"Saw XI" Suffers Devastating Blow as Production Plunges into Crisis

The future of "Saw XI" is currently uncertain as “zero progress” has been made on the next installment since writing partners Patrick Melton and Marcus Dunstan turned in a draft back in the spring of 2024.

“We haven’t heard anything since May,” says Saw XI screenwriter Melton, who has been involved with the franchise since 2007’s Saw IV. “It’s stalled at a managerial level. It has nothing to do with the creative or anything else. There’s higher-level things at play.”

In late December 2023, Lionsgate announced that franchise mainstay Kevin Greutert was attached to direct "Saw XI" for a September 2024 release, but the studio ultimately delayed it by a year to September 26, 2025. 

Greutert helmed "Saw X", which revitalized the franchise when it hit theaters in September 2023 and collected $112 million at the global box office. It is unclear if he is still involved in "Saw XI".

Melton points out that "Saw X" did well, and that the team has a concept that they’re proud of for the next movie. They intended to tackle a timely topic, although plot details have not yet been shared publicly. 

The writer likens the new project’s premise to the timeliness of the 2009 release "Saw VI", in which health insurance executives are targeted by John Kramer, aka Jigsaw (Tobin Bell). This topic captured renewed attention earlier this year with the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson.

“Saw XI may or may not be made, but we have a very timely story in it, and I hope it gets made just because of that,” Melton said. “It taps into the same themes of Saw VI, where you’re a citizen, you feel angry and frustrated with something, you feel like you can’t do anything, and John Kramer’s going to do it.”

Adds the writer about "Saw XI", “The reason it’s held up is just, there’s inter-squabbling between producers and Lionsgate. They just can’t quite get on the same page.”

As far as the previous movies, Melton recalls that critics reacted favorably to "Saw VI", but that the feature was hurt at the box office by Paranormal Activity hitting theaters a month prior. 

“Saw VI was the one that got cut in half because of Paranormal Activity, which was odd because it was the best-reviewed one [at the time],” he added. “It was the first one that really resonated with a lot of critics because it was about health care. The production was really easy, though, even though the Saw movies were made every year, which is hard to do.”

Mark Burg, a longtime producer on the Saw franchise that launched with director James Wan’s 2004 original, pointed out that he oversaw not only "Saw VI" but also 2002’s similarly themed "John Q", the Denzel Washington thriller about a father who resorts to crime after he can’t pay his son’s health bills.

“Jigsaw goes after somebody who won’t provide insurance for him,” Burg says of Saw VI. “So I guess I’m two for two.”

As it turns out, Melton went to college with slain United Healthcare CEO Thompson at the University of Iowa. “We were at Iowa at the same time, so we graduated the same year in 1997,” recalls the writer, who notes that they knew each other but weren’t close friends. “I can tell you Brian was pretty normal at school. He drank Bud Light and was a good guy.”