R-Rated Piranha 3D Footage Won't Be Screened At Comic Con

When the Comic Con schedules started to be released prior to this past weekend, the Friday lineup included a panel for The Weinstein Company and Piranha 3D. But the listing has since been pulled from the schedule, leading suspicious onlookers to throw around a silly word: 'banned.'

Turns out the situation isn't as dire as all that.

Paul Scheer, who appears in the film, said,

Piranha 3D has been banned from this year's Comic Con Convention in San Diego for being too "Intense" and "NOT FAMILY FRIENDLY"

And what's better for a reputedly bloody, very R-rated film like Piranha 3D? A little controversy!

But HitFix spoke to David Glanzer, Comic Con's director of marketing and public relations, who said,

My understanding is that thee footage wasn't all ages appropriate. We don't check ID to get into those meeting rooms, so we don't want something inappropriate.

That makes sense; if you haven't been to Comic Con, the Hall H panels aren't packed with kids, but families and kids are definitely there. While some of the stuff that has been shown in the hall is definitely on the edge of PG-13, super-explicit content doesn't get shown. Glanzer says that The Weinstein Company could cut a new footage reel to present at the Con, and as long as it conforms to PG guidelines, everything will be fine.

He also says that TWC could go ahead with a panel with no footage, but the company decided not to do that. Hopefully TWC's marketing department will step up here. Sure, the selling points of the film are violence and nudity, but they've got a week to cut a footage reel that makes a joke out of the fact that they can't show that stuff. There 's got to be a funny, entertaining reel to be made of 'censored' footage from the film.