Mega Shark vs. Giant Octopus (2009)

A lot of fun.

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

About four years before the Sharknado series graced, or rather disgraced, the screens, this was the first in what would become a series of low-budget movies featuring the titular Mega Shark, you can probably guess the outcome of each one when you watch. Basically off the coast of Alaska, oceanographer Emma MacNeil (singer Debbie Gibson) is aboard an experimental submarine studying the migration patterns of whales. Meanwhile, a military helicopter drops experimental sonar transmitters into the water, causing a pod of whales to go out of control and ram into a nearby glacier, and the chaos causes the helicopter to crash into the glacier. The combined damage breaks the giant glacier open, thawing two hibernating, prehistoric creatures, a giant shark and a giant octopus are freed. The octopus has tentacles large enough to wrap around an entire structure, it brings down a drilling platform off the coast of Japan, while the shark has a bite powerful to destroy structures, it brings down the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. MacNeil investigates the reports of giant creatures causing destruction, she recovers what appears to be a giant shark tooth from the corpse of a beached whale. MacNeil's old professor, former U.S. Navy pilot Lamar Sanders (Sean Lawlor), believes it belongs to a Megalodon, an enormous species of shark thought to be extinct for 1.5 million years, while Japanese scientist Dr. Seiji Shimada (Vic Chao) confirms the existence of the giant octopus. MacNeil reflects on the melting of the polar ice caps, due to man-made global warming, she wonders if the creatures are mankind's "comeuppance". The scientists work in the laboratory to develop a method to lure the creatures, MacNeil and Shimada become attracted in the process, while the naval and military forces plan many strikes to destroy the monsters. MacNeil, Sanders, and Shimada strongly oppose the use of nuclear weapons, as an alternative, MacNeil suggests using a pheromone to attract both prehistoric beasts, the two creatures are believed to have been frozen in ice locked in combat, they must be natural rivals and their aggressiveness towards one another will cause them to fight to the death if they're lured together. The shark and octopus are brought together and begin to fight, they part once or twice to attack the oncoming submarines and attack ships, in engaged in a fierce battle, the octopus strangles the shark to death, while the octopus dies from blood loss, dismembering its tentacles, the two still locked from their battle sink to the bottom of the ocean. Also starring Lorenzo Lamas as Allan Baxter, Mark Hengst as Dick Ritchie, Michael The as Takeo, Jonathan Nation as Vince and Chris Haley as Kenji. There's not really any point mentioning the cast, it is unclear if they are taking things seriously or not, as with many movies like this, the story is absolutely ridiculous, the script and dialogue is nonsense, and the special effects are far away from special, they are atrocious, it is just a complete waste of time, a crap science-fiction horror. Poor!

Bad special effects, rubbish sets, ridiculous story line, poor, unconvincing acting - including a has been pop star - why do they keep churning these stupid, trashy movies out?? For suckers like me to keep watching!! Some of these Mega movies are funny because they are so stupid but this one can't even achieve that. Avoid

Really, Mark's review, (the highest rated one about this movie) is more entertaining than Megashark vs. Giant Octopus. Not like that is difficult, however cheers Mark! Great satirical 10 star review. Normally I can't stand them because people can't pull off satire but you nailed it! Anyway.....On to my review.I have to give some credit to the cast and crew for basically pulling an Ed Wood and just using whatever toys their kids had lying around as "Special Effects". The acting was actually not too bad considering the script they had to work with. I personally think that Debbie Gibson did quite well, however any career she planned in the film industry was destroyed by her accepting this role.I wish I could say that this movie is one of those "It's so bad it's good" but it just isn't. I think with the FXGuru app on my phone and a bunch of friends could remake this movie and make it look more realistic. In general, even if you are a huge fan of B movies like I am, this movie is not deserving of being called a B: film. It is almost like the director and writer believed that they were making a AAA film on a shoestring budget, and just failed all around.To use the old trope, they "jumped the shark" the moment the shark jumped into the air to grab the airplane (not really a spoiler since it's in the trailer and happens within the first 10 minutes...) If you enjoy watching the same 4 second clip of a shark swimming over and over again (and sometimes even FLIPPED!!! or REVERSED!!! omg!) than you'll enjoy the 4 min of screen time the monsters get.Hard to give this a 3, but I really think that Gibson showed that she had acting potential, so I am giving it an extra point due to her performance. And notice, I said "she had potential", because seriously, this movie killed any chance of her being taken seriously in the industry. And that's kind of sad because she actually showed some talent.2.5 but bumped up to a 3 for Debbie Gibson seeming to be the only one involved in this project to give a crap about it.

Woe is me, was this ever excruciating. I'm probably among the minority of imbeciles that checked this movie out, because of the title. I knew about the bad reviews, I knew it was from Asylum, I knew it was going to be super cheesy, but I love cheesy. It sounded like my kind of movie. I couldn't have been more incorrect if I tried with that assumption. NOTHING happens until around the 75 minute mark. There is endlessly talky dialog that seems to go on forever. I'll give you a small example of how bad it is. "Don't love the Ocean too much. It doesn't love you back" It purposely swindles the viewer with the title, and delivers "F" all for 75 minutes. I expected the creatures to look horrendous, but it has some truly atrocious CGI. It does give us a battle at the end. The shark & octopus do fight one another, but it's so lazy. The fight becomes very redundant, and does virtually the same thing, each time they cut to the creatures battling. The shark rams the Octopus, the Octopus entraps the shark in its tentacles, and refuses to change things or make them remotely interesting. The acting is god awful. Deborah Gibson is ostensibly an 80's pop singer. Shockingly enough, I haven't heard one of her songs. At least I don't think I have. She's gorgeous, and seems to be having fun with the role. I wouldn't call her performance great, but it's tolerable, which is something I can't say for anyone else. Lorenzo Lamas is atrocious. His character is a complete pussy. I grew up with him. I watched Renegade religiously when I was younger, but he is horrible in this film. Everybody in this movie plays it straight faced, I couldn't believe itFinal Thoughts: I should have known better to watch something from Asylum. I'm sure I'll stumble across films from them in the future, but I'm not gonna make a habit of it. The title is nowhere near as fun as it sounds. 1/10