@A-Dubya said:

@DRDMovieMusings said:

@howardburns said:

I called it as well when the van first appeared. A good shocker but honestly I was hoping for something that packed a bit more of a punch to match up with the bars set by Sloth and Lust, which were absolutely blood-curdling. Regardless, still a great ending to a masterful film.

I think that the punch was provided by the fact that we actually had some emotional connection to ...don't want to spoil it...but, suffice to say, all the other victims were not known to any of the main characters in the movie, nor to we the audience. As such, those gruesome scenes were more detached, violence porn, per se. The box scene, being about a person we (both the main characters and the audience) knew made it emotionally painful, without having to resort to visual gore gratification.

And that, for me, was far more impactful. In fact, not even showing the contents was far more artistic, a higher craft of storytelling, because, by that point, hadn't we already had enough gore? Crafting that scene as they did, after all we'd seen leading up to it, was better, in my humble opinion.

Agreed. Somerset's reaction to it gave the audience all they needed to know. At first, I thought it was supposed to be the fetus of Tracy's unborn child inside the box. My mind went far darker I guess.

And thus, the box is an abyss! We stare into it, and see a reflection of what's inside us - and THAT can be where the real horror is (which, disturbingly, is what John Doe was saying, even so pure as to hold himself to the same judgment and condemn himself).

@Stratego! said:

So were you surprised by it? What did you think was in the box? I've got to say, once the van arrived, I knew it was going to deliver a box and I suspected what would be in it. Shocking nonetheless.

1st thing I thought was that there was a body on the van. Most of the whole scene led into believing it was a trap, but usually serial killers don't go into physical fight with their victims and for sure the guy wouldn't with 2 cops, so I was expecting him to somehow outsmart them and shock them.