Meg 2: The Trench

Boring, bad movie. The first one was way better and I didnt like the first one that much.

There's no reason to pull any punches here, 2018's The Meg (directed by Jon Turteltaub, written by Dean Georgaris, and Jon & Erich Hoeber) is a guilty pleasure for me. It's a PG-13 giant shark movie that doesn't rely on an overabundance of blood and gore, doesn't try to take itself too seriously, and shows that even if you're making a B-Movie by all accounts, it can still be top shelf. 5 years later, Ben Wheatley (Free Fire, High-Rise) takes over directing duties for Meg 2: The Trench and while unfortunately it isn't a better film, it does take the film in an interesting new direction that actually set it up for larger success in the future. 2018's The Meg focused on a research station investigating an unexplored section of the Mariana Trench which resulted in the accidental release of a Megalodon shark in the open seas. The film ended with rescue diver Jonas Taylor (Jason Statham – Operation Fortune, Expend4bles) and Oceanographer Suyin Zhang (Li Bingbing – Guardians of the Tomb, Ordinary Hero) defeating the beast and saving both their crew and nearby vacationers from becoming shark bait. Meg 2 picks up 5 years later, where the Mana One Research Station has continued to explore the Marianna Trench. Suyin Zhang has passed in that time, and her brother Jiuming (Wu Jing - Ride On, The Wandering Earth 2) has stepped in both to help run Mana One and to help Jonas raise Meiying (Shuya Sophia Cai), Mana One now also houses a Meg pup they've raised named Haiqi, and Jonas splits his time between Mana One and his responsibilities to Meiying moonlighting as an Eco Fighter, helping to stop environmental crimes in the world. During an exploration mission gone wrong, multiple Megs and other prehistoric creatures are released from the Trench to again wreak havoc on the world, and it's up to Jonas and his friends to stop them. On one hand, it's easy to understand Meg 2 retreading a lot of the same beats from the 1st film, the first movie outside of dealing with Jonas' survivor's guilt and trauma earlier in the film, and the relationship between Jonas and Suyin isn't particularly too complicated which made it that much more accessible to audiences, so it seems there wasn't much of a point to reach any further with the sequel. The problem is when we lose the little bit of development Jonas had along with a romantic plot that was actually fun and interesting for an action/horror film, it leaves Meg 2 shuffling from action scene to action scene which then makes the repeated beats even more glaring (to the point that two characters' certain but inevitable betrayal of our heroes can be guessed almost immediately). Meg 2 does get some new developments right on the money, the inclusion of other creatures from the Trench definitely has me interested to see what's coming down the line for this franchise. Don't get me wrong, I'm all about seeing people fight giant sharks, giant squids, T-Rexs, and prehistoric monsters all sound like The Meg franchise could head towards something akin to Land of the Lost, Planet of the Apes, or 65, all of which sound like a great way for this franchise to go. Letting the returning characters get involved more in the action was a welcome surprise too. Mac (Cliff Curtis – Avatar: The Way of Water, Doctor Sleep) and DJ (Page Kennedy – The Upshaws, Rush Hour) had substantial roles in the 1st film, but outside of the middle section both were mostly sitting on the sidelines, this time around Mac and DJ truly get a chance to shine, with DJ legitimately being one of the best cases of character development in a franchise in quite some time. Page Kennedy without question is Meg 2's MVP, and regardless of your overall feelings of the movie, DJ will keep a smile on your face throughout the film. Now while the returning characters get their chance to shine, unfortunately outside of Jiuming, most of the new players just don't add anything to the movie, including the addition of human bad guys to the franchise. While Rainn Wilson's eccentric billionaire made some terrible choices in the first film, it would be hard to categorize him as a villain, that ambiguity doesn't exist in Meg 2 as the Mana One team now has to deal with a group of mercenaries with their own agenda for the Trench. The new characters either get gobbled up fairly quickly or if they do have a bit more screentime aren't given much to work with and come off fairly one note. Of course it's possible that the new villains were thrown in so that Jason Statham and crew could actually have SOMEONE to punch, but rather than add any tension it just feels like it instead highlights even more why their addition wasn't needed. By taking them out, the film would basically be what Evil Dead 2 is to The Evil Dead, and while that might make it more remake/reboot than sequel, I feel that it would have been more focused and given a chance for a number of the new characters to have a bit more importance. Earlier I mentioned that Meg 2 seemed like it was setting the stage to go in a direction akin to some other films/tv shows of the past dealing with prehistoric creatures and giant monsters, it should be mentioned that Meg 2 definitely borrows from a lot of recent films in the same category too. Underwater? It's in there. Deep Rising? That's in there too. Jaws 2? You better believe it. There's even more if you take the time to really go through it all, and while some of it works, again, it's another glaring fact you can't look past. Even with all the glaring issues Meg 2 had, I can't sit here and tell you that I didn't like it, because I did. It's still good mindless summer fun, and I really want to see where this series can continue to go in terms of monster madness and Jason Statham riding jet skis to fight sharks. Meg 2: The Trench is in theaters now

First 20 mins, palatable at best. The rest of the movie, waste of time and money…

I watched this movie in the cinema, and it was great for watching it in a cinema, but probably boring to watch at home to be honest. The atmosphere of the movie was great, it had moments where it could shake you to the core, eventhough I am not a big fan of shark-horror movies because in my opinion, sharks are simply not scary. However, the movie portrayed the megalodon a creature worthy to be afraid of. But, there are a few things worth mentioning; I found the movie to be very slow-paced at times, and some scenes seemed very, unreasonable to say the least, with some characters simply being there to be annoying or making obviously stupid choices. I imagine the movie to be very underwhelming to watch at home, especially since there is no underlying message or meaning to it, simply, be scared of a megalodon. That's it.

Just like the first one full of action and some comedy, it's hard to find them anymore. Loved it!

this was way better than the first one with the kraken,trex,megalodons, hiqi the megalodon and snappersaurus(snappers) this feels like your in jurassic world but with megalodons.hiqi reminds of blue from jurassic world

Well,the first was much better. I hope they won't be pushing the third one now.

A great thriller for sure.

Loved this. Much better than the first one

This wasn't a sequel. Yes there are sharks in it, but Statham has turned into a mercenary also somehow and the movie is not about Meg's?