The Meg 2: The Trench Review.
Five years after audiences first got their taste of aquatic thrills with The Meg, we’re diving back into the ocean’s depths with its adrenaline-fueled sequel, The Meg 2: The Trench. Will it follow the sequel rules of bigger, badder and have a higher body count?. We give our review of The Meg2: The Trench below. – trying to be spoiler free on this page!
The Meg 2: The Trench brings back Jason Stratham’s aquatic version of A James Bond figure, along with gadgets, futuristic under water armor, spears but (unfortunately) no sharks with freaking laser beams on their heads – maybe in the Meg 3?
We were lucky enough to watch an early showing of this years summer blockbuster on August 2nd, and here are our thoughts and a review, spoiler free – though we do have a spoiler article without a review for the Meg 2: The trench here if you, like us, want to know the plot before you sit down with your popcorn.
Meg 2: The Trench Synopsis.
In long awaited sequel, “Meg 2: The Trench”, we once again join expert deep-sea rescue diver Jonas Taylor (Jason Statham) in another mega-shark infested adventure.
A few years after vanquishing the terrifying Megalodon from the first movie, Taylor and his team find themselves back in the water, this time facing an even larger and hungrier apex predator from the depths of the Marianna trench along side 3 (or is it 4) megalodon sharks
Prompted by a nefarious mining operation, the idea of which is taken from Steve Alten’s Second Meg Novel, that unleashes these monstrous creatures, and some additional ones which means the team must use all their knowledge, wit, courage, speed and clearly luck to survive.
The Meg2: The Trench Plot Review
The plot dives straight into high-stakes action with Jona Taylor clearly having had some fight training since the last movie as he takes on ship full of illegal waste dumpers in the Philippine sea and is then transported back to what has become home base. Where a less than happy Megalodon is held captive in an oceanic lagoon.
Elsewhere a sinister mining operation disrupts the tranquility of the deep ocean, our protagonists find themselves in a deadly race for survival against nature’s ancient aquatic behemoths this time not just 80 foot sharks but a whole host of prehistoric dinosaur type creatures (you can check out what dinosaurs are in the Meg 2: The trench here)
Echoes of Steve Alten’s 1999 novel ring loud, but like the first Meg movie there have been some changes. The introduction, how did you miss this Steve!!, of a Kraken like antagonist, is new, and presumably replaces the Kronosaurus pack from The Meg 2: The Trench novel.
While the setting, at least some of it, mirrors the novel with a deep sea mining operation, bond villain type set up, going on in the Mariana trench the names and genders have been changed to protect the (not-so) innocent.
There are other characters who along with the titular characters of Jonas and Mac, continue their mega shark journeys, although not all to the end it has to be said.
The End introduces to the kraken / Giant Octopus from the trailers and without giving to much away – all hell breaks out!
Meg 2: The Trench Our Review and Thoughts
While we are a dinosaur site we do certainly love a good shark movie here at Dinosaur facts for kids, and went into the cinema looking for something that could match the excitement, fun and high budget production of the first Meg movie that follows the rules of shark movie sequels, better, bigger, and more shark!
We choose to ignore the 46% rating on rotten tomato’s reviews of the first movie as frankly professional film critics sometimes don’t understand that a lot of people want to go and watch something cool and fun and not every movie has to be a refection of the human psyche shown by 40 minutes of staring outside at a rainy window in black and white
( a very specific rant we know but not everything should be judged on its Oscar potential)
That’s what we got in the Meg 2: The Trench.
We don’t do reviews on this site, but as we got to watch it a couple of days before the rest of the word, AND it has dinosaurs ( kinda) in it we thought lets give it a go!
Rules for a great Meg sequel in our eyes.
- Bigger shark – check
- More Sharks = Tipple ( or maybe quadruple check)
- Dinosaurs – check well one at least
- Random sea monsters – check
- Insane luck and stunts – check
- Jason Stratham doing full Fast and Furious stunts – check
- Bad guys getting eaten = check
- The set up for a sequel – maybe check
The Only thing we could ask for in this shark movie, was well more sharks. Yes, the shark looked real (yes we know its not and was much bigger than any megaldoon is thought to grow – more on this on the link)
but like the novels, this movie brought to life a predator that is as awe-inspiring on the screen as it is on the page and as it was in real life and that is not the easiest of tasks.
