Spiral (2021)

Description

During a Fourth of July parade, off-duty Detective Marv Bozwick chases a thief down a sewer drainage pipe. Attacked from behind by a figure wearing a pig mask, Bozwick awakens to find himself suspended by his tongue in an active subway tunnel and is given a choice via recorded message: tear out his tongue and live, or remain until the next train arrives, killing him. Unable to escape the trap in time, Bozwick is hit by the train and killed. The next day, police Captain Angie Garza assigns Detective Zeke Banks a new partner, idealistic rookie William Schenk. Banks and Schenk investigate Bozwick's death and Banks realizes this to be similar to the modus operandi of the now deceased Jigsaw Killer. Meanwhile, a homicide detective named Fitch – who several years prior had ignored a backup call from Banks, resulting in him nearly getting killed – is abducted and placed in a trap where he must rip his fingers off to avoid electrocution in a filling water basin; he also fails to escape and dies. Some officers begin to suspect that Banks may be responsible, due to his history with Fitch. A box then arrives at the station, containing a pig puppet and a piece of Schenk's tattooed skin inside. A small vial inside the box directs the police to a butcher shop, which was previously a hobby shop where Banks and his father, retired chief Marcus Banks, would go. Upon arriving, the team discovers a tape recorder and a skinned corpse, identified as Schenk. Deciding to track down the killer himself, Marcus travels to a warehouse, where he is abducted. Shortly afterwards, Garza is kidnapped, and placed in a trap in the precinct's cold storage where she has to sever her spinal cord on a blade to stop hot wax flowing from a pipe onto her face. She fails to do so and dies from her injuries due to the boiling hot wax as Banks discovers her body. While chasing a lead, Banks is captured and wakes up at the warehouse, handcuffed to a pipe with a hacksaw nearby. He considers sawing off his arm, but successfully escapes using a loose bobby pin. He then discovers Peter Dunleavy, his former partner who was fired and imprisoned when Banks exposed a murder he committed, chained in place. In front of him is a large glass-crushing machine, which has been modified to rapidly hurl shrapnel at him. A tape recorder explains that Banks can choose to either free him or leave him to die. Although Banks attempts to save Dunleavy, he cannot get the key in time. Moving to another room, Banks then finds Schenk, who is revealed to have faked his own death by using the skinned corpse of the thief who lured Bozwick into the tunnels, and has been the copycat all along. He explains that his last name is actually Emmerson, the son of Charlie Emmerson, who was the person Dunleavy shot and killed because he had agreed to testify against a dirty cop. He also reveals that Marcus, during his time as chief, deliberately protected corrupt officers to "clean" the streets of crime more efficiently under Article 8.