Cinema Wellman’s Shark(Nado) Week!
Hello and welcome to Cinema Wellman, I am your host David, and it’s time for Cinema Wellman’s 2nd annual “Shark Week,” and this year, it’s a “Shark-NADO Week!”
With our almost problematic love of JAWS, we thought we needed to get in on The Discovery Channel’s annual iconic “Shark Week” celebration (which starts today!), so we began our own “Shark Week” last year with a marathon of 17 bad shark movies.
We also screened and ranked ALL of those “# Headed Shark” movies last season, so we’re no stranger to bad shark movies.
Which brings us to today.
By now you probably know that I have a database of every film I’ve ever seen that I started putting together when I was a freshman in college.
One of the basic rules of the archives (a.k.a. “IMDavidb”) is, “If it’s not in the archives, I didn’t see it.”
When I had the idea of doing an episode about the Sharknado series, I wanted to check my database to see which ones I missed, if any.
Believe it or not, there are SIX Sharknado movies, and lo and behold…
NONE of them were there!
I had “officially” seen ZERO Sharknado movies, and that’s when I decided on this year’s Shark Week project.
My first thought was to do a “WWW?” episode like I did with the “# Headed Shark” series, but I knew that all of these are “bad” on some level, and we also know they were all made while winking and keeping tongue firmly in cheek.
Today we are here to celebrate the absurdity of the Sharknado series as opposed to bringing it down.
Everyone involved knew exactly what they were involved in, which is one of the things that makes them enjoyable on a certain level.
We came up with a “Sharknado Scoresheet” (as Hannah told me, we do love a scoresheet!) that we filled out while watching and we’ll be sharing the following with you for each of the six movies:
Quotable Quote(s): favorite lines of ridiculous dialogue, many taken DIRECTLY from some of our favorite movies!
Most Preposterous Moment: The “MPM” as it were - believe me, there will be many to choose from.
And we’ll also award Cinema Wellman’s “3 Stars” a la NHL games as we highlight three actors & actresses who picked up a check to be in one of these. And there are way more than three to mention for each movie, so I’ll run down that roster for all six for you as well.
We were planning on a “Standout Death” category, but it turns out the sharks don’t have too many methods of killing you, especially when flying around in a Sharknado.
They like to land straight on your head and kill you that way. Every once in a while they’ll slit a throat or take a head off with a flick of their tail.
They're SO good at decapitating people! You wouldn’t think that!
One shark did legit slurp someone up like spaghetti, which I really don’t think is possible in any way, shape, or form, but it was fun to watch.
And, in case you were wondering, you can have a tornado on the ocean, and it’s called a “waterspout.” A waterspout, however, does not carry metric tons of sharks.
The Sharknado movies will not be ranked in any way and will be presented chronologically. There are six of them, and they were churned out one a year from 2013-2018, which we applaud.
In for a penny, in for a pound.
Commit to the bit.
Sharknado (2013)
UR/86 m/IMDb: 3.3
This and ALL 6 of the Sharknado movies were directed by Anthony C. Ferrante
IMDb: “When a freak hurricane swamps Los Angeles, nature’s deadliest killer rules sea, land, and air as thousands of sharks terrorize the waterlogged populace.”
hoopla: “Against all logic and the laws of nature, a monstrous storm devastates Los Angeles, leaving the streets flooded and infested with sharks.”
Picking Up a Check Roster: Note: We will NOT be including stars Ian Ziering and Tara Reid in any of these lists because they’re “regulars.” Each movie’s roster will contain names of mostly B/C List celebrities who are picking up a check and enjoying every minute of it.
They really didn’t start loading up the cast until later films in the series, so for this one I’ll just mention that both Lindsay Lohan AND Steve Gutenberg turned this movie down.
QQ: “We’re gonna need a bigger chopper.”
MPM: HAS to be the iconic scene of Fin being swallowed by a flying shark and him cutting his way out of the shark with a chainsaw.
3 ⭐⭐⭐:
#3: Julie McCullough (Julie Costello from “Growing Pains), don’t recall seeing her at all
#2: John Heard is in this! He’s a serious actor!
#1: Robbie Rist shows up as a bus driver - you may know Rist as Cousin Oliver on the O.G. “Brady Bunch” - his band “Quint” (wink, wink) wrote and performed the music in this, and other movies in the series.
*Ian Ziering’s character is named “Fin,” and that makes me extremely happy.
*The hurricane spawning these Sharknados is named “David,” which also makes me happy.
*There are at least five JAWS references, including a shark landing right near Steven Speilberg’s footprints at Grauman’s Theater.
*This was shot in 18 days, but I’ll bet you it was in post for ten times that.
*Features a rolling Ferris Wheel, which I support.
*There is also a car chase in this movie! Why is a car chase needed in a movie about shark-filled tornados?!
Next up is the very appropriately named…
Sharknado 2: The Second One (2014)
UR/95 m/IMDb: 4.0
IMDb: “Fin and April are on their way to New York City, until a category seven hurricane spawns heavy rain, storm surges, and deadly Sharknadoes.”
