Deep Blue Sea



""You killed my bird.""

Dr. Susan McCallister, her team of scientists, and shark wrangler Jake Carter are researching a cure for Alzheimer's in a refurbished WWII Submarine refueling platform, using sharks to "grow" a protein that reactivates dead human neurons. However, the sharks' brains were too small, and the amounts of protein harvested were so small as to make the efforts unviable, so they use genetic engineering to give them larger brains. They kept the sharks corralled in an unbreakable mesh cage submerged in the ocean along with their labs. What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

After one of the sharks escapes and causes a PR fiasco, Russell Franklin, the CEO of the company funding their research, comes in to inspect their progress and see if they should be funded or shut down. Of course something Goes Horribly Wrong Right.

Characters include:
 * Dr. Susan McCallister: A scientist on a mission. Being The Caretaker for her ailing, Alzheimer's-ridden father has given her the drive necessary to eradicate the disease. However, her ethics and judgment regarding GE aren't up to snuff. She and Carter have a lot of UST.
 * Jake Carter: Loner with a Dark and Troubled Past, he knows what Susan is doing and wants her to stop, but she reminds him of his job prospects if they fail. A surprisingly nautical Action Hero.
 * Russell Franklin: Played by Samuel L. Jackson, this CEO survived an avalanche in the Himalayas. He survived ice, how hard can a few sharks be?
 * Sherman "Preacher" Dudley: The Comic Relief cook, a Bible-quoting man with a profanity-spewing parrot mascot. Unlike Franklin, he has little expectation of getting out of this alive.

""They ate me! A fuckin' shark ate me!"""
 * All There Is to Know About "The Crying Game": Sedgwick Speech is far more famous than any other scene in the movie.

"Russel Franklin: I'm just amazed we've come so far so fast without genetic tampering. Scientist: You know that's illegal."
 * As the Good Book Says...: That's why they call him "Preacher".
 * As You Know: It had to be brought up so that scientists could claim they hadn't. Even more awkward because it's Samuel L. Jackson talking Science.


 * Batman Gambit:
 * Badass Preacher:
 * Big Bad: The sharks.
 * Black Dude Dies First: There are actually two black dudes; one a heroic leader figure played by Samuel L. Jackson and the other a secondary character separated from the main group with his own B-plot played by rapper LL Cool James. Guess which dies first?
 * Darkness Equals Death
 * Darkest Hour:
 * Lampshaded.
 * Dead Star Walking
 * Death by Irony:.
 * Death by Sex: With drunk teens no less. Subverted, though it did attract the escaped shark in the opening.
 * Decoy Protagonist
 * Did Not Do the Research: Some of the stuff the sharks do is just not physically possible, even if they were smart enough to think to try.
 * Like swimming backwards. Sharks physically can't swim backwards; it has nothing to do with how smart they are.
 * Although, to be fair, this is pointed out by one of the characters who states something to the effect of: "That shark just swam backwards. That's impossible! Sharks can't do that." However, as the sharks aren't just stated as being smarter as a result of the scientist's genetic tampering, but also faster and stronger, it's feasible to presume that the genetic changes were to more than their brains. If those changes also affected their basic physiology, too, perhaps those changes made it possible for them to sudden swim backwards.
 * The MythBusters examined the climax of the film and determined that most of it was not possible.
 * Even a real mako could clear that fence with almost twenty feet to spare.
 * Carter's tiger shark. Tigers don't have pointed snouts.
 * Everything Is Even Worse With Sharks
 * Famous Last Words

