If you spent any time hanging around video stores in the eighties or obsessed over movie trivia on early internet forums, you’ve probably heard of Jaws 3 People 0. It sounds like a joke. Honestly, it was supposed to be. But this isn't just some urban legend or a fan-made meme that spiraled out of control; it was a legitimate, green-lit project from National Lampoon and Universal Pictures that almost changed the entire trajectory of the Jaws franchise.
Instead of the semi-serious aquatic horror we eventually got with Jaws 3-D, we nearly ended up with a R-rated, cocaine-fueled, meta-parody.
Think about the late seventies for a second. Jaws had basically invented the summer blockbuster in 1975. Jaws 2 came out in 1978 and, while it didn't have the soul of Spielberg’s original, it made a mountain of cash. Universal knew they had a golden goose, but they also knew the formula was getting a bit stale. Enter the wildcards from National Lampoon. At the time, they were the kings of comedy after the massive success of Animal House. The pitch was simple: if we can't make them scream anymore, let's make them laugh until they puke.
What Jaws 3 People 0 Was Actually Going to Be
The script was penned by Todd Carroll and John Hughes. Yeah, that John Hughes—the guy who would go on to define the eighties with The Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Back then, he was a hungry writer at the Lampoon. The premise of Jaws 3 People 0 was delightfully insane. It wasn't a sequel about a shark eating people in a new location. It was a movie about a film crew trying to make Jaws 3.
It was meta before meta was a thing.
The plot kicked off with the director of the "movie within the movie," a character named Joe Dante (named after the real director of Piranha and Gremlins), being eaten by a shark in his own swimming pool. From there, the story followed a group of incompetent filmmakers, a washed-up star, and a series of increasingly ridiculous shark attacks that defied all logic. It was intended to be a "naked gun" style spoof of the entire blockbuster industry.
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Why the Shark Never Bit
So, why didn't we get to see it? You’d think a John Hughes script backed by the National Lampoon brand would be a slam dunk.
Well, Steven Spielberg had something to say about it.
While Spielberg wasn't directing the sequels, he still had a massive amount of influence and a protective streak regarding the original film’s legacy. He reportedly hated the idea of the franchise becoming a self-parody so early on. There’s a persistent story in Hollywood circles that Spielberg told Universal he’d walk away from future collaborations if they turned his masterpiece into a punchline. Whether it was a formal ultimatum or just a very stern "please don't," Universal blinked.
They got cold feet.
The studio decided that a straight horror-thriller, even a mediocre one, was a safer bet for the brand than a raunchy comedy. They pivoted hard. They tossed the Hughes script into a drawer and started development on what would become Jaws 3-D, moving the action to SeaWorld and focusing on the then-trendy (and terrible) 3D technology.
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The Weird Legacy of a Cancelled Sequel
It’s kind of ironic when you look at how Jaws 3-D and Jaws: The Revenge turned out. Those movies are basically accidental comedies anyway. Jaws 3-D has some of the worst special effects in major studio history—the scene where the shark slowly floats toward the control room glass looks like a screensaver. If they had just stuck with the Jaws 3 People 0 plan, the franchise might have retained some dignity by being "in on the joke."
Instead, it became a punchline by accident.
Matty Simmons, the founder of National Lampoon, talked about this project in several interviews over the years, including in his book Fat, Drunk, and Stupid: The Inside Story behind Animal House. He lamented the loss of the project because it represented a peak era of Lampoon creativity. They even had a director lined up: Joe Dante himself was actually considered to direct the movie that featured a character named after him.
The script itself has floated around the internet for decades. If you ever manage to track down a PDF of the Carroll/Hughes draft, it’s a fascinating time capsule. It’s mean, it’s chaotic, and it’s very much a product of 1979-1980 humor. There are jokes about the "shark" being a guy in a suit with a fin on his back and heavy-handed satire of studio executives who didn't care about the script as long as the merchandising worked.
What Most People Get Wrong About the Project
A lot of people think Jaws 3 People 0 was just a working title for the movie that became Jaws 3-D. That's not true. They were two completely different creative paths. One was a satire; the other was a gimmick-driven horror flick.
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Another misconception is that the project died because the script was bad. By most accounts from people who read it at the time, it was actually hilarious. The problem was purely political and brand-focused. Universal wanted to maintain the "prestige" of the Jaws name, which feels pretty funny considering they eventually released a movie where a shark follows a family from Amity to the Bahamas out of spite.
Why It Matters Today
The story of this lost film is a perfect example of the tension between creative risk and corporate safety. In today's world of cinematic universes, we see this all the time. Studios are terrified of "breaking" their brands. But sometimes, breaking the brand is the only way to keep it alive.
Looking back, Jaws 3 People 0 could have been the Deadpool of its time. It could have subverted the entire genre of creature features before they became repetitive. Instead, the Jaws series took itself too seriously until it became impossible to take seriously at all.
If you want to dive deeper into this specific era of film history, there are a few things you can do to see the "DNA" of what this movie would have been:
- Read "Fat, Drunk, and Stupid" by Matty Simmons: It gives the best first-hand account of how the National Lampoon guys dealt with the big studios.
- Watch "The Last Movie Stars" or documentaries on 70s Hollywood: It helps set the scene for why a parody felt so necessary after the excess of the mid-seventies.
- Track down the script: It’s out there on collector sites. Reading John Hughes write R-rated horror-comedy is a trip.
- Watch Joe Dante’s "Piranha": If you want to see what a smart, funny, low-budget shark (well, piranha) movie looked like around that same time, this is the gold standard.
The "3 People 0" part of the title eventually became a bit of a cult phrase. It’s appeared on bootleg t-shirts and in the back of movie magazines for years. It represents the "what if" of Hollywood—the movie that was too weird to live but too funny to be forgotten. While we’ll never see the actual footage, the legend of the shark that almost ate the film industry remains one of the best "lost" stories in cinema.
To really understand the impact, look at how modern horror-comedies like Slotherhouse or Cocaine Bear operate. They owe a spiritual debt to a script written in 1979 that a studio was too scared to produce. We've finally reached a point where the "People 0" mentality is actually profitable. Universal was just forty years too early.
Actionable Insight: If you're a film buff, don't just stop at the movies that were made. The history of "Development Hell" often contains more interesting stories than the films that actually hit theaters. Start by looking into the "Greatest Scripts Never Filmed" lists—you'll find that Jaws 3 People 0 is in very good company alongside projects like Stanley Kubrick's Napoleon or Ridley Scott's original version of I Am Legend. Understanding these failed projects gives you a much better "BS detector" for why modern sequels often feel so watered down.