Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III (1990)

“New decade, same chainsaw, way less impact.”

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🎥 Let’s start by showing y’all the trailers shall we?

[Trailer link here — honestly the trailer might be scarier than the movie]


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🧾 Non-Spoiler Plot Overview

So this time around, it’s the early 90s and New Line Cinema picked up the franchise (yep, same studio that had Freddy Krueger). They wanted to revive Leatherface as their new horror icon. What we got is… a road trip gone wrong. Two yuppies traveling through Texas run into the Sawyer family, and Leatherface is back swinging the saw. It’s darker and grimmer than part 2, less goofy, but also way more generic.


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👥 Character Rundown

Leatherface (R.A. Mihailoff) – Back to basics. He’s brutal, hulking, and this time carries a giant golden chainsaw with “The Saw is Family” engraved on it (not subtle).

Michelle & Ryan – Our unlucky couple driving through Texas. They’re more bland than memorable, just here to scream and survive.

Tex (Viggo Mortensen — yes, that Viggo Mortensen) – Yep, Aragorn himself before Lord of the Rings. He plays a charming but psychotic member of the Sawyer family. Honestly, he’s the best part of the movie.

Benny (Ken Foree) – Vietnam vet who just so happens to get stuck in the madness too. He’s the badass survivor type and puts up the best fight against the Sawyers.

Mama & the rest of the Sawyer clan – Yet another version of the cannibal family. They change with every movie, which makes continuity a joke at this point.



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⏱️ Pacing / Episode Flow

The movie starts with a couple on a road trip, runs into creepy gas station vibes, then bam — Leatherface and the family start their torment. A lot of chasing, some cat-and-mouse in the woods, then back to the Sawyer house for torture time. It drags in spots because it doesn’t have the raw horror of the original or the insanity of part 2. It’s kind of stuck in the middle, trying to be grim and scary but not really pulling it off.


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✅ Pros

Leatherface feels scary again, more of a brutal monster than the awkward teen from part 2.

The golden chainsaw is ridiculous but iconic.

Ken Foree as Benny is a great addition — dude actually puts up a fight.

Viggo Mortensen steals scenes, you can tell he’s too good for this movie.



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❌ Cons

The plot is super thin, just “couple gets lost, family terrorizes them.”

Characters are mostly bland, outside of Benny and Tex.

The gore was hacked up by the MPAA, so a lot of kills feel neutered.

Pacing is uneven, too much filler and not enough payoff.

Feels like a franchise just spinning its wheels, not sure what it wants to be.



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💭 Final Thoughts

Leatherface: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre III tries to go back to gritty horror after the comedy detour of part 2, but it doesn’t have the spark of the original. Leatherface is cool again, the new family members are… fine, and honestly Benny and Tex are the only ones who stick in your head. It’s not awful, but it’s forgettable compared to what came before.


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⭐ Rating

I’m giving this one a 5/10. Middle of the road. Some good performances (Viggo, Ken Foree), Leatherface feels threatening again, but overall it’s just another entry that doesn’t hit the highs of the franchise.


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⚠️ Spoiler Warning

Alright, into the meat grinder we go.


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🩸 Spoilers

Michelle and Ryan are on a road trip, stop at a creepy gas station (because of course they do), and meet Tex, who seems nice at first but turns out to be a full-blown psycho Sawyer. Leatherface attacks them in the woods, and the couple gets dragged back to the family.

The Sawyer family here is another remix — Mama, Tex, and a little girl who’s basically a mini-psycho. They torture Michelle, chase Ryan, and do the usual “dinner table of doom” routine but with less punch than the first movie.

Benny, the Vietnam vet, stumbles into this nightmare and basically becomes the real hero. He fights Leatherface multiple times, even gets into a full-on chainsaw duel. He’s the only one with real grit.

Leatherface gets some brutal moments, including using his oversized golden chainsaw. In one cut of the film, Benny dies fighting him, but in another cut he survives. The endings differ depending on which version you see, but either way, Michelle ends up surviving after a long night of torture and running.

Roll credits — another set of survivors scarred for life, another Sawyer family setup that will probably be ignored in the next sequel.