YMMV / Se7en

• Accidental Aesop
  • Whether you live in a big city or elsewhere, it's a good idea to have some of your acquaintances check on you regularly and do the same for them. A factor that helps John Doe maim and kill without being noticed in time is that most of his victims conduct a rather lonely lifestyle (probably as a shut-in in the case of Gluttony).
  • Not only is prostitution a source of danger for prostitutes themselves, violence against them tends to be overlooked. Case in point, the victim chosen by John Doe for the sin of Lust is the only one whose name isn't disclosed, even though her death is a contender for the most horrific one in the film.
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • William Somerset and John Doe are different takes on the Only Sane Man, knowing well how bad the world is, but differ on how they deal with it (which essentially makes Doe Somerset's Evil Counterpart). Both believe they live in a Crapsack World, but Doe believes that because he is a completely egotistical bastard who ignores his own rampant hypocrisy, while Somerset tries to approach the situation with empathy and hope that people can be better. Somerset sees the world's flaws and how they can improve it while Doe is Right for the Wrong Reasons (for a really, really cynical interpretation of "right").
  • Which one is the Lust victim? The girl tied to the bed whose death would have come relatively quickly, or the guy forced to live with what he was forced to do? John Doe has an opinion on which was the worse sinner, but it's hard to decide which of them suffered the harsher punishment.
• Angst Aversion: Mills and Somerset are unable to prevent any of John Doe's murders, or even prevent him from completing his "mission" by goading Mills into gunning him down. This can make it very difficult for some people to get invested, knowing that everything will inevitably go to Hell.
• Awesome Music:
  • The creepy, grimy, tone-setting opening credit sequence is topped off by the equally creepy and grimy Precursor to Nine Inch Nails' "Closer."
  • Johann Sebastian Bach's "Air for the G String" is used beautifully for one of the movie's few peaceful moments. See Heartwarming Moments below for more detail.
  • The unnamed industrial track used for the pounding music in the massage parlor. If you're into industrial music, it's got a good beat and you can dance to it. If you're not into industrial music, it's the stuff of nightmares, especially considered the context of when you actually hear it in the movie, as it's only used during the opening of the Lust scene. Either way, it's a hell of a track.
  • The beautifully creepy "The Hearts Filthy Lesson" by David Bowie serves as the background track for the credits, capping off the grisly story with a feeling of dread and uncertainty for what awaits the protagonists in the future.
• Catharsis Factor: It's possible to take comfort in Doe dying regardless of the circumstances as it means even though he gets exactly what he wants, he will never kill again. If one also thinks in terms of the unfilmed alternate ending where Somerset kills Doe so that Mills won't, that's pretty satisfying though without any kind of caveats.
• Complete Monster: John Doe is a Knight Templar who targeted people whom he deemed to embody one of the Seven Deadly Sins, then horribly murdered them in a way that reflected their vice. After 5 murders, John Doe, feeling envious of Detective David Mills's "normal" life, decapitated his wife—despite her being completely innocent—then arranged for her head to be delivered to Mills outside of the city. Goading Mills with his crime and revealing that she was pregnant, Doe succeeded in getting Mills to murder him in revenge, making Mills the embodiment of wrath and leading to Mills's arrest and the ruination of his life.
• Creepy Awesome: John Doe may be a nightmarish, horrible, and merciless person, but you can't deny John's scare factor makes him so captivating to watch.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Surprisingly, the movie enjoyed some degree of success in post-revolutionary Iran, where it did well at the box-office (this was prior to the hardline Iranian regime taking control, and effectively outlawing anything pro-Western). Its success in Iran can partly be attributed to the fact that the film's cinematographer, Darius Khondji, hails from that country.
• Harsher in Hindsight: During John Doe's Motive Rant, he condemns one of his victims for being a pederast. Considering the underage assault allegations that came out against Kevin Spacey in 2017, and his reactions to the charges, this is... awkward.
• Heartwarming Moments: The library scene has a surprisingly charming subversion of Men Are Uncultured. Somerset chides the security guards and off-duty policemen for wasting their time playing poker in a library containing "a world of knowledge at your fingertips." The guards take it in stride, laughing and saying, "Hey, we got culture coming outta our asses!" One of the guards says, "How's this for culture?" and turns on the tape player... and it plays Bach's "Air for the G String". The guards may not be connoisseurs of High Art, but they at least have an appreciation for classical music. At the end of the scene, one of the guards tells Somerset that Somerset will miss them after he retires. Somerset has to agree.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: David Fincher would later make a film about the hunt for a real serial killer.
• It Was His Sled:
  • People who don't know who plays the villain, or what happens in the dénouement, are pretty hard to come by.
  • The horrifying Jump Scare of the "Sloth" victim has lost a lot of its power due to this.
• Jerkass Woobie
  • Sloth (Theodore 'Victor' Allen). While he was a drug-dealing pederast who'd also robbed and assaulted people, hardly anyone deserves a fate as excruciating as what happened to him. As if to add to this, it's mentioned he had an abusive childhood as well.
  • Pride (Rachel Shade) is characterized as an insufferable bitch in the graphic novel, but dying disfigured and completely alone while grabbing a teddy bear as your only company is pathetic and horrific at the same time.
