“This can’t get any worse,” Jamie mumbles, tears dripping down his face. Bottled water! Outrageous. He and Patrick had always promised that they would burn the company to the ground before betraying the mission of BMT. That mission includes ice cold Coca-Cola. It includes the X-treme flavor blast of Mountain Dew. It includes the Rocky Mountain taste of a cold Coors Light. But it sure as hell doesn’t include bottled water. “You can drink it straight out of the tap,” Patrick says, shaking his head. “You know what Kyle would have said to all of this,” Jamie says with a chuckle, and Patrick nods his head with a smirk. “Water schmater, water is for the birds.” Classic Kyle catchphrase. They turn to the Metaphorical Kyle with determination. “You’ve convinced us,” they say, “what do we do?” Kyle is a bit bemused. “You sure you don’t want to see what they do next? I mean, it’s way worse than bottled water. This is just a front for a much more dastardly plan.” They consider for a moment and then nod their heads. The Metaphorical Kyle whispers it in their ears and their eyes widen. “Boy that is way worse,” Patrick says, looking a little sick. “I actually wish you hadn’t told us that,” Jamie agrees, “In fact, let’s not talk about that part. We’ll just make sure they don’t get the company and start selling bottled water.” The Metaphorical Kyle shrugs his shoulders and gets ready to fly them back to the Apologies Tour brought to you by Tim Horton’s. As they are about to leave Jamie and Patrick recall the root of their hatred of bottled water. It’s a story not about water being for the birds, but rather… for the sharks. Bum bum bum. That’s right! We are finally getting the opportunity for a second BMT Live! Of the year with the sequel we’ve all been anticipating. Meg 2: The Trench! The first one didn’t qualify, but I thought it was horrible. Patrick liked it a little better. Let’s see if we agree on this one. Let’s go!
Meg 2: The Trench (2023) – BMeTric: 28.4; Notability: 24
StreetCreditReport.com – BMeTric: top 6.8%; Notability: top 2.8%; Rotten Tomatoes: top 15.4%; Higher BMeT: Knights of the Zodiac, 65, The Black Demon, The Ritual Killer, The Out-Laws, White Men Can’t Jump, Hypnotic, House Party, Your Place or Mine, Maybe I Do, Ghosted, Insidious: The Red Door, The Tutor, Mafia Mamma, The Old Way, Paint, Johnny & Clyde; Higher Notability: Ghosted, House Party, Spinning Gold, Haunted Mansion, The Out-Laws, 65, Your Place or Mine; Lower RT: Dead Man’s Hand, Johnny & Clyde, The Ritual Killer, Assassin Club, On a Wing and a Prayer, The Tutor, The Out-Laws, Robots, Fear, Mafia Mamma, Knights of the Zodiac, Sweetwater, One True Loves, God Is a Bullet, Love Again, Ambush, White Men Can’t Jump, Ghosted, The Machine, House Party; Notes: Solid early BMeT, but the Notability is quite surprising. I don’t know why this wouldn’t involve more big name production. It has a big name director and ensemble cast. Who knows. House Party is probably one of the weirder ones that came out this year that we have a chance of seeing.
RogerEbert.com – 1.0 stars – Anyone hoping that Ben Wheatley might bring some of the exuberant personality and boundary-pushing creativity on display in films like “Kill List” and “In the Earth” to his for-hire gig directing the dismally boring “Meg 2: The Trench” should find different cinematic waters to swim in. Much as in his atrocious remake of “Rebecca” in 2020, Wheatley mostly phones it in here, and he does so with a rotary landline. At least until the final half-hour, when he’s finally free to unleash some monstrous chaos, this is one of the dullest films of the year, a plodding, poorly made giant shark movie that inexplicably lets the giant shark take a backseat to an evil underwater drilling operation. This thing just has no teeth.
(Yup, this is basically what I’ve heard on the street (aka online). That the film takes ages to get to the good stuff and for no discernible reason at all. But once it does it is pretty fun.)
