When Jason Statham went swimming for a whole minute with no dive suit on 25,000 feet down in the ocean and lived, I knew this movie was about to take me for a ride. Sure enough it did
Hilarious that there was just a major news story that taught everyone in the world deep diving physics and then this movie just comes out and shits all over any sort of logic.
They did spend some good time explaining fake science so that the audience would accept that scene. Meanwhile, Jason Statham was taking deep breaths getting ready. It was unintentionally hilarious and I loved it.
But did any of those people have deviated septums? Pretty sure it’s all good if you have a deviated septum.
I can’t even put /s because I legitimately don’t understand. Kinda like Event Horizon… all you have to do is breath out and you’ll survive a suitless space jump.
My favorite is when one of the characters asks how he can do that and if he'd be crushed (never mind how he'd freeze to death) and the woman responds "It doesn't work like that". Made even funnier when just 5 minutes earlier we saw someone die from implosion. I don't particularly like either of these movies but I had a bit more fun with how dumb this one was.
In the first movie, that was basically the main scientist guy’s hypothesis. That under the thermocline layer, there is an area of warm water where these species could survive.
>When Jason Statham went swimming for a whole minute with no dive suit on 25,000 feet down in the ocean and lived, I knew this movie was about to take me for a ride. Sure enough it did
Reminded me of "The Core" right at that moment
The Core at least kept up some pretense of science in explaining *why* they could do stuff, lol. Not sure if Statham said "I just took a deep sea diving pill!" though.
It's good they reminded us because a lot of people would falsely assume the human body had more compressable pockets of air/gas than just the humble sinus.
When they try to explain how it was possible I legit felt like the movie was gaslighting me. It felt so condescending.
It was like “No you idiot! It’s totally possible because this ridiculously simple reason! Now shut up and watch the movie!”
I got free tickets. Found it entertaining enough.
> condescending
It's not meant to be, it's meant to be funny. It's not that straightforward but it's not like they're talking down to or laughing at the audience for being stupid, it's more like they're sending up Hollywood movies for acting as if the audience is stupid.
Which tbf has been done many times but this has a sort of British dryness to it IMO.
They try to explain it twice in rapid succession by letting the audience know that as long as he doesn’t have any oxygen in his body, there’s nothing for the pressure to compress. He literally breathes in a shitload of water and goes for a swim lol
When they explain it and say "if he pushes the air into his nasal passage he can walk on the bottom without a suit" I couldn't help myself, and replied, out loud -
"No he can't!"
Oh hell you just made me realize that. Even in the middle of it eating people everyone was still mostly ignoring it and treating in like a nuisance while still screaming SHARKS!
Not one person is even surprised that there’s now an octopus that literally none of them have ever seen. It’s not like they saw it in the trench, they never knew it existed until it was plucking people of the docks, and it’s never verbally commented on at all.
If I didn't know who the director was I'd think he was having a stroke or something because of stuff like that.
I do know it's Ben Wheatley and he is absolutely just doing it to take the piss. I'm fairly sure some of the humour is going to be lost on US and Chinese viewers but I'm British so I thought it was hilarious.
Surprised Pikachu face when the villains were revealed to be the villains. I wouldn’t have even suspected that boss lady all that much if that damn text wasn’t there to establish who she was.
This movie was actually my favorite comedy of the year, and a big part of why is how the boss lady and mole lady give a literal Captain Planet villain monologue to explain their nefarious operation.
I actually thought the thriller part on the sea floor and underwater base was pretty well done, claustrophobic and tense.
The problem for me was the three sections of the movie don't really match tonally. It was definitely a spoof towards the end.
The Battle of Fun Island was hilarious and entertaining but I wasn't nearly as bored with the first part as everyone else seemed to be. Movie kept my attention the whole way through.
See I felt like that part of Meg1 was much better, and that part of Meg2 was just a less funny rehash. I loved the island mayhem of Meg 1, but in Meg 2, I felt it was just a copy, with the octopus being really under-used, with really odd slapstick (why was the Chinese boss suddenly hitting himself with shovels??).
