John Kramer

In the first film, John is a name the police are still hunting. Detective Tapp spends years chasing him after finding Amanda alive. In the bathroom, Adam and Gordon fight for their lives while a bloody body lies between them. Once Adam kills Zep and is left alone, the body gets up. It was John, watching the game up close the whole time. He kills the lights and says "game over".

Soon after, with the tumor spreading, John bets on one last hope: an experimental treatment in Mexico. He pays, goes through the surgery and starts to believe he'll live. When he learns Cecilia Pederson and her crew staged the whole thing, John goes back to building games, now with Amanda at his side. He walks each scammer into a trap, and in the end shows he was a step ahead all along.

Weakened, John lets the police reach him. He sits in a chair and talks with Detective Eric Matthews while monitors show eight people in a gas-filled house. He works on Eric calmly, every line meant to make the detective lose control. Eric's game was never the house. It was his patience. John walks out of the story still alive, with one more win.

Bedridden, John relies on an abducted doctor to keep breathing. He watches Amanda, the heir he picked, and sees she no longer follows the rules. His plan had a test for everyone, her included. When Jeff drags a saw across John's throat, the last tape plays. John dies, but leaves a game still running.

The autopsy doesn't end anything: there's a tape in his stomach. Jill Tuck's interrogations reveal who John was. He was a successful engineer, married to a doctor who ran a clinic for addicts. A robbery at the clinic caused Jill to lose the son they were expecting, Gideon. Then came the diagnosis, a suicide attempt and the choice to test others. His first target was Cecil, the man behind the robbery.

Ten years later, a new game in a barn seems to bring John back. The truth comes out slowly: that game was the first one he ever built, long before Saw. Logan Nelson was there by mistake, and John let him go. Logan became an apprentice. Now he uses John's legacy for a game of his own.

Tobin Bell plays John in every film of the Kramer era and returns in Jigsaw and Saw X. James Wan built Billy the puppet by hand for the first film.