Film Review: Mega Shark Vs Crocosaurus

Oh, The Asylum! Back with the “official sequel” as it says on the cover, Mega Shark Vs Crocosaurus continues to show filmmaking at it budget best. Although I must admit, the laughs are predictable now we’ve got used to the formula, there’s still much to cringe and laugh at.

Released: 2010

Runtime: 1hr 28 mins

The Premise

Mega Shark, not quite dead from its encounter with Giant Octopus last time out returns to face off against Crocosauras, this time hungry to eat all the poor crocs eggs she’s been laying all over the place.

The Disasters Faced

A synchronised swimming Mega Shark, a heavy-footed Crocosauras, a lot of awful CGI, a volcano, some wayward accents and a broken cigar! (Noooo!!!)

The Execution

Now we know The Asylum cater to the b-movie fan base and here its very much by the numbers. If anything it’s actually relatively competent and having being spoilt by the absolutely dire Dinocroc Vs Supergator, that makes this film look big budget! The films relatively well paced although I feel the shark is very much a one trick pony this time around and its the croc that causes more carnage and fun. Both creatures are underused however and the film rehashes a lot of the originals set pieces but with little or no improvement. The script contains corkers such as a “Will I be able to smoke my black dragon?” from an Admiral and the acting is typically cheesy and overblown. I could not get my head around that the lead was not Jeff Fahey! It was like Gary Stretch was a brother from another mother but with an accent that has a world tour in 89 minutes. The females in the film all overact to the point of high school stage drama. Still, all being said, when a film is quite clearly setting out to master this type of feel, it all clicks together in a perfectly awkward mess. That’s why we love them.

The Effects

The planes, missiles and ships are well done and the sets aren’t bad either. The Shark looks identical to the original and Croc’s feet slip even when he’s standing still. They could have got some plastic toys in the frame and things wouldn’t have looked much worse in some instances. More laughable is the volcano scene which is effectively someone using a fire transition from Sony Vegas as a film climax.

Why It’s Worth Watching

A shot for every time someone says Crocman or Sharkman. A shot for every leery comment our lead male makes (he’s disgusting). Watch out for gay porn star Dylan Vox whose character is named Butowski! That’s the best name for an ex gay porn star in history surely?!  However hats off for not including any kind of dodgy romance in the middle of the film! It’s all about the monsters baby!

Drinking Game

This. CGI. Is. Awful.

Favourite Death

Amazingly this film is death toll light. I’ll go for the man who gets splattered at the beginning as when we return we’re treated to his remains of half an arm and leg that was left behind.

Favourite Character

Can I have the Crocosaurus? My biggest complaint was the lack of nice characters in the film as a whole. Croccy was at least protective her eggs!

Random Trivia

Originally the sequel was meant to be Mega Shark vs Gigantosaurus – but this idea was scrapped even though it was initially designed and the idea shown at Cannes.

Weirdest Moment

This film is stupidly nuke happy – stupidly so. There’s also absolutely no prior explanation or reason to blow up a volcano with a nuke either. Let’s just burn Hawaii to dust then shall we?! Failing that, our leading lady Hutchinson can take the weirdest moment with her lack of smile as she desperately trying to play the hard nut special agent but sexy silent all at once but actually comes across wooden and constipated throughout, making the film much better as a result!

Conclusion

I think I prefer the original, but this is a worthy sequel. Next time though Asylum, let’s take the animals inland as I think that’ll breath new life into the franchise.