''Lavalantula'' is an American 2015

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

comedy horror Comedy horror, also known as horror comedy, is a literary genre, literary, television genre, television, and film genre that combines elements of comedy and horror fiction. Comedy horror has been described as able to be categorized under three ty ...

thriller television film that takes place after a series of volcanic eruptions in Los Angeles unleashes a swarm of gigantic,

lava Lava is molten or partially molten rock (magma) that has been expelled from the interior of a terrestrial planet (such as Earth) or a moon onto its surface. Lava may be erupted at a volcano or through a fracture in the crust, on land or un ...

-breathing

tarantula Tarantulas comprise a group of large and often hairy spiders of the family Theraphosidae. , 1,040 species have been identified, with 156 genera. The term "tarantula" is usually used to describe members of the family Theraphosidae, although ...

s from which the film draws its title. It was directed by Mike Mendez and stars

Steve Guttenberg Steven Robert Guttenberg (born August 24, 1958) is an American actor, author, businessman, producer, and director. He is known for his lead roles in Hollywood films of the 1980s and 1990s, including '' Cocoon'', ''Police Academy'', ''Three Men a ...

Nia Peeples Virenia "Nia" Peeples (born December 10, 1961) is an American R&B and dance music singer and actress. Peeples is known for playing Nicole Chapman on the hit TV series '' Fame''; Pam Fields on the drama ''Pretty Little Liars''; Karen Taylor Win ...

and

Patrick Renna Patrick Maxwell Renna (born March 3, 1979) is an American actor and film producer best known for his role as Hamilton "Ham" Porter in the 1993 baseball film The Sandlot. Some of his more recent projects include, ''Bad Roomies'', which is Patri ...

Ian Ziering Ian Andrew Ziering (; born March 30, 1964) is an American actor best known for his role as Steve Sanders on the television series ''Beverly Hills, 90210'', which he played from 1990 to 2000. He is also the voice of Vinnie on ''Biker Mice from M ...

appears as

Fin Shepard Fin Shepard is a fictional character and the protagonist of the ''Sharknado'' film series. He is a former surfer and shark hunter, who is played by Ian Ziering in all the films. He is a positive hero, protecting his family and the rest of the wor ...

, tying the film into the ''

Sharknado ''Sharknado'' is a 2013 American made-for-television science fiction comedy disaster film directed by Anthony C. Ferrante. It tells about a waterspout that lifts sharks out of the ocean and deposits them in Los Angeles. It is the first installm ...

'' universe. It premiered on

Syfy Syfy (formerly Sci-Fi Channel, later shortened to Sci Fi; stylized as SYFY) is an American basic cable channel owned by the NBCUniversal Television and Streaming division of Comcast's NBCUniversal through NBCUniversal Cable Entertainment. Lau ...

on July 25, 2015.

Plot

A-list An A-list actor is a major movie star, or one of the most bankable actors in a film industry. The A-list is part of a larger guide called ''The Hot List'', which ranks the bankability of 1,400 movie actors worldwide, and has become an industry ...

actor Colton West has an argument with Darren the film director, and storms off in his car. An

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...

hits, and Colton sees the

Santa Monica Mountains The Santa Monica Mountains is a coastal mountain range in Southern California, next to the Pacific Ocean. It is part of the Transverse Ranges. Because of its proximity to densely populated regions, it is one of the most visited natural areas in ...

erupt, spewing

volcanic bomb A volcanic bomb or lava bomb is a mass of partially molten rock (tephra) larger than 64 mm (2.5 inches) in diameter, formed when a volcano ejects viscous fragments of lava during an eruption. Because volcanic bombs cool after they l ...

s all around him. A large fire-spitting spider comes out of the car in front of him. Colton runs and drives out of the traffic back onto the main road to escape. Colton arrives home, and tells his wife Olivia about the giant spiders and that they need to leave. He takes a shotgun from his house and drives off in his car to find his son Wyatt, who had left the house under the guise of going to a soccer game. In reality, Wyatt is out with his friends Jordan, Eli and Travis when they hear an explosion and see much smoke in the distance, and go to investigate. The teenagers find the source of the explosion to be a

sink hole A sinkhole is a depression or hole in the ground caused by some form of collapse of the surface layer. The term is sometimes used to refer to doline, enclosed depressions that are locally also known as ''vrtače'' and shakeholes, and to openi ...

. Spiders come out of the hole spitting fire and start attacking people. Terrified, the teenagers flee to a warehouse, but Eli is caught by a spider and killed. Colton's car is damaged when he hits a lava sinkhole. He gets out and finds a tour bus full of people further up the road. He tricks the driver and steals the bus. As he is driving, a spider jumps onto the bus. He brakes heavily and the spider falls off the front of the bus, after which he runs it over. The front of the tour bus starts dissolving because of the spider's blood being acidic. Colton stops the bus and evacuates it just before it blows up. A spider comes down the chimney in Olivia's house but she shoots it. The army starts moving into the city, and they rescue Olivia from her house. Colton gets a lift from his friend, Pirate Jack, a film

stunt man A stunt performer, often called a stuntman or stuntwoman and occasionally stuntperson or stunt-person, is a trained professional who performs daring acts, often as a career. Stunt performers usually appear in films or on television, as opposed ...

