Shiver Me Timbers

Shiver Me Timbers is the third (and hopefully last) Popeye horror film I have seen this year, after Popeye's Revenge and Popeye The Slayer Man. This one isn't the worst (That would be Popeye's Revenge), but it's close. Shiver Me Timbers' heart is in the right place, I suppose, with a suitably ridiculous plot and a decent amount of OTT violence, but the execution is extremely weak: the direction is basic, the script is terrible, the acting is amateurish, and there is an over-reliance on bad digital special effects. Even Popeye is CGI at times.

Set in 1986, the dumb plot sees a group of friends camping out so that they can witness Halley's Comet and the accompanying meteor shower. In the film's cleverest moment (make that the ONLY clever moment), a meteor is seen plummeting to Earth, but instead of causing a cataclysmic impact, the flaming rock is revealed to be minuscule, landing in an elderly sailor's pipe. The tiny rock causes the sailor to mutate, the man becoming a murderous, muscular maniac who goes on a killing spree, targeting the teenagers.

With a bigger budget and a lot more talent involved, this could have been very entertaining, but with incredibly unlikeable characters, a pathetic Popeye (he doesn't even have the character's massive forearms), an annoying use of horror movie quotes and references, and a finalé that is laughably bad, the film fails on almost every level. On paper, the ending must've sounded awesome, with final girl Olive (Amy Mackie) arming herself with a massive meteor-powered rotary saw to battle Popeye, but the reality is an ineptly handled mess, with some truly awful CGI.

2.5/10, rounded down to 2 for the lame Evil Dead inspired final scene. Not groovy.

This movie isn't your usual horror-it's more about having fun than being scary. It's over-the-top, playful, and designed to entertain. The filmmakers did a great job capturing the 80s vibe, and their Popeye character was surprisingly solid. The deaths were definitely the highlight-bloody, creative, and full of dark humor. The final scene brought a lot of energy. I'd recommend this movie if you're just looking for something light and enjoyable, without expecting any serious scares. It's not trying to be serious, but it's a blast to watch. I had a great time, and it left me smiling. It's the kind of movie you watch for fun, not scares.

Absolutely nobody who puts this movie on is expecting an oscar winner nor anything serious. Why people are hating on this when it's been done deliberately that bad it becomes good and hits all the hilarity you could expect from a movie of this ilk... I'm sorry but this is definitely a 6 and will keep you laughing all the way through just for the sheer hilarity. They nailed this, fun night in. Only idiots would actually expect this to be a serious movie. What's not to like about a old aged pensioner who smokes a pipe fishing getting hit by an asteroid and then turning into a pot smoking serial killing meathead.

This film knows exactly knows what it wants to be - a sincere homage to the low-budget horror movies of the '80s - and director, Paul Stephen Mann, has assembled a crew and cast more than capable of helping him achieve this vision.

With references to the video nasties of Raimi, Craven throughout and gore aplenty, the film follows in the tradition of 'good time' horror films, made on a shoestring by fans and for fans. This could be something made by Troma, minus the unnecessary nudity and misogyny.

Mostly practical effects, augmented by some decent CG (especially for the money - the Jurassic World films still can't get anywhere close to what the original film did with a couple puppeteers in veloceraptor leggings), this akin to something made by a young Peter Jackson. Filmed in Scotland in September, mostly during the night, I'm surprised none of the actors died of hypothermia from the no-doubt freezing blood they are frequently drenched in.

The actors all around nail their assignment and the crew are clearly top of their game, particularly the make up and practical effects, recreating both a believable nostalgia for the 80s as well as the numerous injuries and bloody deaths incurred almost every character.

I suppose the question might be, why would people so talented make a 'Popeye' film and not something more 'original'? Particularly when many of the negative reviews seem fixated on this, focussing on what they misunderstand to be flaws in the film (rather than deliberate referential codes) to reinforce an opinion formed before they even saw it.

The answer would be, well, why not? This is clearly the film that Mann wanted to make and the cast and crew have achieved this 100%. Any review that takes the premise of 'why can't this thing be a different thing?' doesn't hold any weight, and perhaps said reviewers would benefit from rewatching the end of Ratatouille. It is always easier to complain from a distance; creating something is hard and making a film is among the hardest. So well done to all involved.

So, if you're looking for knowingly cheesy and bloody (haha) good riff on 80s shlock classics, check this out. It is considerably better than many of the films that followed in the wake of Grindhouse and, at just over an hour, it even excises much of the tedious first acts of too many of the films it homages, so you can get straight to the good stuff. Get the beers in and watch with friends.

I have to admit that I harbored zero expectations to this movie, as I sat down to watch it. Yeah, I've watch two other horror movies with Popeye and they been pretty terrible. But I still opted to watch "Shiver Me Timbers" on account of it being a movie that I hadn't already seen.

But this movie was God awful. Writer and director Paul Stephen Mann managed to maul E. C. Segar's work to a bloody pulp. And not in a good way. Nay, this was horrible in oh so many ways. Sure, the script was pretty straightforward for a slasher movie, but the attempts at incorporating comedy just made it into an even bigger mess than it already was. So yeah, you're not in for anything grand here.

Of course I was not familiar with a single actor or actress that starred in this travesty of a movie. Sure, some of the acting performances were actually fair.

The special effects in the movie were exactly that; special. Most of them actually had me laughing at how utterly ridiculous it was. And the fact that Popeye looks like some kind of mutated meatloaf and Colonel Guile from the fairly laughable 1994 "Street Fighter" movie just didn't work out in the least bit. Sure, some of the gore effects were actually passable and fair enough.

Writer and director Paul Stephen Mann doesn't seem to know how beheadings work, as there are two of them in the movie; and one has the guy still screaming after the head is chopped off, and the other has a girl's eyes going left and right after her head is chopped off.

"Shiver Me Timbers" is seriously the worst of movies based on the Popeye character so far.

I wouldn't even recommend this movie to newcomers of the slasher horror genre. Nay, "Shiver Me Timbers" was just hands down a terrible movie. Do yourself a huge favor and skip this one. Don't waste 73 minutes on watching this dumpster fire. Some of us literally suffered through this garbage, so you don't have to; you're quite welcome.

If you're looking for a quick way to end a friendship, recommend "Shiver Me Timbers" to a friend and watch the friendship melt away like a guy put into a barrel of acid that just happens to be around (which actually also happens in this movie).

My rating of writer and director Paul Stephen Mann's abysmal 2025 movie "Shiver Me Timbers" lands on a very generous one out of ten stars.