Obi Tate is a supporting character in the horror movie Saw II. He was among a group of people who had been kidnapped by the Jigsaw Killer and forced to participate in one of his sinister games. He was portrayed by Timothy Burd.
History[]
Obi was a man who tended to lie to the people around him, defrauding them for the sake of his own goals. However, at one point in his life, he was innocently framed and arrested by Detective Eric Matthews for a crime he didn't commit, after Matthews had faked the evidence in his case.
Obi was eventually released from prison. However, his dishonesty towards other people ultimately and his connection with Eric Matthews eventually made him a target of John Kramer, better known as the Jigsaw Killer, for one of the latter's deadly games. Besides Obi, seven other people had to participate in the game as well. These people were: Daniel Matthews, Eric's son, as well as six other convicts who had been innocently framed by the detective: Jonas Singer, his manager Gus Colyard, the prostitute Addison Corday, the drug dealer Xavier Chavez, Laura Hunter and Amanda Young, a former heroin addict who was in fact a Jigsaw apprentice on her own and played as another victim primarily in order to observe the other prisoners' progress. To accelerate the proceedings of the game, Jigsaw convinced Obi to assist him in the abduction of the others by unknown means. However, he didn't tell him about the connection between all of them. At the night of the game, Obi hid on the back seat of Laura Hunter's car. When she got in, he attacked her from behind and pressed a cloth drenched in chloroform to her face. After subduing her, he kissed her on the cheek and delivered her to Jigsaw.
After accomplishing his task, Obi was ultimately abducted himself by Jigsaw's apprentice, Detective Mark Hoffman, who took him to a run-down house. Hoffman dragged his unconscious body into a room with a large safe and trapped him there along with the seven other people. Jigsaw placed a tape recorder behind a brick wall and helped Hoffman to install a booby trap connected to the lock of the room's only door. Having finished all of their preparations, Jigsaw and Hoffman left the room and locked the door.
Upon waking up inside the house, Obi recognized the other prisoners and remained silent while they tried to figure out what was going on. When Amanda discovered the tape recorder hidden in the wall, the group listened as Jigsaw's voice revealed that the house had been pumped full of nerve gas that would kill the group within two hours. After Amanda discovered a hidden key, Xavier tried using it to unlock the door leading to the hallway, ignoring Jigsaw's warning on the audio tape. Xavier opened the door, but set off the trap that had been installed on it: a revolver that had been rigged on the other side fired through the peephole, killing Gus. After Daniel covered Gus' body with his jacket, the group left the safe room, wary of the instructions left on Jigsaw's tape, which mentioned that they each shared a connection and that the clue to that connection would be marked with an 'X'. Jigsaw had also mentioned that there were syringes filled with an antidote to the nerve gas that were hidden throughout the house.
Death[]
The next room the group entered was a boiler room that contained a furnace. Two syringes had been placed inside the furnace. An envelope in the room had been attached to a hooded mannequinn sat in a chair. Xavier grabbed it and opened the envelope, which contained an audio tape. When they played it, using the recorder from the starting room, it revealed to them that their fellow prisoner, Obi, had assisted Jigsaw in their abductions. Furthermore, the tape told him that in order to redeem himself, he had to crawl into the large furnace in front of them, where two syringes with the antidote were waiting for him; one for him and one for another prisoner of his choice.
Upon this revelation, Laura recognized him as her abductor. Therefore, the group and Obi engaged in an argument during which Obi claimed that he had only done what he had to do. Xavier threatened to kill him, but was held back by Addison, as Obi could get two antidotes for them. However, Xavier continued to threaten him with a knife and demanded that he tells them how to get out. When Obi said he didn't know how to get out Xavier pressed the knife against Obi's throat. Obi grabbed the knife and made a small cut in his own throat, mocking Xavier for threatening him. Xavier backed away shocked. Obi eventually agreed to crawl into the furnace, but demanded that one of the syringes was for him.
Obi crawled inside the furnace and found the two syringes taped to the interior. He removed the first syringe without issue, but the second was attached to a small chain. When the syringe was removed, the furnace door slammed shut, trapping Obi inside. The furnace then activated and Obi quickly crawled to the door on the other side. Looking back, he saw a small doodle of a devil pointing to a valve, noting that the fire could be turned off by turning it. However, the flames had already started up and Obi could no longer reach the valve without being burned.
Obi knocked on the door on the back of the furnace, begging to be let out, but the others couldn't open it. Using the nailed baseball bat he had found in the hall, Xavier smashed the window of the door. Obi tried to crawl out, but got stuck and the lower half of his body was engulfed in flames. Not only did Obi die a painful, terrible death, but both the syringes he was carrying were destroyed.