. Jack's car gets a puncture after hitting a lava vein in the road. Spiders come out of sink holes and chase them into a museum. They meet a scientist in the museum, who is researching the spiders and the volcano. He works out that the spiders were buried in the magma millions of years ago. Because the spiders became active, they are causing the

volcanic eruptions Several types of volcanic eruptions—during which lava, tephra (ash, lapilli, volcanic bombs and volcanic blocks), and assorted gases are expelled from a volcanic vent or fissure—have been distinguished by volcanologists. These are often ...

, and that the only way to stop them is to kill the Queen spider. A spider gets in through a window in the warehouse where the teenagers are hiding and tries to attack them. Wyatt fights the spider with a fire extinguisher. Jordan, who was burnt earlier, has a fit and dies. Then loads of baby spiders crawl out of her as she catches fire. The baby spiders then attack Travis, setting him on fire and killing him. Wyatt runs to the roof of the warehouse where he gets a phone signal and texts his location to Colton. The spiders attack the army truck Olivia is in, she hides under a

fire blanket A fire blanket is a safety device designed to extinguish incipient (starting) fires. It consists of a sheet of a fire retardant material that is placed over a fire in order to smother it. Small fire blankets, such as for use in kitchens and aro ...

as they breathe fire inside the truck. The soldiers all get killed and Olivia kills the spider and drives off in the army truck to try and find Colton. Meanwhile, the spiders break into the museum. Jack is killed, but Colton manages to escape. Olivia finds Colton and they drive off to rescue Wyatt. Wyatt climbs off the roof of the warehouse, and is attacked by a spider. Olivia and Colton arrive and run over the spider with the Army truck. Colton realizes that

liquid nitrogen Liquid nitrogen—LN2—is nitrogen in a liquid state at low temperature. Liquid nitrogen has a boiling point of about . It is produced industrially by fractional distillation of liquid air. It is a colorless, low viscosity liquid that is wide ...

can be used to fight the spiders. They all go to the

special effect Special effects (often abbreviated as SFX, F/X or simply FX) are illusions or visual tricks used in the theatre, film, television, video game, amusement park and simulator industries to simulate the imagined events in a story or virtual wor ...

s store, where Colton finds his colleagues from the film set. Colton makes a plan to kill the queen spider with a liquid nitrogen bomb, made using items from the special effects store. He leaves with his film crew, to drop the bombs into the queen’s underground chamber. They plant the bombs around the chamber and detonate them. Many spiders come out of sinkholes to the surface. The

film crew A film crew is a group of people, hired by a production company, for the purpose of producing a film or motion picture. The crew is distinguished from the cast, as the cast are understood to be the actors who appear in front of the camera o ...

shoots them all down. Then, the giant queen spider comes to the surface. Colton uses a jet pack from the film set and flies off a building towards the queen spider. He drops a nitrogen bomb into the spider's mouth, killing it and saving the city.

Cast

as Colton West, a former A-List actor *

as Olivia West, Colton West's wife *

as Chris, a tourist *

Michael Winslow Michael Leslie Winslow (born September 6, 1958) is an American actor, comedian and beatboxer billed as The Man of 10,000 Sound Effects for his ability to make realistic sounds using only his voice. He is best known for his roles in all seven ''Po ...

as Marty, part of the film crew *

Marion Ramsey Marion Ramsey (May 10, 1947 – January 7, 2021) was an American actress and singer. She was a regular on the series ''Cos'' but is best known for her role as the soft-spoken Officer Laverne Hooks in the '' Police Academy'' films. Later she app ...

as Teddie, part of the film crew *

Leslie Easterbrook Leslie Easterbrook is an American actress and producer. She played Sgt./Lt./Capt. Debbie Callahan in the ''Police Academy'' films and Rhonda Lee on the television series ''Laverne & Shirley''. Early life Easterbrook was adopted when she was nin ...

as Doris, Olivia's friend *

Ralph Garman Ralph Garman (born November 17, 1964) is an American actor, comedian, saxophonist, drummer and radio host best known as the host of ''The Joe Schmo Show'', for his voice work on the Fox animated series ''Family Guy'', former entertainment reporte ...

as Pirate Jack, an ex-film stunt man *

Danny Woodburn Daniel Charles Woodburn (born July 26, 1964) is an American actor, comedian, and activist for the disability rights movement linked to his dwarfism. He played Mickey Abbott on the sitcom '' Seinfeld''. He has more than 150 television and 30 ...

as Arni, Colton West's agent * Noah Hunt as Wyatt West, Colton West's son * Diana Hopper as Jordan, a friend of Wyatt * Time Winters as Dr. Eric Von Struble, a scientist *

, main character from ''

'' * Zac Goodspeed as Travis, a friend of Wyatt * Ben Snowden as Eli, a friend of Wyatt *

Felisha Cooper Felisha Cooper (born September 8, 1992) is an American actress. She is known for her role as Sasha Thompson on ''The Bold and the Beautiful''. Early life and education Cooper was born in Fayetteville, North Carolina to Kimberly Gibson (née J ...

as Britney, Arni's assistant

Sequel

A sequel to ''Lavalantula'' called ''2 Lava 2 Lantula'' premiered on Syfy on August 6, 2016. Some of the cast from the original film returned, including Steve Guttenberg, Marion Ramsey and Michael Winslow.

References

External links

* {{Sharknado 2015 television films 2015 films 2015 horror films 2010s science fiction horror films 2015 horror thriller films CineTel Films films Syfy original films Films shot in Los Angeles Films set in Los Angeles Films about spiders 2010s monster movies American monster movies American science fiction horror films Giant monster films Sharknado (film series) American comedy horror films American science fiction comedy films American comedy television films American science fiction television films 2010s American films