Hydra: The Lost Island

Another reviewer described this as being superior for a Sci-Fi Channel TV production. He was wrong. This is very much par for the course for the channel, a cheesy CGI-filled slice of monster mayhem in which various assembled non-actors are bumped off one by one on a remote island by the titular creature.

The ridiculous set-up of the narrative is particularly amusing here. There's a remote island in the Mediterranean where a group of archaeologists just happen to be conducting an expedition when they fall foul of the titular beastie. At the same time, and most bizarrely, there's a MOST DANGEROUS GAME-style hunt going on too, where some big game hunters are tracking down convicted criminals and get cash prizes if they manage to murder them.

Inevitably the stories all combine but in the most ordinary way imaginable. HYDRA is for the most part a repetitive production in which almost the entire cast is bumped off before the survivors finally figure out a way to combat the monster. The acting is poor and the CGI effects typically awful for a Sci Fi Channel production. There's little more to say really other than you know what you're going to get with this one.

HEY EVERYBODY ITS ME, (4) .......and today we review ......a big ol snake monster movie .....multi headed snake monster that is ......

SO standard FX from back when digital / CGI was terrible.... my kids have made better CGI FX drawing with crayons lol.....but i can appreciate the attempt, especially the "temple" scene with the green screen/digital over lay of old statues lol... i mean it ALMOST worked .... colour was pretty close ...... so you at least get a gold star for that one .... good job buddy ....

i did enjoy seeing some great actors in here though ... guys like that creeping captain guy whos has always been awesome ..... also the chubby dude from peewees great adventure and the leprechaun movies LOL ........so i mean ... the acting portion was decent at least ........had a solid cast of the average people to die ... like the jocky guy, the token black dude , who i might add survived a long time actually .... the bimbo chick .... the nerd science chick ...so this almost was a slasher film if you think about it , except it took place during the day , AND honestly if should have been night shots , that probably would have helped ALOT with the cgi parts .........

PLOTHOLE: if hercules already killed it with the sword that could kill it then why is it back again and they need the sword to kill it ?!??!!!!??!?!?... real talk though ...... obviously he didnt do a very good job the first time or he wouldnt be dead and the giant snake monster thing would be .......ALSO showing the entire body MIGHT have been a bad idea as well .... i mean we all KNOW what it should look like ...but that doesnt mean we should actually see it on screen because WOW it just ends up looking like a REALLY bad hand puppet .... like a glove with snake heads on the end ......

over all this is a pretty average kind of creature feature for the mid 2000's late 2000's when cgi ruled the film world and honestly it was/is a double edged sword ....hopfully NOT wielded by herk there lol... but its bad because it was cheap to mass produce SO many creature movies and it over saturated the market for the longest time ...cheap fast flicks ......but not quality ....... sadly .... this was semi entertaining because i love giant monster movies / creature features , a call back to my younger days staying up late nights watching the all night monster marathons .........

3/10.

Do you want me to start with the good news or the bad news? Well, the good news is that Hydra is not the worst SyFy's done, and it's not quite bad enough to be down there as one of their worst. The scenery is atmospheric, and the photography and editing are better than the choppy standard I have come to expect. Also the hydra itself actually looks good, not amazing, but compared to the cheap-looking and stilted-moving effects before and since this movie it is a considerable improvement. The bad news is that Hydra is still not a good movie, I have seen worse by all means but it was still lame. The main problem here was the story, a good idea on paper and is better paced than most SyFy movies but on film it was predictable and could have been developed much more than it was. The characters are the same, they are not as annoying as other SyFy efforts but still clichéd and you don't learn much about them. The hydra was not bad in look, but like the rest of the characters, you don't really feel threatened partly because the killings and gore lacked tension and had a you've-seen-it-all-before vibe and also that Hydra makes little to no attempt to expand on the hydra's origins and the like. The script is cheesy and doesn't feel like it's flowing naturally, and while they admittedly don't have much to work with the actors do nothing in their body language or their delivery to elevate the characters and script. For want of a better word, it all felt bland. All in all, a lame movie but I've seen worse. 3/10 Bethany Cox

(2009) Hydra HORROR

Straight-to-rental low budget cheapie because the special effects of the creature "Hydra" who can also rejuvenate itself like a worm looks super fake like a copy-and-paste image from a low grade computer, centers on some lazy wealthy tycoons attempting to find an abandoned island so they could hunt some citizens who have recent criminal records for the exception of a navy SEAL which viewers were not supposed to know until later. And at the beginning, young archeologists are trying to find some old artifacts of the hydra unbeknownst that the hydra is still alive who ends up eating the whole crew leaving only one survivor behind and no boat to go to because it sank when she was attempting to escape- how convenient, forcing her to wait for another ship. Bomb.

As much I want to like it I didnt last 10 minutes, really not worth it.