Trailer – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dG91B3hHyY4/
(Yeah … so this was the prime example of where this trailer dropped and I was like “this looks horrible, if this isn’t qualifying there is no God.” I’m glad I still have it a bit. There seemed like there was an okay reception for it online, but when I saw it I just couldn’t help but think it looked terrible.)
Directors – Ben Wheatley – ( Known For: Free Fire; In the Earth; Rebecca; Kill List; High-Rise; Sightseers; The ABCs of Death; A Field in England; Happy New Year, Colin Burstead; Down Terrace; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Notes: British. He wife co-wrote High-Rise which he directed. Started by making viral videos, his films are considered somewhat “visionary” for horror fans. Except Rebecca which people seem to have not liked at all.)
Writers – Jon Hoeber and Erich Hoeber – ( Known For: Transformers: Rise of the Beasts; The Meg; RED; RED 2; My Spy; Montana; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Battleship; Whiteout; Notes: Boo, we were pretty close to a twofer with Transformers: Rise of the Beasts for BMT Live. Kind of wild that we’ve kind of accidentally completed their BMT filmography.)
Dean Georgaris – ( Known For: The Meg; The Manchurian Candidate; Future BMT: Tristan + Isolde; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Paycheck; Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life; Notes: Been making crap action for a while now. Does a bit of television as well, including two episodes of the new Quantum Leap.)
Steve Alten – ( Known For: The Meg; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Notes: Wrote the books. Was at one point the assistant basketball coach for the University of Delaware. Has a degree in Physical Education.)
Actors – Jason Statham – ( Known For: The Meg; Fast X; Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre; Snatch; Wrath of Man; F9: The Fast Saga; Collateral; Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels; Homefront; Furious 7; Spy; The Italian Job; Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs & Shaw; The Expendables; The Fate of the Furious; Furious 6; Safe; The Transporter; Transporter 2; Parker; Future BMT: The Pink Panther; War; The One; Turn It Up; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Crank; The Expendables 3; Mechanic: Resurrection; Crank: High Voltage; Killer Elite; In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale; Ghosts of Mars; Notes: Ah Statham. Should I do it? Why not: was an Olympic caliber high diver competing for England in the Commonwealth Games.)
Jing Wu – ( Known For: Ride On; The Wandering Earth II; The Wandering Earth; Wolf Warrior; Kill Zone; The Battle at Lake Changjin; Shaolin; Wolf Warrior 2; The Climbers; Kill Zone 2; Water Gate Bridge; Badges of Fury; Legendary Assassin; My Country, My Parents; The Sacrifice; My People, My Country; Invisible Target; Call of Heroes; Home Coming; Twins Mission; Future BMT: The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Notes: Trained at the Beijing Wushu Academy because his father and grandfather were both martial artists. Was then spotted by a talent scout looking for martial artists for a film.)
Shuya Sophia Cai – ( Known For: The Meg; Somewhere Only We Know; BMT: Meg 2: The Trench; Notes: Oh this is the kid … I would have thought the mother / love interest would have been the second or third lead. Whatever, she lives in New Zealand and is fluent in both Mandarin and English.)
Budget/Gross – $129 million / Domestic: $12,000,000 (Worldwide: $12,000,000)
(Obviously this is just the first weekend. It seems like it is going to basically make its reported budget worldwide in the first weekend, which I think means it’ll just barely be profitable? But I don’t know how much is the somewhat less profitable Chinese market, so unclear. The CinemaScore being quite bad means it could miss it due to word of mouth as well.)
Rotten Tomatoes – 29% (34/117): It isn’t without its fun moments, but Meg 2: The Trench suffers from a disjointed story that drifts for too long before finally delivering a few campy thrills.
(Yes, the thing I’ve seen is basically that the first hour operates like Jaws … but you’ve already seen the giant shark in the first one? So it ends up being quite dull until the last act when it picks up. B- CinemaScore which is terrible, and the verified user ratings are also quite bad.)
