James Wan wants to stop the gore for Saw 11 and return to fear

The director of the original opus takes the saga in hand and intends to bring it back to its roots.

Back to basics for Saw 11.

After years in the background, James Wan, the co-creator and director of Saw original (2004), returns to pilot the future of the saga – now under the aegis of Blumhouse – with a clear promise: rediscover the DNA of the first film and put fear back at the center of the game.

In an interview given to Newspaper from Letterboxd, James Wan teases the first intentions behind Saw 11. And the slogan is clear:

“I want this next Saw to be scary again. I want to make a Saw that’s scary — not just gory, but psychologically traumatic, like what Leigh Whannell and I did on the first movie.”

In other words: less graphic escalation, more mental terror.

James Wan also wants to return to the initial philosophy of John Kramer, aka Jigsaw: a killer guided by a twisted, but coherent, moral code:

“He attacks people who don’t enjoy their lives“, explains the filmmaker. “If you’re trash but you enjoy your life, he doesn’t see you as someone who’s wasting it. I want to go back to what we touched on in the first film.“

A return to essence, therefore, rather than to the mechanical escalation of traps. But there is no question of repeating exactly the same recipe either. Wan knows that a Saw 11 must also speak to a generation who did not grow up with the saga.

“We have to do something different to reach a new audience,” he said, even claiming an advantage: having been largely removed from the consequences would give him “the freshest look” on the franchise.

Finally, James Wan recalls how Saw was a film of self-help, shaped by a DIY energy and an indie ambition, inspired by models like Kevin Smith or Robert Rodriguez. The grimy aesthetic that has become cult? A necessity transformed into a signature. “The quick cuts, odd camera and dark lighting helped hide the DIY that held it all together.”

It remains to be seen whether 20 years later, Wan will direct himself Saw XI…