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A couple of months ago, I decided to have fun watching something after I procrastinated on all my college work for the day. I started The Meg well past midnight, thinking I’d turn it off in half an hour. Spoiler, I didn’t. The film had me hooked from the beginning thanks to its incredibly cast and genuine suspense. I also happen to defend the equally, if not more ridiculous, film Moonfall. With that said, I was all set and ready to enjoy Meg 2: The Trench (dir. Ben Wheatley).
In this movie, the main character Jason Statham, who plays a marine biologist, battles against megalodons. My friend who is a marine biologist claims the existence of megalodons is not scientifically accurate, but I like to humor him. While focusing on this issue, Taylor has an issue considering his relationship with his stepdaughter Meiying (Shuya Sophia Cai) who is now extremely independent. He also has a conflict with Meiying’s uncle Jiuming (Wu Jing who is having a lot of fun in this movie). As some of the developments in this film seem to imply, the depth of the impact caused by Suyin (Li Bingbing), Meiying’s mother’s death is reduced to a throwaway line where her child gazes at an orphan megalodon, which is rather puzzling. This film does not attempt to account for this death off screen, and the two most deeply affected lead characters lack onscreen emotion, which makes the film puzzling. Their lack of emotion makes the movie ring unusually hollow.
Even though it was executed, the sharks are overlaid with another layer of subplots that dilute the entire premise of the movie. What serves as the illegal mining operation in the titular trench gives credence to the base hostility of the movie and adds to the megalodons’ strife. It is shocking how the juxtaposition of Humans and Sharks is advertised and bears very little economic value considering how commercially hyped this shark-human crime drama is. The most disturbing bit is these antagonists for some reason or the other do not make for entertaining characters at all. They simply serve no purpose other than some caustic quotient in the movie as a caricature of a villain. The quote of the mercenary Montes, ‘It is just business,’ completely retards Taylor’s position as the protagonist instead serves to figure out what prompts makers of the film to self-sabotage it.
The megalodons are next to irrelevant. Even worse, there is no suspense in their appearances. Where the first film held back from using the megalodon’s full size and might for a long time, Meg 2 begins, after a rather enjoyable opening, with far too many cuts of the above-mentioned baby meg. That would wipe out any surprise or fun. Of course the audience (and characters) know what a megalodon looks like by now, but the true danger lies in how fast and unexpected they attack. By overexposing the shots of the action, these sharks start losing their novelty, with the exception of some cool angles shot from inside a shark’s mouth.
New creatures also make an appearance, and they fall somewhere in the middle. I did like the land-sea monsters that were smaller than the megs we are used to, but certainly faster. On the other hand, there is another giant sea creature (which I won’t spoil here) that did not come out as well. It is only shown in all of its glory in a couple of underwater angles. Otherwise, the rest of the shots are above water and it’s true scale is hidden, making the whole concept look, unfortunately, cheap.
In some way, it is the opposite of the problem presented with the megs in this movie, which I attribute to the creature having scarier and more dangerous appendages. A lot of the underwater attack sections of this movie are, in fact, difficult to follow because of the darkness and there’s not enough narrative tension to justify their strength.
Nevertheless, there are a handful of good parts in this film, which for the most part has to do with the supporting characters. Even though the mining subplot captured much attention in most parts of its runtime, the human antagonists do lead towards the charismatic team up of crew members DJ (Page Kennedy) and Mac (Cliff Curtis). After the first film, it was great to see DJ’s character turn into a super-prepper who is also capable of fighting. It’s a good touch. The music performed during the underwater scenes, especially stands out. The trench walk is an interesting idea, too. There is also a pretty gruesome death scene, if one can call it that, but in these sort of movies, I definitely can.
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