It is my unfortunate duty today to report back on the sequel I've been waiting for: Piranha 3DD. Does it have the sea legs to stand next to Piranha 3D? Let me save you the trouble friends, the answer is a sad no...no it does not.
Piranha 3D was a truly fun, great film. A fact that Piranha 3DD unwisely reminds us of by continually re-using footage from the first film, and by throwing in cameos from characters seen in the first film. This is a trait many sequels seem more than happy to do. It would appear that sequels think that by reminding us of how great the original was, that that will be enough to quench fans appetites.....naturally this rarely, if ever, works.
So, what's the story this time around? Perverted Chet (played with some glee by David Koechner) opens what may be the first water park to encourage fornication and nudity on its premises (sounds like my kind of place, tee hee). His step-daughter Maddy (Danielle Panabaker) does not like this. Eventually the fishies from the first film evacuate an abandoned Lake Victoria and make their way (VERY SLOWLY) to said water park. Some non-chaos erupts, and one fishy even decides to swim up a girls vagina (this actually leads to a fairly funny scene later on).
Most of the actors here don't even try to act. There's corrupt deputy Kyle (Chris Zylka), who used to date Maddy. There's nice guy Barry (Matt Bush) who has had a crush on Maddy for a very long time. Danielle Panabaker as Maddy is the more-or-less star here, even though she's as bland as you get. There's Shelby (Katrina Bowden), the poor girl who just wants to lose her virginity. You may wonder why I'm not really attempting to describe the characters here better. Well, the reason why is that there's not much to describe. These aren't characters so much as they are cardboard cut-outs....bland cereal boxes.
The effects in Piranha 3DD have been watered down. While there are some practical effects seen here, for the most part the film just glances over them. The CGI for the fish isn't necessarily impressive, but the Piranha still look pretty damn cool nontheless.
The pacing for the film is also terrible. It takes the fishies a good 51 minutes for them to reach the water park (the film runs at 84 minutes), and when they finally do the chaos that erupts is so non-chaotic you might as well take a snooze (The sequence is also terribly shot and paced).
I would give this film a one star rating if it weren't for several factors: There are some genuinely funny, laugh out loud moments in the film...their few and far between, but their definitely there. That only gets you so far though, what brings this film up just enough are the performances by The Hoff (in what is easily one of his better roles), Christopher Lloyd (Doing his usual zany routine with charm, wit, and passion. He's not Doc Brown here like he was in the first film, but it'll have to do), Paul Scheer ( Back as his character from the first film, reduced to an extremely minor cameo), and Ving Rhames (Back as his Deputy character from the first film, who is surprisingly not dead. He is reduced to an extremely minor cameo as well, which makes me wonder: why even bring back old characters if you're not going to use them properly? Anyways, he has one of the funniest scenes in the film).
Piranha 3DD ups the tits, but dilutes just about everything else that made the first film so great (Many more here...some nice, some not so nice. Unfortunately the film doesn't have fun with the nudity and doesnt even bother to linger on any of the body parts audiences are paying good money to see). It's very messy, poorly paced, lacks the fun atmosphere the first film created, and is badly acted by the leads. The only thing that saves the film is its talented cast of supporting roles/cameos, all of which steal the film. It's not particularly fun, chaotic, or bloody....but it does have its LOL moments. It's worth a viewing if only for the returning characters and The Hoff. Don't expect much from this dud, except maybe a few laughs here and there. Piranha 3DD is, unfortunately, dead on arrival.
1 1/2 out of 5 Stars
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