Brain Bleach Bonanza

Get your rubber gloves on, kids. You're gonna wanna get out the brain bleach after watching these bad movies.

Let’s face it: We’ve all got those days where we think everyone should just go step on a Lego; days where our minds are just buzzing and won’t settle. It could be anger, sadness, or just a horrifying boredom coupled with an existential crisis. Everyone has their own way of dealing – but have you ever tried out watching bad movies?

I don’t mean Batman and Robin (1997) bad. I mean movies that are so bad that they slowly but very effectively bleach all impurities from your brain, bringing it to the base emotion of “what the hell did I just watch”. So bad that they’re an adventure, and you feel as if you’ve run up three mountains and back by the time it’s over. So bad that they’re therapeutic and there’s nothing you could possibly need to do but go lie down and sleep.

It’s about time you tried it out, and I’ve got a list of really bad movies to help you get started. Get your rubber gloves on, kids. We’re getting out the brain bleach.

Sharknado (2013)

As its title would suggest, this is a tear-jerking coming-of-age film about twin sisters who are separated by birth and—no, of course not. Sharknado is about, not one, but three tornados making landfall in California. The twist here is that these tornadoes each carry hundreds of sharks picked up from the ocean. And all of these sharks a) have miraculously remained alive in the vortex, b) are actively looking for people to kill, and c) are strong enough to conveniently survive thousand-meter falls to conveniently-placed floods (apparently from the rain and the rising sea levels). And if they don’t fall into the water, they survive hitting the cement.

Crowning moment of glorious stupid (among many): The protagonists convene and decide on a solution to the sharknadoes and decide that, because normal tornadoes occur because of conflicting temperatures, they need to throw a bomb directly into the eye of each tornado to stop them. They accomplish this themselves (without any military or police aid) by flying a conveniently placed helicopter towards the tornadoes, and having someone stick herself out of it to throw homemade bombs directly into the center of each one. Easy-peasy.

Birdemic: Shock and Terror (2010)

This just in – the entire world (see: no one but the main characters) has been changed by the emergence of the bird flu, an illness literally affecting only birds and causing them to randomly slash people and claw their eyes out. And peeing acid urine. The only solution: To shoot at all the birds (with the four conveniently-present guns that the ex-Army guy they conveniently run into has got in his van) and to stop global warming. If that doesn’t sound bad enough, you can add in terrible computer graphics, choppy sound recording, horrifyingly awkward dialogue, glacial pacing, alarming character choices, pointless not-actually-very-sexy scenes, and hand-waved events.

Crowning moment of glorious stupid (among many): “Hey look, a fishing rod! I can go catch some fish,” says the male protagonist, surprised to discover said rod after opening the trunk of their van several times throughout the movie. “Oh look, a stove. We can go cook it.”

Everyone gets out of the car to go to the beach, where they fish for fish and gather seaweed at the seashore. As they cook what they’ve got shabu-shabu style in the open air, surprise, surprise: Eagles attack.

The Room (2003)

Let’s step away from the mutant animals for just a second, shall we?

There are a million terrible movies about love triangles and secret affairs, and by far, The Room is the worst – and the most notorious. There are three sex scenes (complete with cheesy ballads in the background) within the first half hour, with more to follow. On screen, we’ve got the blonde and needy woman, the “kind” dependable fiancé, and the infinitely better-looking best friend of said fiancé. And topping that, we’ve got a million clichés: the constant ranting about the opposite sex, the macho sissy fight over the woman, and the ignored voices of reason that tell the not-so-secret lovers to just break it off already. It shouldn’t be that hard, considering that the guy has got banshee hair and wears baggy pants. Think of it as an entire three seasons of a badly-written (and acted out) soap opera compressed into an hour and forty minutes.

Crowning moment of glorious stupid: When our two not-so-secret lovers start making out during the fiancé’s birthday party. In the living room, while everyone’s just outside. They get caught, of course. Thank goodness for poetic justice.

Anonymous Rex (2004)

And now, we return to the land of crazy premises.

Keep an open mind for this next one: Imagine if dinosaurs weren’t extinct. Got that? Good. Now imagine that the dinosaurs only faked their extinction millions of years ago, and are actually living amongst us now. Next, imagine that they use state of the art holograms to disguise themselves as other humans. And then imagine that they’re only biding their time before they decide to overthrow the humans and rule the world once more.

And is Anonymous Rex a disaster film? A ghost story? A science fiction feature? A light-hearted family comedy? No. It’s a detective film. Written in the noir style. The main character is literally a velociraptor who works as a private detective.

Go lie down and despair (or alternately, marvel) at how far humanity has come.

Crowning moment of glorious stupid: Velociraptor’s got a partner, who happens to be a triceratops. Said triceratops’ daughter gets kidnapped – when he sees the perpetrator, he runs at him and uses his horns to kill him, conveniently stabbing him and ramming him into a wire fence.

Titanic II (2010)

Unfortunately, this isn’t the sequel to Rose and Jack’s epic love story. Titanic II is literally about a ship named Titanic II, which looks almost identical to the Titanic you’re probably thinking of. Launched exactly a hundred years after the original sank. Following the exact same route that led to said sinking, except in reverse – going from New York, New York to Southampton, England.

Does that sound ominous to you? No? Let’s add in the fact that global warming has apparently caused the super-quick destruction of glaciers, which drop chunks of ice so huge that they can cause a tsunami-sized wave at any given moment. And that icebergs just might happen to be hanging around near Titanic II’s route.

Crowning moment of glorious stupid (among many): You read that memo about Titanic and icebergs, right? Well, the inevitable happens, and the entire sideboard side of the ship is crushed, putting a lot of pressure on the liner’s turbines – which explode, practically splitting the ship in half, and cause a hella huge bonfire.

And then another tsunami hits the ship and flips it upside-down.

Films that I didn’t have the courage to watch:

• Birdemic 2: The Resurrection
• Sharknado 2: The Second One
• Trolls 2
• A Talking Cat?!
• Dog Soldiers
• Foodfight!
• Robocroc
• Sharktopus
• Stonado
• Piranhaconda
• Mega Python vs. Gatoroid

Article by PaCho
Art by Yanna
All posters taken from IMDb.com
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PaCho is the nickname of a full-time fangirl who wants an infinite amount of money with which to travel the world and buy merchandise. This girl is currently amassing the skills to achieve these goals, and collecting stories and perspectives along the way (to consequently be the best that no one ever was) at a university. She will smile in satisfaction at the fall of the patriarchy and Western domination of international affairs. She is only half-joking about this (which means that she's completely serious).

Yanna is an aspiring wizard who enjoys doodling, longboarding, reading and writing. She is also a huge fan of anything Studio Ghibli, although she has yet to watch much of Hayao Miyazaki's films because most of her dvds are pirated. Although she is initially quiet and maybe even serious, those who get to know her will see just how optimistic and weird she really is.