Main cast: Debbie Gibson (Dr Nikki Riley), Tiffany (Terry O’Hara), A Martinez (Dr Diego Ortiz), Kathryn Joosten (Angie), Kevin M Horton (RJ Cupelli), Micky Dolenz (Himself), Carey Van Dyke (Justin), Arden Cho (Gia), Patrick Hancock (Ben), Kristen Wilson (Barbara Fine), and Vanessa Claire Smith (Contrary Mary)
Director: Mary Lambert
This review of Mega Python vs. Gatoroid is a request from a Patreon supporter who’d prefer to remain anonymous. I’m glad that the person made the request, because I’d never know otherwise that there is a movie that pits 1980s pop princesses Tiffany and Debbie Gibson against one another. It’s quite tragic that the movie itself isn’t any better.
Debbie Gibson is Dr Nikki Riley, a biologist who’d be laughed out of town with extreme prejudice. She and her people break into a laboratory to release some pythons… and she lets these snakes go free in the neighborhood. Her argument is that nature will balance itself, something that is just so wrong that I can only imagine that she bought her degree instead of working for it. Hello, invasive species! Unsurprisingly, these pythons grow to huge sizes and end up devouring Park Ranger Terry O’Hara’s fiancé – among other people.
Furious, Terry decides that the pythons need to go. Since they are in the Florida Everglades and there are many alligators all over the place, she has her team spike chicken carcasses with anabolic steroids (including some experimental ones that cause a spike in aggression) and throw them at the alligators. Those things then grow to huge sizes too. If you haven’t fled in terror at the tidal wave of bad science thrown your way in this movie, you may then have to sit through the titanic showdown of really bad CGI monsters in between the showdown of two really unlikable harpies.
Seriously, poor Ms Gibson. Her character is so mind-boggling in her stupidity, and yet so smug that it is impossible to muster any positive emotion for this wretch. As for poor Tiffany, she’s not the best actress around, and they forced her to wear clothes that are so tight-fitting that the poor dear looks like an overstuffed sausage. Not that this is a bad thing, as this means her cleavage is on full display and folks who like looking at such things will have fun, but I don’t think it would be comfortable to be in those things all the time. Maybe that explains the clumsy acting from the poor dear. Her character is a little more sympathetic, but that’s only because she is paired with Nikki. Terry is hypocritical, impulsive, and judgmental, although her stupid feeding of the alligators with those things may be explained by the passing of her hubby-to-be. That’s understandable, even if it’s also dumb as can be.
The other main character, Diego, is a biologist who is in a way responsible for the mess in this movie because that moron, instead of telling the ladies over the phone that the gators and pythons are growing to abnormally large proportions, would give vague statements and cause more misunderstanding. This first class idiot will do dumb things like telling them he can only explain to them in person – don’t know why, maybe he needs to draw them a flow chart – only to of course show up way too late all the time.
Therefore, the entire movie is all about morons behaving badly, and other people dying as a result of their rampant stupidity.
Things wouldn’t be so bad if this movie had been rife with fun and campy elements. Well, there are some fun elements. Some of the lines uttered by two ladies can be quite meta, referring to their biggest hits and such, and I love how everyone in the movie has a gun – some with big ones – that they can pull out at any moment. For the most part, though, the movie can be dreadfully dumb thanks to the wretched brainpower of the main characters, and the CGI is iffy enough to accentuate how cheaply made and dodgy-looking the whole film is.
It’s really a shame. Debbie Gibson and Tiffany deserve a better vehicle than this turd. Can I have some kind of spiritual sequel with both ladies playing better characters and a better script?