• Love to Hate: John Doe. Sure he is a completely horrible person, but no one can deny that he is one of the most intriguing and interesting serial killers in all of cinema, in part because of the acting performance of Kevin Spacey.
• Memetic Mutation: "WHAT'S IN THE BOX?!"
• Misaimed Marketing: David Fincher mentions in a commentary track that for reasons he cannot fathom, the people who went out looking for test audiences for the movie used Driving Miss Daisy and Legends of the Fall as examples of movies that Morgan Freeman and Brad Pitt, respectively, have been in. So naturally, most of the people in the audience were the kind of people who would watch films like Driving Miss Daisy and Legends of the Fall, and not films like, well, Se7en. Fincher said that after the movie got out, he was standing outside the theater, and three middle-aged women walked past him. As they did so, one said "Whoever made this movie should be shot."
• Moral Event Horizon: While most would consider John Doe to have crossed this with his very first murder, torturing and killing someone for merely being gluttonous, in his view his victims were not innocent which makes one particular case stand out since Tracy was completely innocent of everything, so even his own twisted standards couldn't have excused his last killing.
• Narm:
  • Kevin Spacey's delivery of "DETECTIIIIVE!!!" might seem a little scary and ripe for Nightmare Fuel, but considering how little Mills was even paying attention to the murderer they were tracking down, it's pretty hard to not laugh at Mills' ignorance and Doe's exasperation.
  • Brad Pitt's delivery of "What's in the boooox?" was ripe for meme material due to it coming off to some like a kid whining that he wants a cookie.
• Narm Charm:
  • In-between the above bleating, Brad Pitt makes a convincing expression of pain and hurt, so the drama's not totally lost.
  • Dr. Beardsley ends his summation of Sloth's physical condition — that he's barely being kept alive by IV drips and about to die any minute — with a curt "and he still has Hell to look forward to". It's an odd thing for a doctor to say, even considering the kind of monster Victor was, but it gets the point across: for months on end, this man has been tortured in the most horrible ways imaginable.
• Narrowed It Down to the Guy I Recognize: Ingeniously averted. The name of the guy you recognize doesn't appear on the poster or in the opening credits, and you don't get a clear shot of his face until the third act.
• Once Original, Now Common: Modern viewers might find the notion of a serial killer who implements cruel and elaborate tortures to deliver Karmic Death to his victims to be cliche, but in 1995 it was genuinely horrifying and new. That most of the films inspired by Se7en have focused more on the Gorn and pure shock value aspects of the film rather than its meticulously-crafted atmosphere and cerebral tone certainly hasn't helped matters.
• One-Scene Wonder:
  • Michael Massee and Leland Orser during the interrogation for the Lust murder.
  • A then-unknown Richard Schiff makes quite an impression as John Doe’s shameless Amoral Attorney.
• Retroactive Recognition:
  • John C. McGinley appears here before his more famous role on Scrubs.
  • While the actor playing the murderer was well-known for performing character roles when the movie was being made, he became MUCH more recognizable and iconic as an actor in the following years and decades. Watching the movie today, even if you don't know who he is at first, hearing John Doe's voice especially in the phone call scene might tip the viewer to who Doe might be based on the actor's now-infamous voice.
• Signature Scene:
  • The ending with its twist regarding the final victims is so notorious that even non-viewers usually know the twist.
  • The sudden reveal that the Sloth victim is still alive is effective, given that the previous victims were found dead.
• Special Effects Failure: The Sloth victim's actual arm is so clearly visible on the bed right beneath the prosthetic arm that it makes one wonder why they didn't bother to cut a hole in the mattress so that the actor could hide it, or even just cover it up with a part of his shirt.
• Tough Act to Follow: For screenwriter Andrew Kevin Walker. No screenplay he has penned since this one has achieved anything like the kind of critical acclaim and commercial success heaped on Seven (the screenplay that immediately followed it, 8mm, was a rather obvious attempt to recapture the mood and tone of it).
• Values Dissonance: In the end, the chief repeatedly promises to look after and "take care" of the cop they're arresting for murder. While modern audiences are likely just as sympathetic toward the murderer, this scene does play differently to modern eyes after many controversies over law-breaking police officers receiving preferential treatment.
• The Woobie:
  • Poor Tracy. Moves to a city she can't stand to support her husband's career, winds up unexpectedly pregnant, and debates whether or not to bring a child into a Crapsack World. To say nothing of the ending...
  • The poor guy whom John Doe forced to kill the Lust victim. He's visibly shaking so hard he can barely breathe.
  • Most of the victims can fall under this, because even without much character development they die horrifically for completely undeserved reasons (undeserved for people who aren't John Doe of course). Gluttony, just for being obese, is forced to eat until he passes out, and is then kicked to rupture his stomach; Lust is raped to death with a blade for being a sex worker, and Pride gets her face gruesomely mutilated for being a little vain. It's such Disproportionate Retribution for unbelievably minor "crimes" it's hard not to feel bad for them. The only exceptions are Sloth and maybe Greed (who, in the graphic novel, is revealed to have been an Amoral Attorney who defended rapists and mob bosses).
  • Mills. While he can certainly be a Jerkass, Mills was honestly well meaning and truly does love his wife. Whom he finds out was murdered, and then finds out she was pregnant. Who can really blame him for killing John Doe?

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