Mega Python vs Gatoroid: The Recap

Hard as it may be to believe, not everyone tuned in to watch Mega Python vs Gatoroid. So, I figured I would recap it for you!

First, an intro by Debbie Gibson and Tiffany. Tiffany says this movie contains big scary monsters, awesome cat fighting, and a hillbilly rampage. Debbie says "Sounds a lot like my Electric Youth tour." If that's how they set the stage, I think we're in for cheesy good fun.

The movie starts in a shadowy lab with lots of snakes in glass cases. At least I think it's a lab. What other place would have snakes like this in glass cases? Snakes R Us? Anyway, we see Debbie Gibson in her shorty-shorts and tank top, a boring lab assistant, and a pretty Asian girl all "rescuing" the snakes by stuffing them into bags. Debbie pulls out a boa constrictor and holds it up, marveling at its beauty. Or maybe we're supposed to be impressed that she's holding a snake? Whatever the case, we learn that she's one of those militant animal rights people who doesn't believe snakes belong in cages. They're God's creatures and should be out in nature! She and her two assistants make a get away in her jeep. But then a cop starts following her! Probably because she stole a whole lab full of snakes! They have one of the most ridiculous chase scenes ever. It actually looks like they're just driving through the park. But Debbie loses the cop when the police car swerves to follow her around a curve and flips over! How fortuitous for Debbie! Then we see Debbie and her friends in the Everglades where they release all the snakes. Clearly, this movie is going to rock my face off.

It's the next day and we see a dog and its owner on the bank of the swamp. The owner is tinkering with his boat while the dog hangs out by the water. Clearly, it doesn't look good for Fido. The camera pans to swirls in the swamp scum. The dog starts barking and...wait, he runs into the woods? I thought for sure something was coming out of the water! What's up with focusing on the swamp scum? Maybe this is their idea of a shocking twist! Anyway, the dog runs off. We hear some sounds of a struggle and then a yelp. The dog owner goes looking for the dog and screams when he sees a huge snake! Which he then shoots! And then we see a big bloody mess with both some dog remains. I guess we're supposed to infer that he blew apart the snake and the dog was inside. The owner cries. The special effects on this movie are ah-mazing, by the way.

And now: Tiffany! She's working for the Department of Forestry and is in charge of the Everglades. She's also in shorty shorts and a very low cut khaki shirt. Wow, Tiffany is really busting out of that uniform. Yeesh. Ok, she talks about how the gator population is way down, and that she cannot issue any gator hunting permits to the group of hillbillies drinking beer outside the Department of Forestry office. She gets on the phone with a handsome man who is working on renovating a cute old house. He says they should get together to go over the color scheme for the wedding. So, apparently he's Tiffany's finance. Exposition!

In the next scene, Debbie is driving down the road and - oh no! Someone is shooting at her! So she pulls over to find the people with guns. That sounds sensible. She finds a trio of hillbillies. She snaps at them for shooting. Oh, I guess they weren't shooting at her. They were shooting at snakes. But this makes her even more mad than if they were shooting at her! Then, the guys parlay Debbie's love of snakes into a bunch of dick jokes. Debbie says that instead of an anaconda in his pants it's more like a Lumbricus terrestris. That's a common earthworm, y'all! Burrrrrrrn! Then there are some gator sounds coming from the water behind them. They turn and see an awesome snake vs. gator fight! It's a giant python springing up out of the water and wrapping itself around the gator. It's also biting the gator a lot. I thought pythons were all about constricting? Whatever. Just go with it. The hillbillies shoot at the gator and snake, which enrages Debbie. For an animal rights & environmentalist nut, she really doesn't seem to care much about gators. Just snakes. After the snake takes out the gator, Debbie and company hit the road.

Cut to Tiffany and her Forestry crew examining what looks like part of a gator tail. Her Forestry deputy says they couldn't find the rest of the gator, and should probably break out the scuba gear to find it. Why on earth would they get scuba gear to search the swamp for some animal remains? Whatever. Just go with it.

We see Debbie next to her jeep, still in the Everglades. I'm not sure what she's doing, but Tiffany's fiance drives by. He notices an impossibly huge snake coming up behind Debbie, about to eat her. He backs up his truck and runs over the snake a couple times in order to save her. Of course, rather than being grateful, Debbie is angry because that girl loves her snakes! He shakes his head and drives away to meet Tiffany.

