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Sharknado 5: Global Swarming (2017) promotional art
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Sharknado 4: The 4th Awakens
Sharknado 4: The 4th Awakens (2016)
Set
five years after the events of Sharknado
3: Oh Hell No! (2015), it finds chainsaw-wielding Fin Shepard (returning Ian
Ziering) in Kansas where he
lives peacefully with Gil (Anthony
Rogers) and Raye (‘70s
model Cheryl Tiegs). He soon arranges a trip to Vegas with his cousin Gemini (MasielaLusha), in order to catch up with his son (Cody Linley) and his girlfriend (Imani Hakim) to whom he just got
married above Vegas on an airplane, because he is a soldier in the army and he
can do stuff like that. Our protagonists don’t worry about sharknados anymore
because Astro-X and its CEO Aston Reynold (Tommy
Davidson) have dealt with the
problem once and for all in scientific fashion (I really can’t explain too much
about the science in such films) and what’s more they even managed to bring
Fin’s father (David
Hasselhoff) back to earth (he was
left in space for a while) who is now seen briefly in a funny combat suit. But
things don’t stay as planned, and science and humanity have to deal with
something they didn’t calculate previously, that is sharknados that created out
of sand, essentially shark-sandnados. Will Fin and April (returning Tara
Reid) who now has bionic
superpowers be able to save the day?
Okay,
I usually steer clear from reviewing films such as the twitter-trending Sharknado (2013)
and Sharknado
2: The Second One (2014), because reviews for such hyperbolic fan-pleasing
post-modern ape-shit bananas genre parodies [the poster and credits spoof Star Wars: Episode
Vii - The Force Awakens (2015)] are really irrelevant (we are just talking about a film that
is simply showing you a good time – nothing more, and nothing less). But I
thought I’d give it a go this time.
So,
where exactly a third Sharknado
sequel stands? The series at this point have become totally self-referential
and endlessly quote movies and other pop-culture stuff (although luckily, they
toned-down the tweet-inducing one-liners). The problem I have with this though
is that because I usually get entertained with gutter-lever unpopular culture,
I am totally sure that so much is going on here (especially in the cameos
department) that I simply wasn’t able to understand or point out. The cameos I
managed to spot was these of my favourite hair metal vocalist Vince Neil (who
is mumbling something about ‘Girls, Girls, Girls’, which is the title of Motley
Crue’s 1987 hit record) and Lloyd Kaufman [who is making a reference to Class Of Nuke 'Em
High (1986)]. Other than these I
also caught up some one-liners that wink to The
Texas Chainsaw Massacre franchise (1974 –
present) and Terminator
2: Judgment Day (1991). Other than that this
is business as usual, with CGI stunts that are so unbelievable that put James
Bond to shame, and a variety of outrageous ideas that include go-go boys
fighting sharks with their bare (ahem!) hands. But overall, this exercise in
extreme ridiculously is really boring. And while I am at it, somebody has to
acknowledge the huge influence The Evil
Dead franchise (1981 – present) had to this.
But
if The Asylum has ran out of ideas, and because the ratings for this entry in
the series were not as good as the ones from the previous one, I have a few
suggestions of my own, and these include Disharkster
(which will be a regular disaster movie – ‘70s style – that will also feature
sharks), Sharktan (it’s a word that
combines ‘shark’ and ‘tan’ and sounds like ‘Satan’, so you get something from
all worlds), Zombishop (which will be
about a bishop that turns into a zombie, and his followers will too, although
one can argue that they are zombies already), Dinosaucer (which will be about – you guessed it – a dinosaur that
is also a flying saucer), Zombabies
(which will be about infant zombies), and Confessions
Of An Invisible Snowman.
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Sharknado 5: Global Swarming
Sharknado 5: Global Swarming (2017)
Series regular
buffoon Fin Shepard (ever-returning Ian Ziering) somehow unleashes a new
Sharknado from the depths of the Stonehenge where in ancient times sharks in
tornados (you get the title by now, I guess) were worshiped, as did in several
other places such as Egypt. And speaking of other places, sharknados this time
around hit pretty much everywhere and they destroy the whole world, from the
U.K. to Australia, you will see the sharks flying in pretty much every exotic
location you can think of. Fin is of course to the rescue, with the invaluable
aid of April Wexler (the immensely attractive Tara Reid even at 43 years old)
who is now a superhero in her own right.
The very Indiana
Jones-like beginning is only one of the several elements that keep director
Anthony C. Ferrante’s fifth opus in the Twitter-trending series fresh and this
is the key to success here (for example, the wild ending is setting up for so
many new and outrageous things to come). Producer David Michael Latt
(co-founder of production house The Asylum) seems to have put his hand deeper
in his pocket this time around as the film looks more expensive than the four
preceding ones, although it might be that the technology just got better and
cheaper. Thoroughly entertaining with its endless puns and one-liners
(screenwriter Scotty Mullen seems to have had a lot of fun penning this), its many
cameos (my favorite one this time around was that of legendary glam rock band
Poison’s lead singer Brett Michaels), and its blasting rock soundtrack (that is
again featuring punk rock legends The Offspring, albeit this time with an old
classic, rather than a new composition), this is brainless, wild, and cheesy
enough for you to have zero reasons to miss it.
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The Last Sharknado
The Last Sharknado: It’s About Time (2018)
Fin (the
ever-returning Ian Ziering, also an executive producer here) employs time
travel once more, in order to go back in time to meet April (Tara Reid, also a
co-executive producer here) who is apparently alive. Together they will join
forces (again, once more) in order to fight a Sharknado (meaning, yes, a
tornado with flying sharks in it). This disaster is supposed to be the first,
and if they manage to stop it, the domino effect will be prevented and none of
the happenings of the previous movies will have to happen. Will they make it?
Does anybody care anymore?
Based upon the
characters created by Thunder Levin (who also provides a cameo), the screenplay
by Scotty Mullen (the film’s casting director) feels tired in a concept that
had lost its steam long ago. The direction by Anthony C. Ferrante is flat as
usual, and what’s more the crappy CGI are worse than usual, preventing even the
slightest of hopes one might had for subpar entertainment. There are some
interesting choices in the rocking soundtrack (that include The Offspring’s
classic ‘Come Out and Play [Keep ‘Em Separated]’) but they too feel out of
place. Finally, this event crap-fest is now mostly known for the several cameos
that it is featuring, and this time you will get to see Dee Snider, Chris Owen,
Tori Spelling, and Bo Derek.
As viewing habits and methods of purchasing movies
change, I find myself to now be estranged from the SyFy material. One the one
hand, the last five years or so I have watched too many of those silly monster
movies, and on the other hand I now have a Netflix account. This means that
when I need my fix of indie horror, I’d rather catch up with something on
Netflix – because, damn, I have paid for it already – rather than buy DVDs of
cheap CGI monsters (this decision in
regards to the future of my movie-watching habits, was determined in big part
due to the fact that a SyFy film’s DVD release costs approximately as much as
my monthly Netflix subscription). It’s
not that I will never go back to a SyFy film or two (especially those that
become ‘sensations’ of sorts), it’s just that I won’t be watching everything
they produce or broadcast, as this is a somewhat of a happy divorce. We won’t
be spending a lot more time together, but we will occasionally keep in touch.
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