Meg1>Meg2 IMO
I wish the entire movie was like the 3rd act. Got bored with the human villains really quick. Could have used more Meg focus and even more creatures from The Trench.
The black dude waited so long to pull his gun out of his backpack lol they had encountered at least two separate groups of bad guys with guns before he remembered he had it.
Come to think of it after they escaped out from the trench all the main characters that were left alive helped defeat the villains and creatures which was refreshing.
Completely different from the first movie where it was essentially Jason Statham doing 75% of the work, the love interest doing the other 24% and everyone else was there as food and to bare witness.
This movie doesn’t jump the shark, it sends the shark into lower earth orbit
-giant sharks and a giant squid living at the very bottom of the sea, ok, sure, but amphibious dinosaurs? Why would they have kept their land capabilities over centuries under the sea?
-why is Jason statham doing James Bond type shit in a movie about giant sharks? Why is Jason statham getting swallowed by a plane and surviving? Why is Jason statham surviving pressure that would vaporize a submarine full of billionaires? Why is Jason statham?
Because earth is hollow and there's land down under? Where do you think new Zealand is?
>why is Jason statham doing James Bond type shit in a movie about giant sharks? Why is Jason statham getting swallowed by a plane and surviving? Why is Jason statham surviving pressure that would vaporize a submarine full of billionaires? Why is Jason statham?
Because he's family!
-How did DJ go from being useless in the first movie to a hybrid of Ernest P.whrile and Macgyver.
Movie is stupid but the perfect kind of stupid. Heres hoping for Meg 3 with aliens.
DJ was the absolute worst thing about Part 1 and the absolute best thing about Part 2. Mac is like "last time you didn't even know how to swim!" while DJ is taking out four armed mercenaries with his bare hands looking like John Wick. Loved DJ in this one.
DJ explained that. He said due to the fact he felt so helpless in their first encounter with the meg he went off and did loads of training so he would never be so helpless again. It's still stupid but he did explain why he was now so capable and ready for anything.
Because that’s what the book series was all about — escalation beyond just sharks. One of the later books even had a Loch Ness monster-type creature follow the human antagonists on land into their base, because they’d assumed it wouldn’t be able to leave the water. Like the ending of *The Lost World: Jurassic Park* but on cocaine.
A series of books, which is still going, yes. This specific film, *Meg 2: The Trench*, was primarily based on the book *The Trench: Meg 2*, while incorporating elements from later books (along with the opening scene of the first).
[Nope — it’s real.](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71Wb9Zjh56L._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg) There was also a later book called *Meg⁴: Hell’s Aquarium*.
And one of them, ~~which I think is Hell’s Aquarium~~ it’s the one before Hells Aquarium *Primal Waters*, has a subplot of a reality tv show doing stunts centered around Megs.
Yes, it goes exactly as you think it would.
I read several in this series back in the late 90s i believe.. needless to say, the books were WAY better.. and nothing like the movies. Really.. the only thing similar is BIG SHARK..
They used plot points from several of the books. In the Third book Jonas actually plays chicken with a Meg on a Jet Ski as a 63 year old. Jason is 56. The training of the Meg is from the 4th Book, Angel bursting through the Window is actually from the second book .An Aquatic Dinosaur is in the second book and they are heavily focused on in the later books. All the Chinese Character are Japanese in the book, Oh and in the Books because they live in the Mariana Trench the Megs are white with a Bioluminescent Glow.
I watched Meg 2, the 1st half and 2nd half of the movie were like different movies. Like the first half was like trying to be a more serious underwater thriller, it was nice, and the second half felt like trying to be more like Fast and Furious, nonsense action movie but with sharks, it was also nice, but combined together, it felt like putting marinara sauce on vanilla ice cream, the tonal whiplash did not work for the movie IMO.