When he meets Tiffany, he tells her about the scary snake encounter. So snakes are killing her gators! Tiffany can't stand for that. She suggests they set traps to catch the snakes. The hillbillies who hang out in the Everglades suggest they could hunt the snakes. Tiffany agrees to this plan.

Next we get an explanation on how to kill snakes. The deputy demonstrating has a rubber snake. He says that you should grab a snake, whack its head on the ground, and then shake the snake around a lot to "pith" the head. Otherwise the head can stay alive up to an hour! I ask you, what difference would it make if a constrictor's head was alive or not? The dangerous part is the body that will squeeze you to death! But...whatever. Just go with it. Debbie is with a group of animal rights protesters who are angry about the injustice about to be done to the snakes that she illegally released. Debbie is wearing a psychedelic mini dress that reminds me of stuff Goldie Hawn wore back in her Laugh In days. Debbie gets in Tiffany's face. One loves gators, one loves snakes. They're nasty to each other, and let me say that when these two fight, it's just magic. Debbie snaps at Tiffany, "Well, it looks like someone had bitch for breakfast!" Clearly one of the most poetic lines in cinematic history.

Next we see the Hillbilly brigade in a boat, looking for snakes. But they admit they'll hunt for gators, too. They are equal-opportunity. The camera shows a duck floating in the water nearby. Then a huge gator pops out of the water Jaws-style and takes out the duck.

Then we see a forestry officer and a hillbilly with a gun poking around a bunch of old buildings. I have no idea where they are. They open a shed and see that it's full of giant snake eggs. They had to open a big steel door to get into this shed. How did the snake get in there? The hillbilly goes looking around the rest of the grounds while the officer calls in to the forestry office to report the eggs. He says, "There's a HUGE bunch of eggs at the Dynamite Depot!" Oooh! This place is full of dynamite? Fun! It's nice that they have a dynamite depot out in the middle of nowhere with nary a fence or a lock in sight to secure it. That makes sense. The officer then hears his pal the hillbilly scream. He searches for him, and then comes across the hillbilly's dismembered body. The torso, a leg, a hand. So...the giant python - which crushes its prey and eats them whole if I'm remembering my days in 6th grade science class correctly - basically chomped off this guy's head and ate it, but decided to leave the other body parts laying around? What? The officer doesn't stop to ponder these questions, though, and instead decides that he's going to shoot the crap out of all the snake eggs. You know: in the dynamite depot. I'm expecting an explosion. But - shocking twist! - instead a snake comes out and grabs the officer by his sleeve and drags him away to eat him.

Folks are searching for snakes. One of them says, "Here, Snakey Snake!" My husband, who is watching this with me, replies, "That's not something you hear much outside of prison." That husband of mine is fun.

Tiffany's fiance - oh, apparently his name is Justin! Justin and another local yokel are searching for snakes. The Yokel is tired and breathless from all this swamp trekkin' and wants to rest. Justin goes off on his own to pee on a tree while the yokel rests by the water. There's this lacy bit of something hanging in the tree next to him. Oh, hey! It's a giant snakeskin! This freaks him out when he realizes it, which makes him back slowly into the water. And...a giant gator gets him. Meanwhile Justin finishes peeing and - oh no! a giant snake is in the tree above him! He chops off the head, but the giant snake body falls out of the tree and knocks Justin to the ground where he loses consciousness. When he wakes up, he's staring at the severed head of the yokel. He screams and jumps up to call Tiffany on the walkie talkie. He's talking to her, and then realizes there are half a dozen giant anacondas surrounding him. He tries to be calm on the walkie with Tiffany. He asks her to talk to him about their wedding. She's confused. He yells, and the walkie cuts out. Tiffany insists they have to find Justin! They go to the area where Justin had been, and they can hear the static from the walkie. But - oh! It's another giant snake, attacking them! Tiffany stabs at it with a knife. She cuts a perfect slice in the side so that Justin's walkie talkie falls out of the snake. Justin is gone! Oh, and her deputy dies, too. Tragedy abounds!

During the commercial, we see more of Debbie Gibson and Tiffany chit chatting. Tiffany says, "I can't believe my fiance is dead!" Debbie says, "Yeah. I think you're alone now." Hee!

Back to the movie, Tiffany is very distraught over this snake issue. There's also some talk about a big benefit they're going to have to raise money for the Everglades. Some PR person booked a singing monkey to perform. Blah blah blah, she questions how a singing monkey going to really entertain people at this benefit. I don't understand why they're talking about this, but whatever. Tiffany has to figure out this snake problem ASAP! That's when she comes up with the idea to get a bigger gator! Bigger gators would kill the snakes! Meanwhile, Debbie thinks the way to stop the snakes from being hurt is to install cameras throughout the Everglades and film everything. Alrighty then.

