The ocean is a black void, teeming with nightmares! And now, apparently, it’s harboring Martian fish.
Whether or not there’s water on Mars remains up for debate, but one thing is certain: some creatures lurking in the depths of Earth’s oceans might as well be from another planet. A Russian fisherman has sent shockwaves across the internet after posting footage of a bizarre, otherworldly creature—something so strange that viewers have started throwing around the A-word: alien.
Wanna catch an alien fish? Be prepared.
The unsettling clip was shared by Roman Fedortsov, a deep-sea trawlerman who has made a habit of photographing the monstrosities that end up in his nets. His Instagram, followed by over 600,000 people, is a veritable freak show of deep-sea oddities. He’s hauled in toothy wolffish, gelatinous blobs, and even creatures with lips so plump they look like they’ve had cosmetic surgery. But this latest specimen? It’s got the internet asking whether the Martian fish have finally landed.
The footage shows a grotesque, bulbous-looking creature perched on the railing of Fedortsov’s ship—a swollen mass of gray flesh with a disturbingly lifeless expression. The fisherman later identified it as a smooth lumpsucker, a deep-sea fish known for its globular shape and sucker-like disc that helps it cling to surfaces.
Instagram users, however, weren’t convinced.
“That is 100% an alien,” one person declared. Another wrote, “That’s the pet of aliens living underwater.”
And then, of course, there were the jokes. “Fished in Chernobyl?” one person quipped. Others compared the beast to pop-culture brainiacs like Megamind, the bug-eyed invaders from Mars Attacks, and Krang from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Despite the panic, the fish’s bloated appearance likely isn’t due to some intergalactic mutation—just the brutal effects of decompression. Creatures from the deep don’t handle rapid ascents well, and what looks like an alien brain swelling with forbidden knowledge is probably just a sad side effect of surfacing too fast.
But it does make you wonder. If there are Martian fish hiding in our own oceans—creatures so strange they defy belief—what else is out there, lurking just beyond our reach?
And more importantly… do we really want to find out?
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