SomeoneWhy Sy-Fy Is Dead To Me: A review of Snakehead Terror
August 14th 2009 23:47
Part 2 of the Sci-Fi Channel Crock of Shit Double Feature Extravaganza!
Premise: A group of voracious snakehead fish decimate the fish population of a lake before the lake is poisoned, supposedly killing them off. A few years later, the snakeheads are back, only this time they're huge, and start eating everyone. Oh and they can walk on land. Oh, and one of them is the size of a whale. Yeah, it's that kind of movie.
This, alone, couldn't have killed 'Sy-Fi' (that will now on be referred to as Sci-Fi, because the whole rebranding is mind-numbingly stupid) for me. I have fond memories of the channel... going over to a friends house who had cable and catching the latest Battlestar Gallactica episodes (which is quite possibly the best sci-fi series ever, right up alongside Firefly, Stargate SG-1 and even The X-Files. And a ways back I reviewed Altered, which I thoroughly enjoyed.
Unfortunately, it seems that the fun ended along with Battlestar. I've seen a number of Sci-Fi channel movies in the recent past, and they have pretty much been the same story over and over again, with a little twist in each one. Start with a flashback to the beginnings/Last attack of (insert bad-guy here). Introduce supporting character, who knows details of the plot, usually someone knowledgeable in the field of (bad-guy). Often Supporting Character is related to one member of the main duo, be it as father/brother/friend/etc. Then introduce hapless victims, mixed gender, usually teenagers. They come across some evidence of (bad guy), but don't realize exactly what is happening. Main duo (guy/girl) will get some indication of what's going on, and while they are investigating it their friends will start dying. They realize, and start trying to stop (bad guy). They come up with a plan; which subsequently fails. Supporting character will then sacrifice themselves to stop/slow down (Bad Guy), allowing main duo to finish the job, and live happily ever after.... until there is some invariably stupid twist allowing Bad Guy/Spawn of Bad Guy to survive and star in the sequels!
There are some small variations. Supporting Character doesn't always die, and on rare occasions there isn't a twist. Oh, an interesting fact for y'all, the name of Bad Guy, More often than not, the name of Bad Guy can be found in the title. Locusts had locusts, Snakehead has the snakeheads, Pumpkinhead has... well, you get the idea.
Plot: About as hole-y as you would expect from a movie of this title. I'm only going to point out some choice plot holes, as describing all of them would ruin the movie for you... ha. Lets start with the snakeheads. They can walk on land, but who am I to say that the fish can't do that. They grow to enormous size... because someone is dumping human growth hormone in the lake. Like I mentioned, one is whale sized... because a lake would totally have enough food for an animal to reach that size.... other than that, totally plausible, although surprisingly none of the others seem to be longer than 10 feet.
Next... SPOILER!... well, sort of, this movie really sort of spoils itself.
They kill the snakeheads by electrocuting the lake. They cut a power line that's feeding a town, and drop it into a lake. It then sends an electric pulse through the lake, killing all the snakeheads. Mightily convenient that all the fish happened to be in the lake, seeing as they had been roaming around the land right up until then. I'm no physicist, but wouldn't a power line dropped in a lake do very little? It's a lot of water....
What's that, I hear you cry? Horror movies require a little suspension of belief? It would appear in the act of being suspended, belief got tangled up and hung itself.
The acting is terrible. Nothing worth mentioning.
The effects are typical sci-fi... better than some, but pretty terrible. I laughed at them.
Gore is pretty tame. Again, nothing worth mentioning.
Overall... Avoid it. Please, for the love of god, avoid it. I have lost all hope of seeing anything resembling quality being produced by Sci-Fi, and the dumb-ass rebranding just makes it that much easier... Sci-Fi holds some fond memories for me... Sy-Fy can suck my nuts.
Premise: A group of voracious snakehead fish decimate the fish population of a lake before the lake is poisoned, supposedly killing them off. A few years later, the snakeheads are back, only this time they're huge, and start eating everyone. Oh and they can walk on land. Oh, and one of them is the size of a whale. Yeah, it's that kind of movie.
This, alone, couldn't have killed 'Sy-Fi' (that will now on be referred to as Sci-Fi, because the whole rebranding is mind-numbingly stupid) for me. I have fond memories of the channel... going over to a friends house who had cable and catching the latest Battlestar Gallactica episodes (which is quite possibly the best sci-fi series ever, right up alongside Firefly, Stargate SG-1 and even The X-Files. And a ways back I reviewed Altered, which I thoroughly enjoyed.
Unfortunately, it seems that the fun ended along with Battlestar. I've seen a number of Sci-Fi channel movies in the recent past, and they have pretty much been the same story over and over again, with a little twist in each one. Start with a flashback to the beginnings/Last attack of (insert bad-guy here). Introduce supporting character, who knows details of the plot, usually someone knowledgeable in the field of (bad-guy). Often Supporting Character is related to one member of the main duo, be it as father/brother/friend/etc. Then introduce hapless victims, mixed gender, usually teenagers. They come across some evidence of (bad guy), but don't realize exactly what is happening. Main duo (guy/girl) will get some indication of what's going on, and while they are investigating it their friends will start dying. They realize, and start trying to stop (bad guy). They come up with a plan; which subsequently fails. Supporting character will then sacrifice themselves to stop/slow down (Bad Guy), allowing main duo to finish the job, and live happily ever after.... until there is some invariably stupid twist allowing Bad Guy/Spawn of Bad Guy to survive and star in the sequels!
There are some small variations. Supporting Character doesn't always die, and on rare occasions there isn't a twist. Oh, an interesting fact for y'all, the name of Bad Guy, More often than not, the name of Bad Guy can be found in the title. Locusts had locusts, Snakehead has the snakeheads, Pumpkinhead has... well, you get the idea.
Plot: About as hole-y as you would expect from a movie of this title. I'm only going to point out some choice plot holes, as describing all of them would ruin the movie for you... ha. Lets start with the snakeheads. They can walk on land, but who am I to say that the fish can't do that. They grow to enormous size... because someone is dumping human growth hormone in the lake. Like I mentioned, one is whale sized... because a lake would totally have enough food for an animal to reach that size.... other than that, totally plausible, although surprisingly none of the others seem to be longer than 10 feet.
Next... SPOILER!... well, sort of, this movie really sort of spoils itself.
They kill the snakeheads by electrocuting the lake. They cut a power line that's feeding a town, and drop it into a lake. It then sends an electric pulse through the lake, killing all the snakeheads. Mightily convenient that all the fish happened to be in the lake, seeing as they had been roaming around the land right up until then. I'm no physicist, but wouldn't a power line dropped in a lake do very little? It's a lot of water....
What's that, I hear you cry? Horror movies require a little suspension of belief? It would appear in the act of being suspended, belief got tangled up and hung itself.
The acting is terrible. Nothing worth mentioning.
The effects are typical sci-fi... better than some, but pretty terrible. I laughed at them.
Gore is pretty tame. Again, nothing worth mentioning.
Overall... Avoid it. Please, for the love of god, avoid it. I have lost all hope of seeing anything resembling quality being produced by Sci-Fi, and the dumb-ass rebranding just makes it that much easier... Sci-Fi holds some fond memories for me... Sy-Fy can suck my nuts.
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