The new Texas Chainsaw Massacre deals with our school-shooting crisis
Audiences expect more, they want to get wowed, they want to be shocked,” Garcia tells Polygon. “Fede taught me to get creative with the kills, and use more blood than you think you need to. If you didn’t get it, right, reset, even if it takes an hour, then shoot it again, because that’s the stuff that people are coming to see.”
Garcia is quick to note that the violence in
Netflix’s Texas Chainsaw Massacre — a direct sequel to Tobe Hooper’s original 1974 movie, much like
2018’s Halloweendirectly follows the 1978 original — is “not violence for violence sake.” Inspired by the way Hooper’s
anti-Vietnam-war rage blossomed into the grungy slasher-movie milestone, Garcia’s film deals in social commentary even as Leatherface disembowels his victims. But unlike the original, it isn’t allegory. The 2022
Texas Chainsaw Massacre directly grapples with gun violence in America and the trauma of school shootings. Between scenes of intense splatter violence, Garcia threads scenes of intense real-life violence.