The Octopus Chronicles, Part 1…
If Tarkan vs. the Vikings taught us anything, it’s that everyone loves a GIANT INFLATABLE KILLER OCTOPUS!!!! So when Turner Classic Movies recently featured a night of Killer Octopus movies, it made sense to give them a look. First up is the best known of the lot, Ray Harryhausen’s It Came from Beneath the Sea.
And yes, I’m still alive. Very droll.
Ken Begg is the proprietor of Jabootu: The Bad Movie Dimension.« Kommissar X vs LSD and a Psychic Donkey
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Comments
Comment from lyzard
Time: May 18, 2008, 9:34 pm
Hey! No hints, no prompts!
I tell you what would be cool, though: never mind Zombie Lake - how about if we had more reviews of Sh! The Octopus amongst us than the rest of the internet put together?
(And of course, by “cool” I mean “nerdy to an infinite degree”.)
Comment from lyzard
Time: May 18, 2008, 9:38 pm
and remains probably the sole monster Harryhausen ever provided whose demise provokes not even an inkling of pathos.
Except, naturally, for someone like me, who never met a monster whose demise she didn’t cry over. (I’ve even progressed to the point of proving ol’ Dino’s most famous movie maxim wrong.)
Ah, “Lesley”. I’d forgotten that one. Another to add to The List.
Comment from Ken Begg
Time: May 19, 2008, 5:00 am
Yeah, but they kind of cheat that one. Her last name is Joyce, a surname a male character was unlikely to be given, and they never do the ‘confusion’ thing with Tobey.
Comment from hman
Time: May 19, 2008, 9:30 am
I never could really get into this one. I got it back in the 3rd or 4th grade, and as many times as I sat through it, it just never grew on me.
Comment from KeithA
Time: May 19, 2008, 9:34 am
Eerie. I was just sitting down to write reviews for the back-to-back giant squid attack movies I watched over the weekend. Which can only mean one thing: the B-Masters should collaborate on a script for a Sci-i Channel original movie called Octo-squid.
Comment from Ken Begg
Time: May 19, 2008, 9:55 am
“An island helicopter pilot find himself hired by what he learns too late are gang of bank robbers. During their escape, they are forced by storms to land upon a remote island. There a scientist is creating a military bioweapon: A giant, murderous, completely uncontrollable octosquid. His lab assistant, who thinks the doctor is seeking a cure for all diseases, just happens to be the pilot’s estranged ex-wife. Meanwhile, the military black op funders of the project have decided to pull the plug, and have sent in a highly trained yet weirdly inept squad of soldiers to destroy the octosquid…and any witnesses.”
There. Sorry. Didn’t leave much for you guys to do.
Comment from hman
Time: May 19, 2008, 9:59 am
Wow, these scripts almost write themselves. It’s almost like there’s an unfinished script a la “Mad Libs”, which the writers just replace a few names, occupations, and monster descriptions for each new film.
Comment from Ken Begg
Time: May 19, 2008, 10:03 am
“It’s almost like there’s an unfinished script a la “Mad Libs”, which the writers just replace a few names, occupations, and monster descriptions for each new film.”
“Almost”?
Comment from hman
Time: May 19, 2008, 10:46 am
Have to be careful about my generalizations, you know.
Comment from Ken Begg
Time: May 19, 2008, 10:56 am
Not that one.
Comment from KeithA
Time: May 19, 2008, 1:08 pm
Hey, as long as there’s room in the cast for Casper Van Dien or Mark Dacascos, I’m happy.
Comment from hman
Time: May 19, 2008, 1:39 pm
How about Richard Moll as the mad scientist again?
Comment from Matthew Fudge
Time: May 20, 2008, 7:07 am
Surely the black op squad are only pretending to destory the octosquid when they really to capture it to use as a super weapon?
Comment from Matthew Fudge
Time: May 20, 2008, 7:08 am
perhaps they are ‘rogue’ russian military? or terrorists ‘too crazy’ for the IRA?
Comment from lyzard
Time: May 20, 2008, 2:06 pm
I’m pretty sure they’re from Chechnya.
Comment from hman
Time: May 20, 2008, 3:24 pm
I’m still waiting for Saradia to make a comeback in film.
Comment from The Rev. D.D.
Time: May 21, 2008, 11:55 am
Well, Biollante ended up with all those tentacles…not too far a jump from that to an octosquid!
Comment from hman
Time: May 21, 2008, 1:41 pm
Nerd Observation: In Godzilla vs. Biollante, Saradia wanted to mix a wheat/cactus hybrid with Godzilla cells. Taking into account how Biollante came about, can you all imagine what a wheat/Godzilla monster would like like?
Comment from David Lee Ingersoll
Time: May 23, 2008, 9:43 am
Sigh. Looks like Ken has gotten too popular. I’ve been getting “exceeded bandwidth” screens at Jabootu for the last two days.
This does mean I’m getting more done at work but only my boss is happy about that.
Comment from El Santo
Time: May 18, 2008, 8:20 pm
Oh, hey… Does this mean you’ll be reviewing Sh! The Octopus as your rubber-suit movie?