Hoopla: “...no vehicle, building, or national monument is safe from the destruction.”
Picking Up a Check: Robert Hayes (as a pilot on a plane with the same flight # as in Airplane), Judd Hirsch (driving a TAXI), Billy Ray Cyrus, Downtown Julie Brown, Andy Dick, Richard Kind, Viveca A. Fox, Matt Lauer/Jared from Subway (seems like they should be grouped together), and PEPA!!!
QQ: “These sharks will be coming down at over two inches an hour.”
MPM: To combat the Sharknado, a New Yorker (employing Fast and the Furious physics) starts up several chainsaws and hurls them into said Sharknado.
3 ⭐⭐⭐:
#3: Richard Kind as a former New York Met at Citi Field hitting a shark with a bat and having it fly into the scoreboard - and the apple rises in center field!
#2: PEPA!
#1: Wil Wheaton as an uncredited dead passenger on an airplane
*At one point, the disembodied head of the Statue of Liberty is rolling down the avenue at full force for no reason at all.
*Tara loses a hand in this one, so make room for Captain Ahab/Luke Skywalker/Enter the Dragon references! Not to mention four more JAWS references in this one.
*Mark McGrath cannot act. In case you were wondering.
*One more line, I can’t resist; ”They’re sharks. They’re scary. No one wants to be eaten.”
Sharknado 3: Oh Hell No! (2015)
UR/93 m/IMDb: 4.1
IMDb: “A monstrous tornado unleashes ravenous sharks from Washington D.C., all the way down to Orlando, Florida.”
Picking Up a Check: Mark Cuban (as the President), Frankie Muniz, David Hasselhoff, Bo Derek, Michael Winslow, Chris Jericho, Jerry Springer (killed when the JAWS model at Universal ends up being a REAL shark), Penn & Teller, and Kim Richards. Kim Richards?! The little girl who gets shot at the ice cream truck in Assault on Precinct 13 is in this?!
QQ: Fin and April discussing the plausibility of sharks in space; “How can they survive in space?” “How can they survive in a tornado?”
MPM: This may take a bit to set up. Let’s begin with the fact that Tara’s April is pregnant in this one. Fin and April get swallowed by giant sharks in space (bear with me). As the sharks plummets to earth, they manage to cut slits in the sharks and deploy those space capsule parachutes out of the sharks, floating gently towards the earth. Fin cuts himself out, and then Tara’s shark is cut open from the inside and she HANDS FIN THE BABY! Tara delivered her baby while inside a shark that was plummeting to earth from outer space. And then she got dressed again! I mean, we should just stop here, right?!
3 ⭐⭐⭐:
#3: President Mark Cuban
#2: Frankie Muniz (who loses all four limbs to four DIFFERENT sharks)
#1: Kim Richards (as Babs Jensen, which is sweet because ‘Babs Jensen’ is the name of one of the characters in National Lampoon’s Animal House, and I’m starting to believe everything is the universe is connected by the Sharknado series) - and Kim Richards has been mentioned in two consecutive episodes of Cinema Wellman!
*007 open to this one, which I applauded.
*Sharks cause the “Big One” at the Daytona 500 and kill Brad Keselowski, which I also applauded.
*Washington D.C.’s monuments crumble pretty easily. I wasn’t expecting that. And a giant shark lands in Lincoln’s lap at the memorial.
*Mark McGrath and Vice President Ann Coulter (barf) boogie boarding down shark infested stairs on portraits of Washington and Lincoln. And that wasn’t this movies most preposterous moment. Think about that for a minute.
*It was only a matter of time, but we have a chainsaw with two blades!
*We have Sharks in Space, and that doesn’t really seem problematic to the series.
*Poor sharks. It’s really not their fault.
*And six more blatant JAWS references which were someone’s fault.
*One more line; “Every shark in the world must be flying around up there!”
Sharknado 4: The 4th Awakens (2016)
UR/95 m/IMDb: 3.9
IMDb: “Fin, his family and the cosmos have been blissfully Sharknado-free in the five years since the most recent attack but now sharks and tornadoes are being whipped up in unexpected ways and places.”
Picking Up a Check: Supermodels Cheryl Tiegs AND Susan Anton, Gary Busey, Stacy Dash, that Bounty Hunter guy, David Faustino, Donna Mills, Wayne Newton (singing the Sharknado theme song in a casino), Carrot Top, Adrian Zmed, Vince Neil, Gil Gottfried (as newsman Ron McDonald), the entire cast of “The Today Show,” and Steve Gutenberg AGAIN, who gives them the car Christine (from Christine) at one point, and I do not know why.
QQ: “May the force be with you,” “I’ll be back,” AND “Come with me if you want to live!”
MPM: Gary Busey plays Tara’s mad scientist dad, and he’s taken her and made her into a kind of Swiss Army April. She has a lightsaber attachment for her hand, and…she can fly. Tara has flight capability.
