After 2004’s Saw grossed about $104 million worldwide, 2005’s Saw II brought in $148 million total and the producers thought “let’s not get greedy. Let’s end the series on a high note.”

Ha ha? Of course that didn’t happen, which you already know because you clicked on a review of 2006’s Saw III.

Sadistic mastermind John “Jigsaw” Kramer (Tobin Bell) continues his old violent games, now with the assistance of protégé Amanda Young (Shawnee Smith). In this vein, both abduct two new participants.

Jeff (Angus Macfadyen) wants revenge for the death of his child, while physician Lynn (Bahar Soomekh) finds herself depressed and without purpose. A cancer-ridden Jigsaw runs Jeff through a series of brutal tasks while he forces Lynn to keep him alive long enough to see Jeff’s progression through to its completion.

In other words, same old, same old. Actually, Saw II broadened horizons somewhat via a larger cast.

Whereas the first Saw focused on two main subjects, Saw II involved a bigger group of participants. This sounded like a good expansion of the original, but instead it just broadened the character pool too much and left the roles as little more than cheap torture fodder.

Saw III returns to a smaller cast, and that seems like a good idea. In theory, this means we get better developed personalities.

And we do, as Saw III brings more depth to its roles. We get to know a reasonable amount about Jeff and Lynn, and we also find more about John and Amanda as well.

In theory, this should make Saw III a deeper experience than its predecessors. In reality… not so much.

Oh, Saw III comes with some promising themes. For one, it subjects a character who did nothing overtly wrong, a change from the usual reprobates.

This leads to good possibilities. Saw III looks at the notion of whether someone whose refusal to intervene makes that person an accessory to a crime, and it also tests the limits of forgiveness and a willingness to move past obsession.

In other hands, Saw III could explore these notions in a rich and compelling way. Instead, these topics end up as little more than windowdressing.

While Saw III toys with these ideas, it never really looks into them. They exist as tantalizing possibilities without positive realization.

Like the first two films, Saw III comes with annoyingly hyperactive visuals and music. It throws its drama at us in a manner that heavily emphasizes its “in your face” style, with the result that it annoys on a nearly consistent basis.

Saw III never really explores its themes. Instead, it pours on the gore and cares little about anything else.

In another bad choice, Saw III relies on seemingly endless flashbacks. These provide unnecessary exposition and damage whatever potential tension the tale might deliver.

The film also lasts far too long. The Blu-ray comes with a 114-minute extended cut, but even the theatrical version filled almost as much space.

Both running times seem like a good 15 to 20 minutes more than this tale needs. Again, if Saw III explored its drama better, it could work, but it fails to utilize its cinematic real estate in an efficient manner.

This leaves us with a meandering horror flick that occasionally shows promise but it never lives up to those hopes. Instead, it just throws violence and gore at us. Toss in an annoying cliffhanger ending and Saw III flops.

As noted, this Blu-ray provides only an unrated cut of Saw III. It extends the “R”-rated theatrical version to include about two additional minutes of content.

Some of this revolves around trims of gore/violence, but we also get some minor character/dialogue beats as well. None of these seem likely to really change/improve the movie, but I suspect fans will feel happy to see them nonetheless.

Saw III appears in an aspect ratio of approximately 1.85:1 on this Blu-ray Disc. Because Saw III came from the same director and crew that made Saw II, it brought a very similar presentation. Please enjoy this lazily cut and pasted summary!

A release from the format’s early days, this became a spotty image, some of that stemmed from the source. Saw III went with an intentionally ugly sense of visuals.

Still, I thought the Blu-ray could – and should – have looked better than this. Overall sharpness felt decent to good. I couldn’t claim the flick looked razor-sharp, but it brought more than acceptable delineation most of the time.

No issues with jagged edges or shimmering materialized, and edge haloes failed to appear. Grain seemed heavy but appropriate, and only a handful of small specks popped up along the way.

Saw III came with a palette that leaned heavily toward grungy greens and blues, with some ambers as well. These tones generally suited the movie’s choices, though they seemed messier than I might expect even within those parameters.

Blacks seemed a bit inky, while shadows came across as somewhat dense. This was a watchable but less than stellar presentation.

As for the movie’s DTS-HD HR 5.1 soundtrack, it came across as active but not as immersive as I might like. To be sure, the soundscape created a nearly constant flow of information around the room.

