Marisa Kendall

Marisa Kendall is a fictional scientist and a supporting character featured in the 1980 horror movie Alligator. She was played by actress Robin Riker in the film.

Biography
Marisa Kendall was a woman who was born sometime in the early 1960s in Chicago, Illinois.

In 1968 Marisa owned a pet baby alligator. Her father however, didn't appreciate her fondness for the animal and wanted to be rid of it. One day while Marisa is still in school, he flushed the gator down the toilet and later told her that it died.

Twelve years later, Marisa was working as a herpetologist. Chicago detective David Madison told her about a recent string of grisly deaths, which he believed were caused by an alligator living in the sewers. Kendall didn't believe the story, as an alligator would not be able to survive in the sewer without sunlight and suitable nourishment. Madison stuck to his story and explained that not only did the animal survive, but that it was now twice the size that a normal alligator should be.

Soon after, photographs of a reporter named Thomas Kemp surfaced, which showed him being visibly eaten by a sewer gator. Marisa Kendall went on television and confirmed that what they were dealing with now was an actual alligator.

The mayor of Chicago decides to call in the SWAT team. Their plan is to bait the alligator into a fire-zone by banging on pots and pans and stirring up a bunch of noise in the hopes of herding it into the desired direction. The alligator bursts up through the middle of the concrete street and climbs out of the sewer. People start freaking out all over the place and cop cars arrive on the scene. The gator swats at a car with his tail, sending it crashing off the side of the road. The cop tries to get out through the window, but the animal descends upon him and bites down on his leg. A little kid named Joey sees the entire affair and rushes home to tell his mom.

Later, Kendall, Madison, police chief Clark and the Mayor arrived on the scene of another attack, wherein the alligator actually broke through the concrete onto the surface. The Mayor wanted to keep the thing as quiet as possible. Kendall made a cast mold out of one of the alligator's footprints. She estimated the animal to be between 30 and 40 feet long. Further investigation pointed them in the direction of Slade Pharmaceutical, which they believed played an accidental hand in the alligator's accelerated growth.

The next day, Madison and Kendall decided to go to Slade Pharmaceutical to put the thumbscrews to them. Madison interrogates Arthur Helms and discovered that Slade has been trying to create a growth hormone. What's more, the alligator had apparently been eating the dogs that had been tested with the hormone, hence the animal's unnaturally large size.

Madison decides to team up with Kendall to take the alligator down on his own. Thinking that maybe the gator had returned to the sewers, they went down there but turned up nothing. Calling it a day, they went back to Madison's place.

The reason that Madison and Kendall had not been able to find the alligator was because it managed to avert the police dragnet and sneak into somebody's back yard where it had been hiding out in the swimming pool for the entire night.

Marissa Kendall and David Madison tracked the gator to a storm drain and thew that it had returned to the sewer. Madison swiped a bunch of dynamite from the police evidence room and went hunting. While David descended down into the sewers, Marisa stayed topside. Madison found the alligator and began shooting at it with his sidearm. The gator began chasing him around, but David was skilled enough to always remain two steps ahead of the hungry reptile. He baited the alligator into a section of the sewer containing high methane deposits. There he planted the dynamite which was attached to a timer. David's plan was to set the timer and crawl out of a service hatch.

Unfortunately, an elderly woman parked her car right on top of the manhole cover. She was stuck in traffic behind a garbage truck. Marisa showed up and raced over to the old woman. She tried to explain to her that she needed to move her car or else David was going to blow himself up. Marisa was forced to take the initiative and opened the car door, pushing the woman into the passenger seat. She moved the car off the manhole plate allowing David just enough time to crawl out of there before the bomb went off. The bomb exploded and the alligator was instantly killed.

Notes & Trivia



 * Actress Robin Riker is the female lead in Alligator and received second billing in the film.


 * Marisa Kendall falls under the "babe scientist" storytelling trope presented in films, which relates to uncharacteristically attractive women associated with what is stereotypically a "nerdy" vocation.

Relationships

 * Father - Pet killer. Also a man who lies about what happens to beloved pets.


 * David Madison - Non-romantic bond; shared trauma via encounter with deadly sewer gator.