” Apparently, the script would have dealt with a “very timely story,” much like the games in Saw VI.
For a while, it seemed like that was it for the franchise. But in June 2025, Blumhouse — which recently acquired James Wan’s Atomic Monster — bought the rights for the Saw franchise. That means the original creators of the movie, James Wan and Leigh Whannell, will go back to having creative control.
But what does another big Saw director think of this move? “I think the only way that Saw continues to survive is what they're doing, because I think that the franchise has become so convoluted with timelines and in sub-timelines and meta narratives that it's become increasingly hard for a new person to step in and understand what's going on,” Darren Lynn Bousman tells Inverse ahead of the theatrical re-release of his 2008 musical Repo! The Genetic Opera.
“I think the only way that it does have a life from this point is to hit the reset button,” he says. “There is no one better to do it than James and Leigh, who pioneered it. That said, I hope that it doesn't push aside the canon of the movies that we have made because there is a huge fan base for those 10 films.”
It seems like he was just as shocked about the Saw XI cancellation as the rest of the audience. “I think it was a crazy time, because Saw X ended up coming out and doing gangbusters. It, like, revitalized the franchise. Now they're going to redo it again.”
Though he may not be involved as a creative anymore, as a fan, he’s just as interested to find out what comes next. “I am curious to see what they do and if they can hit that bullseye again,” he says. “We'll see.”