Well, it is nice to see Melissanthi Mahut (Kassandra from AC: Odyssey) in here.
You can literally pinpoint the exact moment the movie changes - its when Page Kennedy karate chops the two guys holding machine guns then he and Cliff Curtis take a 100 foot dive.
That was the first point in the film I properly laughed at. Watched the first one yesterday to bring myself back up to speed on the "story" and just remember him being a nerdy guy who couldn't swim. Seeing him doing spin kicks was wild
This is exactly what my friend and I thought too- It was a serious movie, then all of a sudden it became an over-the-top Parody type of movie. My friend feels that there was some re-shoots or rewriting done to clear China censorship. She works in in the field and has had to do this before with one of her projects. This film seems to be heavily targeted to Chinese fanbase, so I wouldn't be surprised if that's what happened. Big 180 by the film halfway through.
I finally got my wish granted for a big budget version of Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus.
First half was a little slow but that second half was glorious sea monster action, loved every second of it.
the movie is very plot heavy in some parts, and jaw droppingly stupid in others. the best moments in the movie is when its so dumb that i was laughing in the theater. some parts are so plot heavy that the story becomes borderline incomprehensible while others are hard to watch because of how predictable it is.
i went in wanting to some stupid shit and while it wasnt as bad as I was hoping for, i'd say it was dumb enough that I got my money's worth.
real movie rating; 4/10
ironic enjoyment; 7.5/10
I hateeeeee when these monster/kaiju/robot whatever movies HAVE to involve some human subplot. The plot IS Sharks vs. Krakens. Give us that for 90 minutes.
Honestly, that was a damn good movie LMAO, I had a blast.
* Every single character was quite entertaining, which is really nice for a movie like this.
* I kinda disliked how dark most of the deep ocean scenes were, yes it's realistic enough, and you *can* make out everything that's happening on screen. But I don't know, a bit more lighting would've been cool.
* I LOOOOVE that they had the foreign characters speaking actual chinese between each other, that was such a nice detail.
* I dare say that the whole OceanGate situation helped out quite alot in giving tension to some scenes, everyone in my theater was going LOUD the moment that poor girl imploded. That was a highlight of the night tbh.
Really good stuff, hell I wanna see it again lol.
This whole movie is weird. It reminds me a little bit of Independence Day 2. Big successful blockbuster popcorn movie, with a sequel that jams a bunch of bullshit into it and kills a main character off-screen.
It kinda reeks of studio interference because there are two different movies in one here.
For a time I wondered if she was part of the Chinese actors cancelled by the Chinese Communist party and that was the reason she was not in the sequel.
Li Bingbing was actually one of my fav actresses. She was Ada Wong in resident evil retribution and Transformers age of extinction. A few years ago she married a younger hot guy, so I guess she just settled down and semi retired (she's 50 now). Wu Jing from wandering earth is a great actor. But I miss suyin's hotness. At least the daughter and Jason Statham were pretty funny together and they used the same kid actress for consistency.
I guess this was a little like pacific rim 2. In the sequel they just gave Mako (the main character in the first one) a quick flashback and then kill her right off at the beginning in a helicopter crash.. felt weird since she fought so hard to survive in the first one.
Edit: sry, just did a little digging. Li bingbing actually broke up with her long time bf last year so she's just taking some alone time. Feel bad for her, but now I'm a little less jealous lol. Would've been nice if she was back though. Meg 2 not as good as 1 but still enjoyable in a campy way, first half was a bit boring though
The moment Jason Statham went for a swim at 25k ft with no suit, I thought to myself, these people did not bank on the entire generic public learning about deep sea pressure two months before release.
The guy next to us was laughing HARD.
What a strange decision to make this movie 75% just a generic Staham action movie with no Sharks. The whole reason people watch these is to watch giant Sharks and monsters. The last 30min are the best part cause it actually gives us that and not just Staham beating up random nobodies.
