by Riley Hodges

On July 11, 2013, SyFy released Sharknado, a made-for-television movie featuring sharks, tornadoes and California. The movie follows a group of friends as they try to meet up with Fin Shepherd’s family while running from a tornado that managed to pick up an obnoxious amount of sharks. The movie wasn’t expected to become popular, let alone get very many viewers.

The original premiere of Sharknado was viewed by 1.17 million, which was slightly below the average for SyFy’s movies. However the wacky premise instantly gained a cult following, and the movie turned into a two-part series.

On July 30, 2014, Sharknado 2: The Second One became the highest viewed premiere on the SyFy channel. The sequel follows the same plot of the first, adding a few new characters and set in New York City. The action itself is much more dramatic, and it becomes more and more clear that this movie isn’t supposed to be taken seriously.

Some critics hated it, often saying that the CGI sharks look terrible or that the movie isn’t taking itself seriously. But others said it was just dumb fun. And in the same month they released the sequel, SyFy announced a third movie for 2015.

The third movie begins in Washington DC as Fin is granted a presidential award for his heroic actions in the last two movies. (The role for president was offered to Donald Trump, but he declined as he was preparing for an actual presidential campaign.) The third movie is when the series takes a turn for the worse. In each subsequent movie (there’s six total), everything becomes exaggerated and out of this world (in some cases literally). The Last Sharknado: It’s About Time came out in 2018 and is the most ridiculous of all of them, featuring paradoxes and time travel. All the movies are really just dumb fun and they’re never boring, even when it is the third time watching.