For the Film adaptation, see here.
- Anvilicious: Steve Alten does not like certain people. Especially the type who govern Middle Eastern nations. Or publicity-hungry animal rights groups.
- Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: In Nightstalkers, Jonas and Zachary are fleeing Brutus, the massive male Livyatan Melvillei underneath the Antarctic ice shelf, when they come across what appear to be bioluminescent plants dangling from above. They turn out to be squid that have evolved to (somehow) live out of the water and burrow their bodies into the ice. The duo briefly stops to watch the creatures eat a manta ray and discuss how weird it is. Then Brutus catches up and chases them away, and the whole thing is never mentioned again.
- Complete Monster: Michael Maren was nasty in The Trench, but his actions in Primal Waters are downright horrifying. He makes a fake competition all to lure the hero Jonas in so he can use his pet Megalodon Scarface to take his revenge for Jonas getting famous from the Megalodons, fully knowing that hundreds of people will likely be killed in the process. He has absolutely no remorse about this, nor does he give a darn when that shark eats his Dragon. He fully plans to involve Jonas's innocent family as well and has zero remorse in causing the deaths of hundreds in return for revenge, money and fame.
- Crazy Is Cool:
- Jonas. Mother. Fucking. Taylor. Has so many batshit-insane moments that the third book even resorts to Lampshade Hanging, with a group of reckless daredevils idolizing him. Jonas isn't pleased. He then goes on to sink the villain's modern yacht using a centuries-old cannon, and prevent the villains helicopter escape by riding a torpedo into into the helicopter with the shark chasing him and knocking the copter out of the sky..
- Mac also has elements of this.
- The series as a whole is this. It's basically B monster movie meets cheesy action movie, and very aware of it.
- Harsher in Hindsight: An Arab conglomerate, including Osama bin Laden (who is specifically credited with the 1993 World Trade Center bombing), is backing Benedict Singer's organization in The Trench. In a book published two years before 9/11 and set IN late 2001.
- Narm: In the fourth book, a team that's working for Dubai by scouring the depths is getting chased through an underwater cavern by some huge Icthyosaurs. One of the members of the team says something along the lines of "Jesus Christ!" At that point in time another member of the team (a priest) decides to shout at him "Don't Blaspheme!" Really? That's so important to you at this time?
- They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot: In Nightstalkers two Megalodons, the Liopleurodon, and an 80 foot long super ferocious prehistoric sperm whale (Livyatan Melvillei) are all brought to the same location. While the Megs and the Lio end up squaring off, it's noticable that the Lio never faces the Livyatan in combat. This is particularly sad because the Livyatan is the closest creature in size to the Lio in the whole series.
- The Woobie: Good God does Terry ever get put through the wringer in the series, even without the constant stress of giant sharks.
- Her brother is killed by the first megalodon encountered in the first book.
- She loses her baby and is subjected to a horrendous mental cat-and-mouse game by Benedict Singer, nearly dying several times in the process.
- Her father dies in Primal Waters, on top of major marital differences with Jonas.
- She's diagnosed with MS in the fifth book, and cancer in the sixth. And just as things are looking up after a miraculous cure? She's (seemingly) eaten by a 200ft Titanoboa.