Tiffany is in a lab of some sort talking to a guy named Manny. She's trying to get him to give her some steroids to feed the gators. Manny warns that steroids cause acne and aggression. And we all know a gator with blemishes isn't something to mess with. Manny also says he has an experimental steroid concoction that basically increases muscle growth exponentially. It's too dangerous to use. Tiffany doesn't think so. She insists her plan will keep the balance of nature preserved.

Then we see Tiffany and another assistant injecting steroids into some raw whole chickens. She puts bottles of the experimental stuff into the body cavity of the chicken. She actually utters the words, "This isn't crazy at all! What could go wrong?" You know, I hate to say it, but at this point I'm getting irritated with this movie. It's really contrived. Cheesy movies are better when they're not really aware of how cheesy they are. You want to see actors really trying to sell it. That's what makes them mockable and fun. If they know it's bad, and they're purposely making it bad...well, it's just too forced. Booo.

Okay, back to the movie. They feed the steroid chickens to the gators. We then see a montage of gators growing like crazy, and the gators then laying super-sized eggs. We also see the swamp snakes eating the eggs, and then the snakes start growing like crazy. Clearly the steroids brought bad juju to the Everglades.

Next we see Debbie and company installing their cameras throughout the Everglades. They come upon a dead snake that is simply enormous. Even Debbie is dumbfounded by the size of this thing. She wants to take the remains with her, and says they'll need to get a Semi. Just then, two giant gators come out of nowhere. There's screaming and running, and pretty Asian lab assistant dies.

More talk about the benefit and the singing monkey. I hope this goes somewhere.

There's also a "native American" guy named Diego Ortiz who is a herpetologist that wants to help with this Everglades problem. He finds a bunch of giant gator eggs. He tells Tiffany they need to be blown up with dynamite. She insists that she won't do anything to hurt gators. She tells Diego to leave her alone so she can get ready for the benefit.

Scene: the benefit. It's a lovely catered party. Tiffany is wearing a particularly boobalicious dress. Debbie shows up in a strapless white number that makes her look like she has no chest at all. I have to say, it's interesting to see the contrast between them. Tiffany is curvy and bustin' out of a black dress. Debbie is on the cusp of being Madonna-style sinewy, and she's in a white dress. Good vs evil! And now they bring up the singing monkey again. And my heart stops when I see it's Mickey Dolenz. MICKEY DOLENZ. So, it's a singing Monkee! I see what they did there. And I can't even hate on it because, as I mentioned in my 100 Things About Me list, I used to be obsessed with The Monkees when I was younger. And Mickey was my favorite one. Oh, Mickey! (You're so fine!) Is this really what your career has come to? My heart is breaking a little bit.

Diego calls Tiffany from the park outside the benefit. He demands that she call in the National Guard. This gator & python problem has gotten out of hand! She refuses and doesn't want to jeopardize the fundraising.

I'm really losing interest in this movie. Are you still reading this recap? It's long. And I have a box of Girl Scout cookies calling to me.

Debbie shows up at the benefit. She and Tiffany have an awesome cat fight where they throw food at each other. There's a gratuitous shot of Debbie smearing whipped cream all over Tiffany's cleavage. Bleh. We get a shot of the Gatoroid army approaching the tent. Diego shows up and tells everyone to run for it. Mickey Dolenz says he's going to sing, and then gets eaten by a python. Diego calls the National Guard - which he apparently had on speed dial. He tells them there's "a gator of literally massive proportions!!"

They leave town. The pythons and gators have escaped the Everglades and are wrecking havoc in Florida. Tiffany, Debbie and Diego get the idea to split up. Tiffany and Diego will lure all the creatures back to the Everglades with the use of some sort of pheromones that they'll spread using a crop duster. Debbie will set up dynamite in the magic cave where all the python and/or gatoroid eggs are waiting to hatch. The pheromone crop dusting plan is working for a while, but then they crash the plane on the highway.

Are they able to lure the creatures out of the city? Can they figure out how to stop the pythons and gators? Will they be able to blow up all the gator & python eggs before a new legion of mutated animals gets unleashed? How many times can they make "I think we're alone now" jokes before you throw a shoe at the TV?

I can't answer these questions because I didn't finish watching the movie. Should I bother? Would you want to read about it? Are you even still reading THIS? Bueller?