Reviewed by

Christopher Armstead

My sojourn continues now with the FIFTH Sci-Fi snake movie ‘Mega-Snake’. I couldn’t stop now even if I wanted to. And I want to. Here’s the good thing though. Because of the level of cinematic quality of Anacondas 3&4, Vipers and Silent Venom ‘Mega-Snake’ just might be the ‘Godfather’ of Sci-Fi snake movies. Thus if you really, really want to get some enjoyment out of this movie I might recommend that you watch those other four snake movies first… if I thought you could handle it. However if you haven’t built up a resistance to this stuff then DON'T DO IT! Don’t even try it. You’ve been warned.

It’s the day of reckoning for little Les Daniels as this is the day he is baptized or something via snake through his families wacky religion. Problem is that Les is afraid of snakes, not that anybody in his family gives a damn. Unfortunately something goes terribly wrong as Les’ father gets bitten while the boy looks on in horror thinking, quite logically, that perhaps somebody should call a doctor. No sir because this here event is apparently this religions version of The Rapture as Dad is on his way to his next heavenly destination.

Years later Les (Michael Shanks) is an EMS tech, still afraid of snakes while his brother Duff (John T. Woods) runs the wacky religion now. One day Duff is looking for a new batch of deadly snakes to worship which runs him into the extremely hostile Native American Screaming Hawk (Ben Cardinal) who happens have a special little snake in a tightly sealed glass jar that IS NOT FOR SALE WHITE MAN! So Duff steals this snake. But before this happened Screaming Hawk gave Duff the ‘Gremlin Rules’ as if he knew Duff was going to steal it. These rules would be 1) never let it out its jar – Duff proceeds to break the jar almost immediately. 2) Don’t let it eat anything alive. This rule wouldn’t matter if Duff had just adhered to rule one. Anyway the snake, named Uteka, eats Tabby almost immediately and then follows that up with Mom as an appetizer. Followed by Spot. Followed by chickens. I like chicken. 3) Don’t be afraid of its heart. Whatever that means.

Uteka is out and about pretty much eating everybody and everything here in ‘Tennessee’, while growing to immense proportions, though nobody ever sees this thing until its too late with only Les and his estranged girlfriend / Deputy / Zoology PhD (seriously) Erin (Siri Baruc) around stop it. And I thought my bachelor’s degree in chemistry was going to waste. Let’s not forget Screaming Hawk who apparently didn’t know this incredibly dangerous creature was missing until the WHITE MAN came to his shop and informed the dude as such. There’s also a local fun event which the Mayor refuses to postpone. Naturally.

Ignore that box cover because there are no F-15’s fighting a Godzilla sized Cobra in this movie, not that an F-15 would’ve helped though it would’ve been cool. There are a couple of things that work in ‘Mega Snake’ such as Bulgaria doubling for Tennessee. I’m used to Toronto doubling for the American South but Bulgaria? Thus we have without a doubt some of the worst southern accents you will ever want to hear. Seriously, if your last name is Shikova or Karlukovski, some of the name actors in this masterpiece, I’m guessing you will have enough trouble simply speaking English much less attempting to sound like Jed Clampett. One thing they got right though was naming the asshole Sheriff ‘Big Bo’. My Dad is from Tennessee and his nickname is ‘Sweet Bo’. Authenticity!

Another thing that rocks about Mega Snake was when Mega ate a heard of goats. Except one which it only half ate. This goat goes ‘baaaa’ or whatever the official term for goat language is and the herder yells ‘It’s Gerdie!’. How in the HELL did he know that? Do people from ‘Tennessee’ have a special ear for goat speak? Silly me thinking all goats sounded the same. Educational! Plus in comparison to those other snake flicks the CGI snake looks better, the whole affair wasn’t taken all that serious, and the ‘southern’ actors weren’t all that bad.

Of course when you take ‘Mega Snake’ at face value it is still a pretty bad movie. A better CGI snake doesn’t make it good CGI. Better acting than those other snake movies doesn’t make it good acting. But we aren’t taking it at face value over here and are forced to comparing ‘Mega Snake’ to its contemporaries, and in this instance it stands heads and tails above. Plus it was funny. Watching headless bodies spin in a carnie ride probably shouldn’t have been funny, but it was funny here. Watching a man try to fight a 75 foot snake with a spatula probably shouldn’t have been funny… hell, there’s no way that they could’ve thought that wouldn’t have been funny. And watching a rasta try to give a snake a doobie is some Uncle Miltie type inspired humor right there. Also taking into consideration that this was directed by the same cat who gave us Mansquito and Ice Spiders so how could it be anything other craptastic? I still I have one more snake movie to watch but considering the youngest Baldwin is in it I’m going to go ahead and stop while I’m ahead, more or less, and all hail ‘Mega Snake’ as king of the Sci-Fi snake movies.