Ezekiel Kincaid
Aug 2, 2023
An entertaining movie with poor effects and multiple random plots
Last week’s review was on werewolves. This week? Sharks! But not just any shark. No, now we have (queue sinister music) an alien shark! Sounds awesome, right? Based on the title, what are you expecting? Sharks from another planet? Another dimension? Maybe even astronauts landing on an earth-like planet and getting devoured by a species of shark not known to man? If that’s what you’re expecting, you might as well get ready to be disappointed. Welcome to the world of B horror.
Alien Shark is about a meteor crashing into the ocean and turning a shark into an “alien” shark that wreaks havoc on some vacationers looking to have a good time. Not a terrible sci-fi shark thriller plot, right? It’d be nice if that’s what we got out of this movie, but instead we get a host of other nonsense that leaves us wondering what happened to the plot. But that’s not the only thing that makes this movie bad. There’s more ... so much more.
First off, the Alien Shark script is terrible. How it ever got accepted, I’ll never know. Second, the execution of the dialogue is SO bad. The actors over-emphasize every syllable of every word they say. What makes me such an expert? Well, let me remind you I do watch a lot of terrible movies, so for me to even notice at all is saying something. Plus, I’m a writer and writers always know bad writing and poor execution. While listening to the dialogue in Alien Shark, I cringed. A lot. At one point I had to check my ears because I thought they were bleeding. I'm not kidding.
All that out of the way, I still found the movie entertaining. Even though the dialogue was so bad, it kept me laughing. So, too, did the cheap special effects. But what else would you expect from a Wal-Mart Exclusive? That’s right, folks. I picked this gem up by hand at Wally World.
Alien Shark was made in 2022 and is directed by Paul Tomborello (Little Savages, Rumors of War), written by Aaron Jackson (Expulsion). It stars Brittany Altrenbach (Fear the Walking Dead, Broken Seeds) as main character Aleesha and Lukas Silva (No Virtue, Carp-e Diem) as Pete.
The movie starts off with two girls finding a weird piece of a glowing meteor on the beach. When they approach it, they get possessed/controlled by some alien force and die. Aleesha shows up to the beach after being invited by her friends to a party they are throwing before she leaves on another military deployment. When they all get to the beach, people start acting weird and their eyes start glowing green. When a guy named Mickey shows up and starts talking crazy, warning everyone about aliens, they dismiss him. Then, for some unknown reason, they hold a crystal ceremony. Somehow this ceremony opens them up to the aliens and things get out of hand. During this time, the alien shark is just swimming in the ocean, looking for people to eat.
(We're sorry that photo couldn't be any clearer. We tried. You try finding stills of the shark featured in Alien Shark and let me know how that works out for you!)
The entire storyline doesn’t make a lick of sense. The filmmakers never explain what is going on with the shark or how it even became “alien.” It’s not clear if the aliens are controlling the shark and the people or if they are possessing them. Random WTF points are just inserted into the story without any explanation and by the end, you aren’t sure what the hell just happened or what the hell you just watched.
Here's a list of Alien Shark’s inserted random plot points filmmakers pull right out of their ass:
Alien shark comes to the shore and pukes out a shark dog.
Alien ship circles the earth without any explanation as to why.
Characters have dreams of eating people.
Shark flies out of the sun.
The spirit of a shark hovers in mid-air.
Calling ritual with crystals invites the aliens.
The aliens’ possession or mind control can be broken by pressing a magic seashell against the forehead.
Alien shark can turn invisible.
Alien shark can be defeated by blowing up a random camera that shows up out of nowhere.
Why all this? I have no idea. Your guess is as good as mine. But here’s my theory. I think the director and the writer got drunk one night, wrote down the dumbest crap they could come up with, put it in a hat, and let their dog pick. That’s the only solid reasoning I can come up with.
The best part of this movie is Mickey, the crazy dude. Every horror movie has to have one. His acting is so bad, it’s side-splitting hilarious. Everyone, and I mean everyone, in this movie takes their role way too seriously, making the film even more entertaining. As far as the CGI goes, it is the most terrible effort I have seen in any movie ever. I kid you not. You’ll get a taste of it in the trailer, along with the heavily acted-out dialogue efforts.
Should you watch Alien Shark? I think so. Especially if you want a good laugh and if you want to learn how NOT to write and direct a movie. There is no blood, no good kill scenes, and no one getting ripped to shreds by the alien shark—things an audience expects to see in any decent shark movie.
All in all, Zeke’s “so bad it’s good” rating is 3 out of 5 shark dogs.
If you really want to watch this movie, you can buy it at Wal-Mart. It used to be on Tubi but I guess even they have standards.
Ezekiel Kincaid lives for horror and loves to watch it, write about it, and talk about it, whether that be in his own novels or in reviews. His experience as both a pastor and a paranormal investigator bring everything he writes to life. Want him to review something specific? Send an email to: mixedalternativemag@gmail.com.