I actually took the time to watch yet another disaster flick on the Spanish language channel UniMás. While I did do some live-tweeting which contains a few "MST3K"-inspired quips, the re-viewing experience was torturous, especially when I learned this was a three-hour show. This TV movie followed the blueprint for your typical average disaster flick. But while the plot was nothing new & detestable, the characters were even worse, particularly w/ that one guy, um, Secretary of Defense or something, acting as evil as a villain in a Jean-Claude Van Damme film (also aired often on UniMás), & that's quite too evil when it comes to a "disasterpiece." Maxim Roy as Dr. Jane spends the first half looking like she's got indigestion from eating at Wienerschnitzel. & after she's escaped the devious Beltway, she becomes an acceptable love interest for Matthew Modine. I'm sure that the climax of the film, which was when Modine & Co. fought off certain apocalypse, actually took place in the middle, because afterwards, "CAT.8" transforms into a conspiracy thriller, w/ some occasional CGI disasters, such as the never-realistic & cartoonish instant canyon. & I knew the science of this movie was noticeably screwy when the government could shoot a laser at the sun, reach it in a manner of picoseconds, & solar flares could actually pose a genocidal threat. If I must say something positive, at least the SFX looked, um somewhat professional. But in conclusion, "CAT.8" is just a big, prolonged hot mess in many ways.

Its a shame someone like Mathew Modine was suckered into this. He is good as usual at keeping a solid character portrayal but thats where it all ends. After that this is probably one of the hardest things I have ever made myself watch. A real lousy implementation of VFX. The fact that his partner did not complain to someone is totally unreal. Let us not forget of course the complete misrepresentation of scientific fact. Finally what happened to the payback against secretary of defense and his sidekick. The ending is a complete let down. Who ever funded this must be regretting it now! Don't waist your time unless you wan to see how not to make a sci-fi. This is more like a bad drama.

At the outset, let it be understood that there is virtually no suspension of disbelief to be found in this sci-fi folly.Science, and science fiction fans more importantly, understand that some scientific capital must be invested in a science fiction narrative to make it at least partially believable. No such investment occurred here, and therein lies the beginning of a bailout that never happened.The absence of suspension of disbelief is well supported. There clearly was a vulgar absence of scientific research within the arena's of the scientific disciplines upon which the (weak) foundation of this cinematic effort was based.Enough of this. Sci-fi fans of any stripe will understand the elements that are lacking. And that would be all of them. Satellites falling from orbit to impact Earth within MINUTES of critical solar events? International Space Station hitting the Earth and delivering an impact equivalent to the destruction delivered by hundreds of megatons of nuclear bombs? The I.S.S. is pretty much comprised of what amounts to little more than aluminum foil. The electro-magnetic effects of solar events assailing the Earth in mere seconds?It's hard not to laugh out loud at the sheer absurdity of these film elements. Oh wait. I did laugh. Out loud.The acting was careless and amateurish at best. Even veteran actor Matthew Modine delivered a performance that was stiff and over-rehearsed. The characters of the President and Vice President of the United States were just plain spooky and damned creepy. Personally, I feel the characters of the Prez and the Veep required lobotomies. That may seem a radical concept, but they *are* playing US politicians -- the majority of whom have already been lobotomized, I'd venture to guess. If you watch this film to its conclusion, I have the contact number for Lobotomies-R-Us.

Out of the four mini-series personally viewed in the past two weeks airing on the SyFy channel, CAT.8 is better than Ring of Fire(though at least that had Terry O'Quinn) and especially the irredeemably terrible Meteor with Christopher Lloyd. But of the four the best was Eve of Destruction, although that was a long way from great that looked reasonably good and at least four of the actors were convincing. CAT.8 also has some better-than-average acting, Matthew Modine is a commendable lead, and the production values(apart from some hokey effects) are reasonable, basic though with some signs of atmospheric. On the whole however CAT.8 doesn't work. What really lets things down is the story and the science. To say that the science is questionable is an understatement in itself, if anything it is a disaster, so bad that experts would feel tempted to bail out halfway through the first half. It honestly sounded like the writers were making things up with no research and it was very difficult to believe any of it. As a result the story was implausible and had little if any credibility. Unfortunately also for the story it didn't feel enough to sustain the three hours, so it felt like a thin structure interwoven with a lot of padding, ham-fisted melodrama/exposition, underdeveloped sub-plotting and an overlong length. If you think the first half takes too long to get going and is implausible, wait until you see the second half, like with the Meteor, Ring of Fire and even Eve of Destruction it gets increasingly dull and illogical. The script is underwritten, cheesy and very awkward, another one of those instances where it came through clearly that the writers hadn't properly checked to see whether what they'd written and given the actors made sense. The music is turgid and unmemorable, the pacing is pedestrian and stretches the story out too much, the characters are nowhere near developed enough which is inexcusable for a mini-series of this length and generally CAT.8 feels under-directed and characterless. On the whole, there is worse out there but this was rather poor stuff, the best assets are the production values and the acting but the story, script, pacing and especially the science bog things down considerably. 3/10 Bethany Cox