Horror Movie Review: Chupacabra: Dark Seas (2005)

A SyFy original *shudder*, Chupacabra: Dark Seas was directed by John Shepphird who co-wrote it with Steve Jankowski. It stars John Rhys-Davies, Giancarlo Esposito, Dylan Neal, and Chelan Simmons.

Unsurprisingly the plot surrounds the legend of the Chupacabra. A legendary creature from the folklore of parts of the Americas. Dr. Peña (Giancarlo Esposito) has been searching for the creature most of his life and has finally found it and captured it on a remote Caribbean island. He needs to get it back to his lab so decides to smuggle it aboard a cruise ship.

Obviously a terrible idea as once the ship is at sea, the creature escapes and begins killing and maiming everyone on board. It’s up to Captain Randolph (Rhys-Davies), his daughter Jenny (Simmons) and the Federal Marshal Lance Thompson (Neal) to stop it. As a side plot, the latter is on board to investigate a robbery. This angle is used to break up the slow moments with some attempts at comedy. It’s needed as Chupacabra: Dark Seas has a lot of slow moments but is rarely amusing.

There’s no point getting mad at SyFy for such an unoriginal idea as it is par for the course for them. If you’re going in hoping for something original, you’ve made a mistake. Instead all you should be hoping for is a short, horror filled and entertaining watch. This is not Chupacabra: Dark Seas with its biggest flaw being just how long and boring it is.

It drags on and on and on and on and on to the point of madness. When we do get some form of action it’s rarely worthwhile as the monster looks pretty terrible. It has some decent gory effects but it’s nowhere strong enough to make this a worthwhile watch.

Then there is the acting. We have here a cast who look like they would rather be anywhere else doing anything else. Their characters are impossibly bland and the dialogue is cliched meaning so much of what is said goes in one ear and out the other. Not that it matters as rarely does anyone say anything of actual substance.

It’s not the worst SyFy original you’ll ever see but it’s also far from the best. If you can put up with poor plot, bad characters and tired acting you’ll at least find some gruesome enough gore to enjoy. Hardly a worthwhile watch though.