Shite Critter Fight

Hello. Carrying on from my last contribution, we shall again be looking at that weird rectangular item in the corner of your living room.

Television, it really is the drug of the nation, isn't it? Or is that the potent marijuana derivative skunk? I always get them mixed up. Tch.

Any road up, I have been musing just now on the genre of made-for-TV movies that I like to call Shite Critter Fights, such as the well-known Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus or the excellent Dinocroc vs Supergator:



This is in no way related to the fact that I have been 'working from home' with the Horror Channel on in the background for the last two days. Oh no. You'd be a fool and a communist to suggest so.

Keen observers will have noticed that these films do tend to follow a definite formula. I won't bother to outline how the plots start, as nobody ever actually watches these things from the beginning - we just happen across them halfway through as we're flicking around the channels trying to avoid Murder She Wrote and Everyone Loves Raymond.

But there are common elements. These include:

• Sort of Hawaiian foresty setting, like the film crew have snuck onto the Lost set at the weekend.
• Budget-friendly cast of about 5 people.
• Two enormous CGI animals (often reptiles, possibly because scales are so much easier to do than fur).
• Unshaven rough bloke with a gun, given to shooting at enormous CGI animal (off-screen).
• Hot chick in a tight black vest. She will often be a doctor / scientist / anthropolologist.
• Back-up rough blokes and hot chicks, given to pointing at enormous CGI animal (off-screen) and getting eaten/swatted by a tail (off-screen).
• Seventy minutes of waffle and running around before we get to the money shot of the two enormous CGI animals hissing and biting at each other. Oh, how they tease us.

That's basically how they all work, though I do recommend Boa vs Python for its trangressive inter-serpent sex sub-plot. Challenging:

Now, it occurs to me that we in Britain are woefully under-represented in these cinematic gems. Or rather our noble native fauna is. So, to redress this shocking imbalance, I have put together a proposal for a number of homegrown Shite Critter Fights to be developed by the BBC. I mean, they can do Walking With Monsters and all those Attenborough Refuses To Retire Even Though He Talks Like He's Had A Stroke series, so this should be a doddle. It'll knock the pants off Springwatch. Check it:

• Megafox vs Starbadger
• Duckzilla vs King Coot
• Voleociraptor vs Dinoshrew
• Slayworm vs Grossnake
• Terrorgoose vs Cyberswan

I was going to spend the rest of the evening trawling Google Images for likely wildlife pictures to mash up into movie posters with Photoshop Elements, but even I have a life. Besides, Cobra vs Komodo is on later.