NY Times Short Review: This lively sequel to 2018’s somewhat tepid killer-shark blockbuster greatly improves upon its predecessor by getting gorier, funnier and more stylish.
Poster – Meg 2: Resurrection
(I want to hate this poster, but it’s kinda good. God damn it. B.)
Tagline(s) – New Meg. Old Chum. (A+)
(Even the tagline is good. And it’s not even good… it’s great! What the hell.)
Keyword(s) – shark
Top 10: Finding Nemo (2003), Toy Story (1995), Jurassic World (2015), Life of Pi (2012), Jaws (1975), Despicable Me (2010), Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005), Aquaman (2018), Shrek 2 (2004), Despicable Me 2 (2013)
Future BMT: 86.6 The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl 3-D (2005), 79.6 Shark Night (2011), 59.7 My Super Ex-Girlfriend (2006), 36.3 Into the Blue (2005), 34.7 Leviathan (1989), 34.2 Suspect Zero (2004), 34.1 Shark Tale (2004), 33.8 Along Came Polly (2004), 33.5 Armed and Dangerous (1986), 25.9 After the Sunset (2004), 23.7 Pirates (1986), 21.5 Colombiana (2011), 19.4 Kick-Ass 2 (2013), 19.3 Ice Age: Continental Drift (2012), 16.9 The Beach (2000)
BMT: Jaws: The Revenge (1987), Jaws 3-D (1983), Movie 43 (2013), Are We Done Yet? (2007), Chairman of the Board (1998), Return to the Blue Lagoon (1991), Strange Wilderness (2008), Lara Croft: Tomb Raider – The Cradle of Life (2003), Serenity (2019), Gamer (2009), Mechanic: Resurrection (2016), Battleship (2012), The Blue Lagoon (1980), Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017), Meg 2: The Trench (2023)
Best Options (Year 2023): 11.5 Meg 2: The Trench (2023)
(Wait, this is the only Shark film this year that qualifies?! No, I knew that. I just wanted the funny sub-genre of 2023 shark films. Looking at BMT obviously the Jawses work, but otherwise I think the rest kind of incidentally have a shark. Shark Night looks like the only other “real” shark film that qualifies.)
Welcome to Earf (HoE Number 6) – The shortest path through The Movie Database cast lists using only BMT films is: Jason Statham is No. 1 billed in Meg 2: The Trench and No. 1 billed in In the Name of the King: A Dungeon Siege Tale, which also stars Leelee Sobieski (No. 3 billed) who is in Here on Earth (No. 1 billed) => (1 + 1) + (3 + 1) = 6. There is no shorter path at the moment.
Notes – While speaking to entertainment site DenOfGeek in April 2021, director Ben Wheatley hinted that the film might see Jason Statham facing off against not one but several giant, prehistoric sharks.
The Meg 2 has been in the works since October 2018, essentially right after the original movie released. By early 2019, producer Lorenzo di Bonaventura confirmed that a script was in the works, and the sequel gained momentum in October 2020, when Ben Wheatley was announced as The Meg 2 director. The English filmmaker is best known for helming horror movies such as Kill List (2011), Sightseers (2012) and In The Earth (2021). Wheatley has also explored other genres with High-Rise (2015), Free Fire (2016), and the 2020 Netflix adaptation, Rebecca.
Influenced by the strike of SAG-AFTRA, publicity activities such as the London premiere have been canceled. The world premiere will be held in the Beijing National Indoor Stadium in Beijing on July 28, which is also the only premiere in the world.
In April 2021, Jason Statham confirmed that things are finally falling into place regarding the sequel. He said the script is ready and that filming should begin the following January.
It was announced in Nov. 2020 that Jason Statham is set to reprise his role and will reportedly be involved in the overall creative process. The supporting cast hadn’t officially been announced, but much of the “key talent” is expected to return. In that case, The Meg 2 will presumably feature Bingbing Li, Ruby Rose and Page Kennedy, among others.
Bad Movie Twins 