However, this felt kind of out of control and not always best suited to the story. The soundfield wanted to wear down the viewer, I guess, so it created a lot of involvement that could annoy at times.

Audio quality worked fine, with speech that appeared natural and concise. Music seemed full and vibrant.

Effects felt accurate and dynamic. Ultimately, I didn’t love the soundfield but thought the track worked fairly well nonetheless.

As we shift to extras, we find three separate audio commentaries, the first of which comes from director Darren Lynn Bousman, writer Leigh Whannell and executive producers Peter Block and Jason Constantine. The running, screen-specific track starts with Bousman, Whannell and Bloch but after a while, Constantine enters and Bloch leaves,

Eventually Bloch returns and Constantine departs. The discussion looks at story/characters, connections to the first two movies, sets and locations, cast and performances, effects, issues with the MPAA, and related domains.

Overall, this becomes a pretty useful chat. The participants – mainly Whannell – engage in too many not amusing stabs at comedy, but we learn enough about the film to make the piece worth a listen.

For the second commentary, we hear from producers Oren Koules and Mark Burg. They sit together for a running, screen-specific examination of the same range of topics from thje prior track.

That doesn’t mean the Koules/Burg chat becomes completely redundant, as they bring their own perspective. However, we don’t get a ton of unique info,

Koules and Burg do provide engaging enough personalities to mean the track goes down smoothly. Nonetheless, fans shouldn’t expect to learn a lot, and the piece too often feels like it exists to promote Saw IV and other films.

Finally, we get a commentary from Bousman, editor Kevin Greutert and director of photography David A. Armstrong. All three sit together for another running, screen-specific examination of… basically the same array of subjects from the prior tracks.

With Armstrong and Greutert in tow, we do learn a bit more about cinematography and editing – but only a little, as Bousman dominates the discussion. Mostly the guys bust on each other and repeat info we already know.

Like the Koules/Burg commentary, the participants make the proceedings moderately entertaining, as without the semi-annoying Whannell, the jokes prove more amusing. Still, we find too little fresh information for me to recommend the track to anyone other than diehard Saw fans.

Two Deleted Scenes fill a total of five minutes, 29 seconds. The first uses up four minutes, 22 seconds and shows Lynn’s early attempts to escape.

The other scene gives more Amanda backstory. Neither proves especially useful, though the Amanda segment makes more sense.

A mix of featurettes follow, and The Traps of Saw III runs nine minutes, 21 seconds. The program brings statements from Whannell, Bousman, production designer David Hackl, prop builder Jason Ehl, prosthetics makeup Francois Dagenais, and actors Mpho Koaho and Debra Lynne McCabe.

As the title implies, the short gives us insights related to the movie’s cruel puzzles. It delivers a few useful notes about the decisions involved with these.

The Props of Saw III goes for seven minutes, 54 seconds. We find remarks from Bousman, Hackl, Ehl, Dagenais, Armstrong, assistant property master Mario Moreira, property master Jim Murray, special props Scott Hamilton and Maya Kulenovic, and actor Bakar Soomekh.

Another self-explanatory reel, we learn about elements like the Billy puppet and other practical elements used in the flick. Like “Traps”, it becomes a good summary.

Up next, The Writing of Saw III spans six minutes, 43 seconds. Here we get info from Bousman and Whannell.

Unsurprisingly, the show covers story and character choices. Some of this repeats from the commentary but the program nonetheless gives us an efficient overview of the actual screenwriting processes.

The Evolution of a Killer goes for five minutes, 12 seconds. This one involves actor Shawnee Smith.

“Evolution” examines the ways the Amanda character changed over the first three Saw movies. Smith presents a decent take on her role.

For the final featurette, Darren’s Diary spans nine minutes, 20 seconds and follows Bousman through aspects of the production. Expect a nice view behind the scenes.

In addition to both teaser and theatrical trailers for Saw III, we get a general Blu-ray ad under Also from Lionsgate.

If you expect something fresh from Saw III, you’ll not find it here. The movie offers some potentially intriguing themes that it never explores well, as it delivers little more than the same old blood and gore. The Blu-ray brings mediocre visuals, pretty good audio and erratic bonus materials. Maybe Saw IV will freshen up the franchise, but I won’t count on it.