"Carter: "That's the answer to the riddle. Because that's what an 8000-pound mako thinks about. About freedom. About the Deep Blue Sea.""
 * Fan Service: Susan is being stalked through the flooded complex by a shark. She comes up with a plan to electrocute the shark, which requires an insulating sheet, which requires her to strip off her wetsuit.
 * Focus Group Ending: This is why, contrary to genre expectations, All things considered, it worked out pretty well.
 * For Science!: Averted. The cast rails against Susan's experiments, but it was never "for science," just for her dead father.
 * That pissed her off, and stated that she doesn't need to justify her actions.
 * Gone Horribly Right: Their efforts to make the shark's brains bigger succeeded spectacularly...
 * It helps that the intelligence was just a byproduct instead of the goal.
 * Gone Horribly Wrong: The shark's escape wasn't exactly as planned though.
 * Great White Hunter: Carter.
 * Hot Scientist: Susan.
 * Idiot Ball:
 * Ignored Expert: Jake Carter tries to convince the "good" doctor that her plan is spectacularly ill-concieved.
 * Obviousness levels approaching Only Sane Man territory.
 * It Can Think
 * Jaws First Person Perspective: It had to open with one.
 * Kill'Em All:
 * Kill It with Fire: One way to kill a shark.
 * MacGuffin: The Alzheimer's data disk Susan was trying to salvage..
 * Night Swim Equals Death: Subverted in the beginning. Played straight later.
 * Ominous Crack: Shortly after the extraction of brain tissue from one of the genetically engineered mako sharks, is attacked by the supposedly sedated animal and has to be rushed to the surface. During the chaos that ensues, 's stretcher is dropped into the water by the crashing rescue helicopter and one of the sharks throws it against the laboratory's observation window, resulting in an Ominous Crack.
 * Polly Wants a Microphone: Preacher's parrot.
 * Pre-Mortem One-Liner: "You ate my bird."
 * Scale of Scientific Sins: Giving sharks, already apex predators, an intelligence boost?! Yeah, people are gonna die.
 * Screw Learning, I Have Phlebotinum
 * Shock and Awe: Another way to kill a shark.
 * Short-Lived Aerial Escape: The Trope Namer is the director, after all.
 * Stock Sharks: Well, there are no dinosaurs here, but almost all shark attack films have the stock shark: the Great White. This one subverts it by making them mako sharks.
 * Could be Shown Their Work too, as real makos are among the smarter and more agile of shark species. A great white wouldn't have done so well at navigating the flooded corridors.
 * Might be attributed to Rule of Scary, as the pointed and jagged teeth of the mutated makos in this film are considerably scarier than the triangular ones of the Great White.
 * Shut Up, Kirk: An effective one. By a shark.
 * Supporting Protagonist: Let's face it. Preacher single-handedly kills one shark, miraculously saves everyone when one of their escape attempts fails, and in the end He's also the only person in the entire movie who survives a direct attack by one of the sharks (the biggest one no less), even partially blinding it in the process.
 * Carter also fits, as Susan is supposedly the focus of the movie (she's even in the poster).
 * Super-Persistent Predator: The sharks; Tom Jane even points out that sharks don't particularly like the taste of people. Justified because
 * Survival Mantra: Starts Biblical ("Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil. For thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life.") then the blackness kicks in ("Because I carry a big stick and I'm the meanest mother fucker in the valley! Two sharks down, Lord! One demon fish to go! Can I get an Amen?").
 * Take My Hand:
 * Title Drop
 * Take My Hand:
 * Title Drop
 * Title Drop


 * Too Dumb to Live: Russell Franklin's best plan to escape the lowest level of the facility was to try to out-swim two freaking sharks to the surface. Fortunately, one of the other survivors tears this plan to pieces by comparing the swimming speeds of average humans and average sharks (the sharks unsurprisingly being several orders of magnitude faster), and provides a less-suicidal method of escape.
 * Fridge Logic sets in. He survived an avalanche in the Himalayas. Certainly there were sacrifices there... he's giving everyone a fair chance to not be the one who gets eaten. What he underestimates is how much faster the sharks are than humans in the water, so much so that no one was making it to the surface intact. Not once did he think that everyone would survive the swim.
 * In other words, "I don't have to be faster than the shark, I just have to be faster than you." (While not realizing that the shark is fast enough to get you and you and you and then you.)
 * Unresolved Sexual Tension: between Carter and Susan.
 * Well-Intentioned Extremist:.
 * What the Hell, Hero?: Dr. Susan's actions prior to the film.
 * Wrong Genre Savvy: Preacher, though at times it actually works out to his advantage.