Piranha 3DD (2012)


Piranha’s just aren’t cool. Face it.

There’s something in the water again. And this time no one is safe from the flesh eating fish as they sink their razor sharp teeth into the visitors of the best summer attraction, The Big Wet Water Park.

Even though it has its haters, Piranha 3D was still a fun movie because it didn’t take itself too seriously, was gory as hell, and had a lot of unabashed fun to it that made it worth watching (especially if you’re buddies one night and looking for entertainment and you have no beer). However, they should have just left it that and stayed away from more Piranha’s cause honestly, who the hell cares?

This is the first flick to ever come out in theaters and Video-On-Demand at the same time, but if you want to save your money and not hate everything about yourself, just stay at home and not bother watching it. First of all, director John Gulager doesn’t do shit here with this promising premise, or anything else he has at his display either. The film looked as if it had no budget whatsoever, and half of the sets/effects are used from the first movie (pretty freakin’ obvious, too); all of the energy that the first one had, is lost in this sequel because it doesn’t even feel like these guys made this movie with the word “fun” in mind, they just tried to cash in on the “Piranha” name; and the scares just weren’t here at all. I know that these types of films aren’t really depending on being scary, but there wasn’t even a single “boo” moment to get me through here and there. Everything just sort of happened with no care whatsoever.

Also, the writing was just freakin’ terrible. The first flick had bits of humor here and there, but this film barely had any which really disappointed me because when you have a plot filled with piranha’s, water, boobs, and gore, you should be gettin’ a laugh-out-loud riot like the first. Instead, you just get some shit that tries hard as hell to be funny with it’s “look at me being quirky and weird” fashion, and ends up not even bringing a chuckle out of me once. Then again, humor is subjective so maybe you’ll find a lot more to laugh at than my sorry-ass did.

Anybody that’s going to see this film (or staying home to watch this, what I suggest more) knows that there’s going to be plenty of boobs and blood. Actually, that’s exactly what you get and I can say that the film does deliver on that promise but not with the same intensity as the first. The memorable sequence in the first one where all of the piranha’s come into invade the lake, killing and ripping to sheds, thousands and thousands of people was a freakin’ awesome scene and is sort of here too, but not with the same kinetic or creative energy as that one. It was just boring, with blood and gore that seemed too tame for a sequel like this, and the naked chicks weren’t even hot. They were just crass, and even though that’s not a bad thing for some people, for me, it just should have been placed better.

If there is anything that’s one bit of a redeeming quality for this flick, it’s David Hasselhoff playing the one character he plays to perfection: David Hasselhoff. Hasselhoff’s extended-cameo is actually pretty funny but definitely not used in the right way. It almost seemed like the film didn’t know what to do with him so they just stuck a bunch of Baywatch-like scenes in there and made it seem like they were doing something so funny and collective with him. It’s weird, he’s easily the best thing in this movie but he is also the most disappointing aspect of it as well. Don’t Hassle the Hoff, especially when you put him in a piece of shit like this.

As for the rest of the cast, they all try their hardest but nobody can really get past the paper-thin characters here. Katrina Bowden and Danielle Panabaker were nice ladies to look at, but ultimately, just seemed terribly bland; David Koechner usually can make me laugh in anything he does, but didn’t have me chuckle once at him; and Ving Rhames shows up to give this film a spark of energy and fun that it needed, but is also just another reminder as to how and why the first flick was so much better and so much fun in the first place. Also, be on the look-out for a Gary Busey cameo that sucks. Honestly, how the hell can you mess up a Gary Busey cameo!?!?

Consensus: Piranha 3DD tries it hardest to be like the first, but is unoriginal, unimaginative, has no sense of what’s funny or what humor is, features plenty of boobs and gore but not as much as it should, and is a sequel that doesn’t do anything other than try to cash-in on the “Piranha” name. Fuck this shit.

1/10=Total and Utter Crap!!!

23 comments

  1. I have to disagree on this one Dan. While it is no where near as funny as the first; it has half the laughs and that’s more than that some others these days. The 3D was used quite effectively. We jumped a few times. The eye canady was there for the ogling guys and the girls got a little. Heck the non swimmer guy was cute in a geekie way and the Bobbit episode was slapstick goofiness. So I give it an 8/10 for delivering what it said. Don’t forget to stay till the lights come on for more of the Hoff and bloopers.

  2. I really enjoyed the first so I was looking forward to this. You are right, it lost all of it’s energy. I think Alexandre Aja made more out of the first film than you would expect, Gulager couldn’t do the same. He seems a good fit having directed the “Feast” franchise, but he failed bad here. It was truly awful.

    I was also a little offended. The part where the girl is getting sucked into the pool was in poor taste. I believe it was based on an incident that happened a couple of years ago where a little girl got sucked into a drain and had her bowels ripped out. If it wasn’t inspired by that, then the director is ignorant for not making the connection. If it was inspired by that then he’s just an asshole.

    • That was a little mean to have in a film like this and I kind of remember something similar happening in the Final Destination from 2009. Something like that at least. Thanks Dusty!

  3. The best we could hope for these types of movies are they are so bad they become good and also eye-candy. But the reviews seem that the film misses both.

  4. This is the second negative review of this film that I’ve read today. After the first one, I was thinking of possibly watching it for the Gary Busey bit but if even that sucks, no thanks.

  5. Saw the original and, understandably, its crap. So I find it strange to imagine anything better for the second. Isn’t the point of these films to laugh at how crap they are? Thats what I did for the first one!

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