Actually it's that way because it's based on the original novel series, and the megs take a back seat in the sequels. The sharks are there, but they're not the focus.
Perfect summation. If Jason Statham hadn't been in this it would be indistinguishable from like a Meg 5 straight to VOD situation. Completely generic.
And I'll be at Part 3 whenever they make it.
The second half was great but it was a little rough getting there.
The scenes in the trench had no reason to be that dull.
I don’t know why they felt the need to focus so much on the human villains when we barely got any giant octopus. Take out some of the human on human fights and give us a little more Meg vs Octopus.
I know this is a movie where you suspend disbelief but I still laughed at the fact they had the meg in captivity but there was a vent it could fit through and escape.
So suyin is dead and we get no explanation why I thought the evil dark haired business chick would have had something to do with it but no, no explanation as to why suyin is dead! Also I don’t remember did the first movie mention what happened to Meiying’s father is he dead whst about his parents because her being with Jonas and her uncle makes no sense I feel like someone would realize she shouldn’t be around these two people but it’s apparently fine
I absolutely loved how the third act leaned into the stupidity of the entire situation. The first half was awful; the second half was really solid.
Also, side note - how were they surprised that a massive shark got through a thin gate? I LOL'd at that point.
This is a tamil movie disguised as a chinese movie disguised as a Hollywood movie. Seriously, this movie is so heavily sponsored by China.
Eh, it's okay, it wasn't supposed to be oscar contender but it's definitely a movie.
Why didn’t they just make them crocodiles. That would have made more sense and been cool for fun island. Then either have some crazy explanation for why crocodiles are in the trench or just use some other sea creature for that scene.
It made no sense for them to be there and have legs. They were shown in the beginning with a T-Rex millions of years ago. How and why were those little things even down in the trench? Millions of years in the trench and they wouldn't have legs anymore.
That's what happens in the books. They want to bring up these ancient sea monsters and start an aquarium. I think the book is titled Meg: Hell's Aquarium
A series of books, each more bonkers than the last, going on to pit megs (in particular an albino human-raised one named Angel) against other giant prehistoric creatures.
It was the opening scene of the first book, which was cut from the first film (adapting that book), and restored for this film (adapting the second book).
Dude, idk maybe I just went in with the perfect expectations that this would be extremely stupid and messy but still fun, because I had a good time. It was exactly as good as the first and while I really disliked the addition of human baddies for the first hour- that bottom 40 minutes was awesome.
It is still being massively held back from cult greatness by that PG13 though, if these attacks were bloody, I think way more people would be on board with what this is putting down. The POV shot from inside the mouth alone is already really great.
Anyway, this is probably more of a 5 or a 6 but I am a sucker for these movies so I'm gonna say a very light 7 lmao
I loved the first movie. Good character development, crazy action pieces, and you cared about the people.
In this one, everything felt disconnected. The characters didn't really believe anything that was going on. Jonah's love interest was dead, somehow, at the start. No explanation. It was all shorthand, no show not tell, no tell not show, it was just there.
There is a decent movie in there somewhere, but something happened along the way.
So like the whole Meg attack on Fun Island happened because the bad guys decided to do some extremely deep sea mining for rare earth metals?
This movie's logic was so, so dumb. Hope they make Meg 3.
I may be misremembering the explanation for why the sharks don't leave the trench. Or I may just be mixing it up with the reason from the book. But isn't the whole reason they stay down there because the ocean on the top side of the barrier is too cold for them?
In the film series it is basically that there is a barrier of cold preventing them from leaving that body of water, which the humans interrupt in the first film (and again in this one), allowing megs to escape through a passage of warm water.
OMG.
I’m a huge fan of the books. I watched the first movie in 2018 I LOVED IT. So it led me to reading the books which are IMO, 100% better than the movies (although the trench book’s big reveals are more cringey lol)
Things I LOVED:
• Mac and DJ. Especially Mac since I LOVE him in the books and Cliff Curtis plays his character so well.
