SPOILER WARNING: THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS
It's the second one! I've been dying to see this since it came out, and of course my sister, who is a huge Sharknado fan, Tivo'd it for me to see when I visited her this past weekend. As you might expect, it is the story of Fin Shepard, and his Bruce-Willis-esque problem with always ending up in the middle of sharknados, as one heads in to New York along with the flight he is on (a flight he ends up landing himself, after sharks somehow eat the pilots). For those who aren't experts at meteorology, a sharknado is an apparently common weather pattern where a waterspout (not a tornado!) forms in the ocean and sucks up some sharks, which then gain the power of flight and air-breathing for the duration of the weather event. I'm sure it's happened in your hometown once or twice, so I probably didn't need to explain.
This movie is sort of a new breed in the past 10 years or so, where it's intentionally stupid for the entertainment value. It has to ride a pretty fine line - it has to take itself seriously (otherwise it's just a bad comedy), and yet still have enough "jokes" to keep from being boring, since it is by intent a bad movie. This movie is really pushing that line, it's almost more like a joke that you are in on - there are a lot of references to other things like a comedy would have (there are about 10 references to 'Airplane!' in the first 10 minutes), yet they're thrown away and ignored by the completely serious cast, whereas in a comedy they'd be front and center like "look at this!". It's easter egg overload.
One thing I found interesting that I don't think I've seen before is some really well-done use of making a 'mistake' for the viewers to catch and mock, as part of the fun. My favorite one is when Tara Reid, whose hand has been bitten off, sneaks out of the hospital dressed in a button-up blouse with a necklace, full makeup, and a glove on her remaining hand. She accomplished this by herself, off-camera, with a missing hand. The fact that they had her wearing a glove is what tips off that they did this on purpose and it's not just bad writing - it looks ridiculous that she's wearing a glove in the first place, which makes you think about it, and realize just how hard it would've been to put on. I actually think that's pretty clever.
There are also things that go over the top into true joke territory, like weather reporters having actual sharknado displays on their weather maps and discussing how many feet of sharks will be falling. But even these things are presented in a completely serious and 'real' way, which makes it better. If it had been done like a spoof comedy, it would not be nearly as good.
So anyway, it's Sharknado, you know what you're in for. You're in for 27 bodies and
4 out of 5 Buzzsaw Hands. This movie is significantly better thank Sharknado 1, and that was fun to begin with! I feel like The Asylum is really getting things together. Maybe they're learning how much better it feels to put out original movies instead of trying to clone every blockbuster. Of course, the super shady cloning act (where they try to make money entirely on the basis of people choosing the wrong movie from the cover) is surely more profitable. So sad.
I have drawn for you today a climactic moment from the film, the conclusion to Fin's rousing speech to the citizens of New York:
