HAVE YOU CHECKED Twitter recently? Then you may have noticed that everyone – well, practically everyone – is talking about something called Sharknado.

Here’s the graph of Twitter mentions of Sharknado for the past week:

topsy.com

What, you ask, is Sharknado? Well, it’s a new TV movie that had its US premiere last night on Syfy.

The premise:

When a freak hurricane swamps Los Angeles, nature’s deadliest killer rules sea, land, and air as thousands of sharks terrorise the waterlogged populace.

Yes, it’s a movie about a tornado full of sharks. A sharknado, if you will. See them?

It’s got Tara Reid in it AND Steve from 90210, aka Ian Ziering.

Sharknado includes the immortal lines:

They took my grandfather. So I really hate sharks.

and

Instead of letting live sharks rain down on people, we’re going to get in that chopper and throw bombs into the tornadoes.

Naturally enough, the internet hasn’t had this much fun since Snakes On A Plane.

There were weather forecasts:

Twitter/@JennJo421

There were gags:

And there were screengrabs of the moment someone killed a flying shark with a chainsaw.

Even Mia Farrow watched it, with author Philip Roth.

Here’s a trailer that gives a taster of what we in Ireland missed:

YouTube/MachinimaETC

So, was it any good? Well, no. Says the New York Daily News:

It’s absurd. It’s ridiculous. If you’re a fan of low-budget horror movies and you miss it, you will regret it for the rest of your life.

And the Hollywood Gossip adds:

The filmmakers obviously cared very little about actual story but when your story is about a tornado filled with sharks, does it really matter?

Incidentally in case you were worried, US publication Mother Jones went to the trouble of debunking the idea that a Sharknado could ever happen:

Even if a sharknado were to somehow form and begin chasing Tara Reid, it is improbable that the whirlwind of shark would pose a danger to humans beyond accidental crushing.

The campaign to bring Sharknado to Ireland starts now. SHARKNADO!

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