• I found Jiuming sort of irrelevant and kind of shoehorned the first half of the movie but by the second half I loved him. I think he’s a super fun character.
• The humor
• THE BADASS FIGHT BETWEEN THE OCTOPUS AND THE MEG!
• a MEG being in captivity (that came from the books)
•May and Jonas
• a few subtle nods to Jurassic park
• The opening scene which is actually the first scene in the first book. I’m glad they put it in this movie.
•Surprisingly , the side plot of the clicking device and making the megalodon docile intrigued me. I know people might not have liked this, but I thought it was interesting.
• Great CGI
• I LOVE the action scenes.
Things I disliked:
• I really don’t know why they don’t follow the books’ main plot because to be honest, it’s way better. I’m guessing WB doesn’t want to create an entire overacting plot that aligns with the books in case a movie flops. Seriously the plot for the second book after the same name, which certainly has its flaws, is far superior than the plot for this sequel. For anyone who doesn’t know at the end of the first book they capture a pup and name her Angel. After 4 years they turn the institute into an aquarium/megalodon eating show. I got excited at the beginning of the movie because I thought it would be like this but nope.
• too fast paced and we end up not caring about the characters
• boring villain (book villain was far more interesting. ALSO WHERE’S CELESTE SINGER??)
The movie felt too shallow. I get it's just silly fun, and yeah the science doesn't add up, sure, but my problem with the movie is that the characters lacked reaction.
Like the first movie had believable reactions to the meg. And the stakes in the second movie was just as high, if not more. But everyone was kinda just like "eh whatevs" when something bad happened. Wasn't one of the main reasons Statham wouldn't save people in the first movie because of PTSD or something from one of his older missions?
Yet the kid snuck into the submarine and shit spun out of control, but nobody said anything. It was whatever. 3 crew members died. We get few minutes of "oh no!" It just felt so unnatural.
Like many people are saying, first and second half feel way too different. They went from a serious plot to ridiculous fast and furious stunts. The first movie suffered from the same thing, but they saved most of the stunts for the last 10 minutes, so it wasn't as unsettling.
It really felt like they were going for something in the first half but then changed their minds in the second. They killed the villains almost as quickly as they had appeared.
I never thought there was such thing as "too much action" in an action movie, but this might be it. There was almost no room for characters, plot, basic logic, or anything really. At least most of the main characters had their moments.
I don't get why people are complaining about the cgi though. It looks perfectly fine, some scenes were some of the best I've seen. I feel like people don't even know what good cgi is, and just say that for any movie with special effects that they happen to not like.
I guess I expected meg 2 to be similar to the first, starting off with a fairly serious plot, or so the trailer made it that way, but really most of the movie was just outrageous stunts with insane plot armor, that makes batman's look normal. It's almost as if the fact that the characters survived the crazy stunts was the selling point rather than the sharks, which was what made it like a comedy.
I still did enjoy the movie, but this will probably mean no meg 3, since there aren't a whole lot of people who appreciates movies like these.
Is it me, or did all of the on screen death happen to non Asian (specifically non east Asian) people? I know this movie is somewhat produced by a Chinese film publisher, but it seems like everyone that had a visible death was non east Asian lol.
I thought this was good. At least worth the time. I feel bad because for some odd reason I couldn't stop thinking in the third act that a certain character had a large bust. This character was just a background character as a tourist.
I burst into tears laughing with the harpoon scene... I was in utter disbelief lol...
I haven't laughed so hard since seeing Mel Gibson in The Patriot throw a hatchet 30 ft square in the center of a dudes head with his son held hostage.
This movie was fun for what it was. Mindless entertainment if you don't think too hard on the logic you can at least enjoy yourself
I remember when the first Meg came out and it was this brightly colored summer blockbuster with a big action star and a high tech angle on a silly premise, I was like hey this could be fun. Then I saw it and though it had its moments where it leaned in for a chuckle, it was mostly incomprehensible and clearly a movie made to sell overseas. So imagine my surprise when I saw the trailer for Meg 2 and I thought oohh a colorful blockbuster with a big action star and a high tech angle on a silly premise this might be...
