Hell Scoop: Dreaming Of Saws

Welcome to our brand-new spooky column Hell Scoop, wherein we will offer sneak peaks at this week’s upcoming horror and thriller releases.

This week, Hollywood has such sights to show us. While the big box office arrival on the stateside film scene seems to be the new Gareth Edwards-helmed, John David Washington-starring original sci-fi actioner The Creator, we’ve also got some chillers and thrillers incoming that seem to be well worth a gander. And one may actually give The Creator a run for its money this weekend.

Friday, September 29th: Saw X

After Jigsaw (2017) and Spiral (2021) disrupted the Saw franchise’s standard Roman numeral naming pattern, the tenth installment in the undying series has reverted to that old chestnut. In the latest iteration of this gloriously, gratuitously grisly 19-year-old saga (Sawga?), we are once again traveling into the series’ past apparently, to a time when both John “Jigsaw” Kramer (Tobin Bell) and his Stockholm Syndromed victim-turned-protege Amanda Young (Shawnee Smith) were both still alive in its chronology, meaning that the events here must transpire around 2006 or so. IMDb tells us that this time around, perennially cancer-stricken Jigsaw tries out some experimental treatments in Mexico, and soon is up to his old avenging tricks when he realizes the system is designed to exploit patients. The flick is riding high off franchise-best reviews.

Sunday, October 1st: Dreams Of Darkness

A no-budget, NC-17 rated erotic cult movie, the trailer for Dreams Of Darkness sure plays like the kind of entertainment best reserved for shame-filled late night home viewings.

And that’s it for traditional horror, but there are also some thrillers on the menu if we want to expand our palette a smidge.

Friday, September 29th: The Creator, The Kill Room, 57 Seconds

The Creator, an $80 million cyborg-themed epic from Disney/20th Century Studios not based on any pre-existing (ugh) IP, appears to be more of a sci-fi actioner than what we would technically consider a “thriller,” but I suppose that’s really a matter of semantics. Edwards is one of the better new-ish action directors working in modern studio movies today, and it will be fun to see how he can handle his own material (co-written with About A Boy and The Golden Compass writer/director Chris Weitz).

I’m almost less interested in the movie itself than I am in seeing how theatrical audiences respond to it this weekend and in the subsequent month or so. Can this garner enough engagement to warrant future pricey flyers on original non-horror genre fare? Daniel Garris of Box Office Report predicts that The Creator, which will be released on premium IMAX screens and a weekend-most 3,680 locations overall, will narrowly beat Saw X and this weekend’s new kiddie fare, the second theatrical PAW Patrol flick, in a three-way fight for patrons’ hard-earned cash this weekend. Garris is expecting a $21.5 million debut. This would be a fairly modest showing, yes, but one that, with enough positive word-of-mouth, could still lay the groundwork for The Creator to get into the black.

The big hook of helmer Nicol Paone’s The Kill Room, of course, is that it reunites Quentin Tarantino favorites Samuel L. Jackson and Uma Thurman for the first time since Kill Bill Vol. 2 in 2004, in yet another dark crime comedy. The Kill Room is said to mix hitman action shenanigans with a playful skewering of the art world. It’s certainly the non-horror picture yours truly is most excited to see among this weekend’s crop, for old times’ sake.

Redbox-targeting indie sci-fi action “thriller” 57 Seconds, starring The Hunger Games alum Josh Hutcherson and Morgan Freeman, rounds out the slate of applicable genre fare this week.