Sea Beast

[Andrew]

What do you get when you cross "Jaws" with "Predator" and cast a 1990s pop culture star as the protagonist?  Why yes, this is a SyFy original movie.  How did you know?

Click here to go to the Review

[Saucerman]

I enjoyed this one quite a bit.  It's part of the "Maneaters" series, produced by a Canadian company and distributed via SyFy.  The early films in the series involved things like bears, tigers, etc., but then they started doing genetically-engineered wasps, alien-controlled ants, gargoyles, sand serpents, wyverns, and of course, the Sea Beast. 

Most of them I found at least cheesy-enjoyable, though Mother Pus-Bucket, I hated Sand Serpents. 

[Flangepart]

Yeesh. Two words. Riff fest.
It's Sy-Fy, the channel that keeps on giving the cinematic equivalent of White Castle sliders with extra onions.

[Jack]

Great review Andrew    I sort of enjoyed this one as well.  It had some fun, silly parts, the characters weren't too bad, and the ending on the ferry was kind of cool.

[retrorussell]

He he he!  The monster makes me think of Venom from the Spider-Man comics!

[rjschwarz]

I have to say I like the SyFy films derived from the Monster Manual better than the giant versions of regular animals ones (although who am I kidding, the Monster Manual was full of those as well). Wyvern rocked and this one was fun as well. I just can't wait until they pick up the Call of C'thulu game for a change. After all the source books are in the public domain.

Or better yet, why not the works of H. Beam Piper, all in the public domain and actually Science Fiction.

[BoyScoutKevin]

"Blinking is a telltale sign of rigormortis."

And shutting your eyes, as your head is pushed beneath the bathwater is a telltale sign that your are totally paralyzed.

And the pupil in your eye shrinking, when light hits it, is a telltale sign that you are totally deceased.

I believe that the last can be overcome by using atropine, but I don't think that filmmakers have come up with a solution for the other two.

Anyway . . . "bad" movies, like this one, make the best reviews, or, at least, they make the funniest reviews. LOL! again in this one.

[SynapticBoomstick]

Out of all the creatures SciFi/SyFy has produced, the sea beast is probably my favorite in terms of appearance.

Now if they'd only stop making so many reality shows.

[claws]

I stopped buying movies from the Maneater series and DVDs in general because of my switch to Blu-ray around the time Sea Beast was released.
After reading Andrew's review I might order the disc after all.

[NitroPress]

Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems like the last few recent reviews have completely omitted the cast names... oversight or Illuminati conspiracy?

[Andrew]

Maybe I'm missing something, but it seems like the last few recent reviews have completely omitted the cast names... oversight or Illuminati conspiracy?

No, they should be there at the top of the review:

The Characters:   

    Will McKenna - He must have spent a lot of time playing "Mouse Trap" as a child, because his plan to kill the monster is ridiculously complicated.
    Carly McKenna - Will's daughter who is scared of pirates.
    Danny - His sordid weekend in a secluded cabin with his girlfriend turns out to be everything except sordid. He spends every waking moment collecting firewood, cooking meals, and doing other chores until the monster puts him out of his sexually deprived misery.
    Arden - Nine out of ten female marine biologists are natural blondes. Yes she is, but no she's not.
    Ben - Easily mistaken for Quint in a pinch if you squint.
    Sheriff Jay McKenna - Will's brother. His death leaves a big pair of shoes to fill, largely on account of that being all that the monster left of him.
    Drew - You are the only black man in the entire town. Of course you are going to die.
    Erin - Drew's girlfriend and similarly doomed.
    Roy - Such a jerk that the monster, which universally paralyzes its victims with venom before eating them, decides to choke him to death instead.
    The Sea Beast - "It" is obviously a "she" but we never see a Mr. Sea Beast, meaning that she is a single mother with ten thousand eggs. Good luck with that, girlfriend.
    The Sea Beast's Babies - Little creatures about the size of medium dogs.

[Flangepart]

Sea beast. Sea beast eat people. Sea beast run and spawn sequel. Sea beast get riffed by smart folks.

[NitroPress]

Thanks, Andrew, I saw all of that. However, the cast names - the actor names - seem to be increasingly omitted from the Dramatis. Not every B-actor is worth listing, but the major character players should be listed, especially when the home page teaser for this listing makes a point about "cast[ing] a 1990s pop culture star as the protagonist"... who, exactly? I never saw a name of said star...

[Keiththegamergeek]

SyFy weekend movies make Plan 9 from Outer Space look like Star Wars.

[Trevor]

Sheriff Jay McKenna - Will's brother. His death leaves a big pair of shoes to fill, largely on account of that being all that the monster left of him.