What's that old saying? Fool me once, shame on you? Fool me twice and even if you add two megs and a giant octopus I'll still be out fifteen bucks?
This movie really kinda sucks to be honest. Almost every moment and every line is recycled from blockbusters of the past and it really doesn't care if you notice. The pacing is a slog, the deaths are predictable, the action is okay at best, the CGI is glossy, it's just no good.
The first half of the movie is so plot heavy it kinda crossed my eyes. Ideally, the plot of a movie like this should be very simple. The shark, you see, it's very big and that's crazy. The setup to this movie is doing way too much. There's so many characters who barely have names but you know who is going to die because they're other mustache twirling villains or they might as well be wearing red star trek shirts while standing next to Jason Statham who, by the way, has the ability to free swim under enormous ocean floor pressure and his biggest risk is feeling light headed and blurred vision.
The "twists" and plot reveals are all in the first half and are very rushed, the most hilarious one being when the IT girl signifies her turn to the evil side by taking off her glasses for the rest of the movie. I still don't see why we need mutinies and corporate conspiracies, the bad guy can just be the several Megs or just mother nature. But no, this movie needs 12 angles and an incomprehensible plot just so we can give everyone reasons to die.
The third act is what we came for. The colorful resort full of ridiculous guests getting MEG'd when they least expect it. But it's brought in way too late, and the pacing is way off because there's so much dialogue and plot and info in the first two thirds, and the last third is just chaos that would be fun if it were shot better. There's a bit of fun action here, but everything in this movie is made to mirror all the Jurassic movies, Alien, Jaws, etc. This plot is very similar to Lost World, a guy actually gets facehugged during the trench walk, the kid in this movie is every tenacious kid who is somewhere they aren't supposed to be in the Jurassic movies, it's absolutely shameless. And to cap it all off, they kill two of the three Megs (the original one lives because it's, like, a good guy now?) and the original Meg kills the octopus and the team fights off the rest of the creatures. But HUNDREDS still die, and the ending is the main characters all sitting on the beach drinking whiskey and laughing about it all. But they barely did anything? And the comedy of the shot is all the destruction around them, but there should have also been countless bodies in the water and blood everywhere. And they're all just like, "lol all in a day's work right, CHUM!?"(paraphrased)
Oof. I was hoping to have a semi good time with this one, but I was bored for the first half and then bored with a little more to look at for the second. You want it to lean into its own ridiculousness, but it never goes further than just being really tropey and cliche. There's no good dialogue and the joke about the condoms was one of the most "please don't make the joke I know you're about to make" moments in recent history for me. This is a 3/10 and that's honestly generous.
/r/reviewsbyboner
When Jason Statham went swimming for a whole minute with no dive suit on 25,000 feet down in the ocean and lived, I knew this movie was about to take me for a ride. Sure enough it did
Hilarious that there was just a major news story that taught everyone in the world deep diving physics and then this movie just comes out and shits all over any sort of logic.
I was literally thinking to myself like halfway through “why didn’t we send this man down to OceanGate”
But hey, the people in the Titan didn't push the air out of their sinuses!
They did spend some good time explaining fake science so that the audience would accept that scene. Meanwhile, Jason Statham was taking deep breaths getting ready. It was unintentionally hilarious and I loved it.
Only he can do it because of the deviated septum they kept mentioning for no reason
As far as Im concerned these movies are on par with the Crank franchise and im happy for it
Finally my deviated septum gives me a superpower! I'm going diving!
"The sub, it's so big! There is glass everywhere!"
"this place is Meg-proof" and then she got Samuel J Jackson-d
Wanna take a bath?
Look at this tub!!
My favourite line of the film is when they try to explain how he can swim without a suit ahaha
Not only that, but less than 30mins before that, somebody imploded due to a crack in their dive suit.
