Watered Down Sharks

The hard-to-chew Empire of the Sharks (2017) is the cousin to Planet of the Sharks (2016), and once again puts apocalypse survivors on floating shacks (docks with outhouses) on a world turned into a global fishbowl. Think of it as Mad Max (1979) meets Waterworld (1995), with a budget about the cost of bottled water.

The bubbles are ruled over by the self-proclaimed master of the ocean, Ian Fien. He’s able to command sharks to do his bidding by way of electronic poker chips affixed to the fish heads. A signal is routed through electric gloves, and when Fien waves his arms around like he’s conducting an invisible orchestra, the sharks — swimming in packs — come out of their metal shark head pen, shoot out of the ocean like dolphin missiles, and feast on human leftovers.

A bunch of young girls are taken hostage by Fien’s hammy henchmen and their friends hatch a flawed plot to get them back. They go to Criminal Island (a floating bar with no happy hour) to assemble a team of “specialists” to take down Fien and his pet sharks. Too bad they didn’t know Willow, one of the abducted young girls, is a shark whisperer. Guess what happens next?

The sharks look like something out of a 1980s video game. They growl when in attack mode and usually go for the head, or “crunchy malt balls.” There’s even a bomb-dressed kamikaze goblin shark sent in to make explosions happen.

Gallons of pixel blood pollutes the water and body parts are turned into buffet sides. The big showdown happens when Fien and Willow battle for control of the sharks by frowning hard at each other while waving their arms at the apparently easily-manipulated fish.

Tedious plot, boring shark attacks, minimal gore and over-acting clichéd characters. What did you expect from watered down sci-fi?

Shark World

The bad news is global warming melted the ice caps and bottoms and flooded the entire Earth as if some sort of sci-fi take on Noah’s Ark, which, ironically, is also sci-fi. The good news is sharks have proliferated (made photocopies of each other) and have taken over the new real estate en masse.

Such is the premise for Planet of the Sharks (2016), whose plot on paper looks interesting the way an uneaten sandwich made with day old bread looks tasty. But the lower-grade special effects, painfully bad characters (some look like the B-team from Road Warrior/1981), and a LOL windsurfing scene renders the entire thing a wet messy mess.

Like Waterworld (1995), people now live on floating “cities”, which look more like discount boat docks. One appropriately named city called Junk is under attack from hundreds of hungry sharks, led by an alpha Great White that commands his army with mutated thinking abilities. Oh yeah, his snout freckles glow, too, which logically communicates with his mates. Think of it as a face walkie-talkie. Prior to the attack, which had sharks torpedoing out of the water to swallow anyone wearing Dockers™ (heh), Junk City had 72 citizens. Final head count: one.

With scientists on a nearby flotilla working to launch a rocket into the upper atmosphere to reset the weather, dry up the water, and go back to swimming at the YMCA. With all the shark attacks, this plan is falling apart faster than their docks. After the population is being reduced by the minute, it’s decided to drop a trigger over an undersea volcano that will explode right when the sharks swim over it. Yep, totally plausible.

The problem is, a shark ate the personal mini-copter carrying the Whiffle Ball™ device. So a female scientist with self-contained shirt pontoons, windsurfs out into the ocean to snag the device, jumping over sharks as she zooms around the waves. Barely avoiding becoming seafood, she deploys said Whiffle Ball™, which triggers the volcano, which kills a pile of shark and causes a tsunami the size of a tidal wave.

Alfie the alpha shark ain’t having none of this and makes trouble bubbles. It’s determined that this particular mutated shark emits a powerful electrical charge, not unlike a cordless shaver. The remaining scientists figure out how to stick cattle prods into its freckled face, thereby jump-starting the rocket, which is (barely) launched. Once the payload goes off, the sun comes out, the seas begin to dry up, and cities, which have been underwater for years, emerge all sparkly and clean as if just having gone through a car wash. (Why they couldn’t have a giant starfish stuck to the Empire State Building left me visibly shocked.)

No nudity, digital blood, some stock swearing in wincing fake accents, a far-reaching premise and sharks so dumbly designed, they’ll make your freckles start glowing. So yeah, something to not do for 83 minutes.

Empire Sharks, Hockey Masks, Murderous Moms

Saw this mash-up of a Care Bear and Pennywise from It on eBay™, Think the going price is around $300. Not sure I want that hideous thing sitting in a corner, visually tasting my flesh. Still, it might keep solicitors from bugging my doorbell.

While I try and drum up $300, here are a few upcoming horror and sci-fi movies that may or may not scare the cotton out of you…

EMPIRE OF THE SHARKS (August 5, 2017/SyFy)
“In the future, most of Earth is covered by water and the only land is controlled by a warlord and his army of sharks. Humans are kept as food for the sharks until two friends risk their lives to rise against their captor and his legion of sharks.”

Sounds like Waterworld (1995) but with the more eating of humans. So yeah, YET ANOTHER Rent-A-Center ™ shark horror movie. These types of shark flicks are usually just bad video games. If you want a real shark movie that’ll make you pollute the water, try The Reef (2010). Just thinking about it is making me need to hide in the safety of my bathroom — until someone comes up with Toilet Sharks.

TO HELL AND BACK: THE KANE HODDER STORY
(August, 2017/England Film Fest)
“To Hell and Back is a harrowing story of a stuntman overcoming a dehumanizing childhood filled with torment and bullying in Sparks, Nevada. After surviving a near-death burn accident, he worked his way up through Hollywood, leading to his ultimate rise as Jason Voorhees in the Friday the 13th series and making countless moviegoers forever terrified of hockey masks and summer camp. After decades of watching Kane Hodder on screen, get ready to meet the man behind the mask in To Hell and Back – n uniquely human story about one of cinema’s most vicious monsters.”

Kane Hodder, as many know, is the 6’4” monster behind such monsters as Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood (1988), Friday the 13th Part VIII: Jason Takes Manhattan (1989), Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday (1993), Jason X (2001), and as the deformed serial killer Victor Crowley in Hatchet (2006), Hatchet II (2010), and Hatchet III (2013). I say cast Hodder in the new Mary Poppins Returns 2018 remake — that’ll keep that persnickety b*tch from trying to teach the world manners.

AXEMAN 2: OVERKILL (October 17, 2017)
“When a band of crazed evangelicals, bank robbers and vigilantes descend upon Cutter’s Creek, there’s only one local legend that can separate them. And dismember them.”

Seems pretty cut ‘n dry to me — heh. Not really a fan of chop shop horror, but hey, crazed evangelicals and bank robbers need to taste the business end of the axe.

MOM AND DAD (2017/2018)
“A teenage girl and her little brother must survive a wild 24 hours during which a mass hysteria of unknown origins causes parents to turn violently on their own kids.”

It’s called parenting for a reason. This is what happens when you don’t clean your room. Speaking of, I’m gonna go do that right now as mom’s in town with a few days to kill.