3 ⭐⭐⭐:
#3: for someone who turned this series down, Steve Gutenberg sure is in a lot of these movies
#2: Gary Busey as a mad scientist?
#1: I know I said I wasn’t going to include Ian Ziering or Tara Reid in any of these three stars things, but didn’t you hear me when I told you that Tara can FLY?!?
*Star Wars open, but you’d figure that since, you know, the 4th is being awaken in this one.
*Along with Star Wars there are several Wizard of Oz references (what took them this long?) and a Network reference!
*There’s a shark themed hotel in Las Vegas. What could go wrong with that?
*The opening credits are 20 minutes into the movie like they’re some kind of art movie! You’re only 95 minutes long!
*So many landmarks destroyed in this one. I should have been keeping track of that.
*The destruction shouldn’t be a surprise since this film features not only a Sharknado, but a Hailnado, Lightningnado, Lavanado, and a Cownado that also had sharks in it and the sharks were eating the cows. Sharks gotta eat.
*People skydive while in a Sharknado.
*Fin is unconscious and two small sharks (one on either of Tara’s hands) are used to defibrillate him. SCIENCE!!!
*One more line, “We haven’t had a Sharknado in five years.” “That’s what worries me.”
Sharknado 5: Global Swarming (2017)
UR/93 m/IMDb: 3.8
IMDb: “With much of America lying in ruins, the rest of the world braces for a global Sharknado, and Fin and his family must travel around the world to stop them.”
Picking Up a Check: Chris Kattan (as the British Prime Minister), Charo (as the Queen of England), Nichelle “Uhuru” Nichols, Geraldo Rivera, Tony Hawk (skateboarding on the roof of the Sydney Opera House), Brett Michaels, David Naughton, Olivia Newton John, Dolph Lungren (playing Fin and April’s son Gil from the future), Downtown Julie Brown AGAIN, and Fabio (as the Pope).
QQ: "The storm is now sucking up lions and gazelles! Now there are sharks chasing the lions chasing the gazelles! It's a Safarinado!"
MPM: I believe I saw April and Fin in a car in the palm of the hand of the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro…in a Sharknado.
3 ⭐⭐⭐:
#3: Pope Fabio/Queen Charo toss up!
#2: David Naughton (David Kessler from An American Werewolf in London) plays Ambassador Kessler who gets bit on the hand by a small shark he then stares at in horror mimicking his iconic transformation scene from An American Werewolf in London. How can you hate these movies when the people who made them love movies so much?!
#1: Bret Michaels (lead singer of Poison) is hit by a double-decker bus in London (I’m all right!) and then straight up “Doofs” it in an homage to Mad Max: Fury Road by playing his guitar (and slaying sharks) while attached to the front of the bus.
*Actual casts of “Today Shows” from around the globe.
*So many people “Ass Dan” it in this one, always a joy.
*I love how many people are able to survive inside one of these things.
*At the end of this one everyone is dead and Fin is a bindlestiff.
*One more line; “That’s a damn Sharknado without the Nado!”
The Last Sharknado: It’s About Time (2018)
UR/86 m/IMDb: 3.6
IMDb: “Fin has to go back in time to rejoin his shark-battling friends to stop the first Sharknado and save humanity.”
Picking Up a Check: Neil deGrasse Tyson, Dee Snider, Tori Spelling, Christopher “Peter Brady” Knight, Bernie “Love Boat” Kopell, and Darrell Hammond from SNL.
QQ: “It’s a ‘Timenado!” “Let’s do the time warp again.”
MPM: The decapitated head of a robotic Tara Reid in a flying shark’s mouth shooting lasers out of her eyes into a Sharknado.
3 ⭐⭐⭐:
#3: James “David Lo Pan” Hong as Confucious
#2: Darrell Hammond as George Washington doing his Bill Clinton. No notes on that one.
#1: To reiterate, I know I said I wasn’t going to include Ian Ziering or Tara Reid in any of these three stars things, but didn’t you hear me when I just told you about Tara Reid’s decapitated head in a flying shark’s mouth shooting lasers out of her eyes into a Sharknado?
*The plan for this one is to go back in time and destroy the O.G. Sharknado.
*All future female humans look like Tara Reid, which is an interesting take on our future.
*The very end features an homage to the O.G. shark video game, which reminded me that the people who made these knew exactly what they were doing from the start.
*One more line, and one FINAL JAWS reference; Fin says, “I’m gonna need a bigger chainsaw.”
Well, that is a wrap from here at Cinema Wellman for our 2nd annual “Shark Week” episode. We hope you enjoy Discovery Channel’s Shark Week (if that’s your bag) which starts today!
We spent 9.1 hours watching sharks kill over 118 people in six movies that averaged 3.8 on IMDb so you didn’t have to.
The smell while cleaning up after one of these Sharknados must be absolutely horrific.
We hope you’re with us next time when I’ll have an in-studio guest with me to break down seven different movies based on the same Agatha Christie book we just finished for book club!
Join us to see if the butler did it!
Until then, take care.