We just wish the movie was more focused on the shark rather than the sub plot of trying to foil an Evil mining Company, which it did stray into a little too often for our liking.
For a summer monster flick we think it is just fine, not quite as good as the first one, but then the book, sorry Steve, wasn’t in out eyes either. The third and fourth book were in our opinion a more return to form for creature feature and hopefully if we see more Meg movies they will head in this direction as well.
We just hope its not 5 years till the next Meg installment to test this theory out.
If we had 7 Sharknado movies……
Then with the source material from Steve Alten’s 8 novels hopefully we can at least expect the same number of Meg Movies – or maybe even one more!
As long as they come out one every year or two and get us our kronosaurus and Liopleurodon which despite our hopes did not make an appearance here, then we will be happy!
It is a perfectly good popcorn flick, just not the creature feature movie we were hoping for!
Review Cinematography and Special Effects
By every definition of the phrase “by no means are we experts” we will take a look at the cinematography special effects in the Meg 2: movie.
While The Meg 2: The Trench takes full advantage of modern-day cinematography and special effects. The larger-than-life Megalodons, giant octopus, and the treacherous Trench itself are rendered in jaw-dropping detail for example, there are a couple of issues we found.
The Nothosaurus ( the dog like lizards / amphibians / overgrown newts) though never actually named in the movie were either not supposed to be Nothosaurus, or inaccurately portrayed, they kinda looked like the Shamosuchus from Prehistoric Planet 2 (which were herbivores btw) and resembled scaly slightly annoyed dogs.
Though not a major issue there were, and are, plenty of prehistoric marine reptiles they could have borrowed from here even if they did give them movement like lambs gamboling in a meadow! – We presume this is inaccurate, but either way it did take away their menace somewhat
The giant octopus was almost an afterthought is seemed, as 3 ( or is it 4) megalodons were not enough, and it wasn’t discussed in any meaningful way at all, which if i was confronted with a 120 foot octopus it might warrant a couple of choice words at least – still it looked good
Review Meg 2: The Trench – Originality and Creativity
Meg 2: The Trench is not just a rehash of its predecessor. It honors the legacy of The Meg while daring to go where few shark movies have gone before, perhaps for good reason.
The mining operation, the introduction of the lizard like dogs or dog like lizards, the addition of the kraken (octopus) are all original (the mining was actually in the second novel) but needed more explanation than was given – to us at least.
it did tip its hat to a selection of other movies, including Jaws 2 and Deep Blue Sea which was a nice touch
One of these moments was in the trailers so its not really that much of a spoiler. – As we mentioned above we do have a spoiler version of this article that goes into the plot and what happens if you need.
Review Final Verdict
Our Advice: Put the lid on your bucket of popcorn if you want to eat it and not deposit it on the floor. As Meg 2: The Trench is a great blend of suspense, humor, action and jump scares set in an oceanic arena.
It is just that the sharks didn’t seem to be much of a threat this time round and hopefully there can be more made of the source material in any upcoming sequels.
The Meg is marketed as a creature feature so the film makers should be confident that the creatures will bring in the viewers, not James Bond like plots!
We are certainly not professional reviewers here but If this sounds like fun then The Meg 2: The Trench should be your port (ha!) of call.
For this movie you will definitely need a bigger boat!
References
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meg_2:_The_Trench
- https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_meg
- https://www.reddit.com/r/movies/comments/13oy1nm/how_do_yall_feel_about_meg_2/
- https://www.megmovie.net/
Hi, I am Roy Ford a General Studies and English Teacher who has taught all over the world. What started as a fossil collection became a great way to teach, motivate and inspire students of all ages and all over the world about dinosaurs and from that and children’s love of dinosaurs came the site dinosaur facts for kids, a resource for all ages.