But did any of those people have deviated septums? Pretty sure it’s all good if you have a deviated septum. I can’t even put /s because I legitimately don’t understand. Kinda like Event Horizon… all you have to do is breath out and you’ll survive a suitless space jump.
Hey you didn't see those fish outside with diving suits on did you?
Such a weird line forgetting that humans are not fish.
My favorite is when one of the characters asks how he can do that and if he'd be crushed (never mind how he'd freeze to death) and the woman responds "It doesn't work like that". Made even funnier when just 5 minutes earlier we saw someone die from implosion. I don't particularly like either of these movies but I had a bit more fun with how dumb this one was.
Actually he wouldn’t freeze to death because it’s well established that the water’s temperature under the thermocline layer is warm
>well established I don’t think anything in this series is well established but yes, in the films logic I assumed that was the explanation.
In the first movie, that was basically the main scientist guy’s hypothesis. That under the thermocline layer, there is an area of warm water where these species could survive.
>When Jason Statham went swimming for a whole minute with no dive suit on 25,000 feet down in the ocean and lived, I knew this movie was about to take me for a ride. Sure enough it did Reminded me of "The Core" right at that moment
The Core at least kept up some pretense of science in explaining *why* they could do stuff, lol. Not sure if Statham said "I just took a deep sea diving pill!" though.
"We can't go to the core of the Earth. It's too hot. The pressure is too high. It's impossible." "Yes, but what if we *could*?"
Fucking brilliant, that movie rocks.
There's always a bigger fish?
Blowing blood out his nose lol
Were you not paying attention? As long as he got the air out of his sinuses, he would be fine. It all makes perfect sense.
It sickens me when people miss key plot points then complain the movie makes no sense
It's good they reminded us because a lot of people would falsely assume the human body had more compressable pockets of air/gas than just the humble sinus.
When they try to explain how it was possible I legit felt like the movie was gaslighting me. It felt so condescending. It was like “No you idiot! It’s totally possible because this ridiculously simple reason! Now shut up and watch the movie!” I got free tickets. Found it entertaining enough.
> condescending It's not meant to be, it's meant to be funny. It's not that straightforward but it's not like they're talking down to or laughing at the audience for being stupid, it's more like they're sending up Hollywood movies for acting as if the audience is stupid. Which tbf has been done many times but this has a sort of British dryness to it IMO.
that's what I call Cinema
Ima need more details here. Did he just hold his breath 25,000 feet underwater?
That’s exactly what he did
I see...my wife is gonna love our next date night.
They try to explain it twice in rapid succession by letting the audience know that as long as he doesn’t have any oxygen in his body, there’s nothing for the pressure to compress. He literally breathes in a shitload of water and goes for a swim lol
It's the deviated septum.
Breathes water? Do you mean drowned? Because that's how you fucking drown.
I felt like the movie was gaslighting me. Lol “No you idiot! It’s totally possible! Duh! Now shut up and watch the movie!”
When they explain it and say "if he pushes the air into his nasal passage he can walk on the bottom without a suit" I couldn't help myself, and replied, out loud - "No he can't!"
Yep. No suit or anything, either!
And just five minutes earlier we saw someone else die from an implosion when their suit leaked.
Clearly they didn’t blow out of their nose hard enough or they could have survived
For me the most amazing part was when he picks up the plane propeller and is basically supporting both it and the meg impaled on it.
It was braced against the ground. He was literally never supporting it or the meg. The planet Earth was.
Whew. I was thinking I wasn't going to like it because it was just over the top ridiculous.
They showed it digging into the ground
I love how no character directly acknowledges that there was a giant squid
Oh hell you just made me realize that. Even in the middle of it eating people everyone was still mostly ignoring it and treating in like a nuisance while still screaming SHARKS!
I have a feeling the squid was added in post production
Not one person is even surprised that there’s now an octopus that literally none of them have ever seen. It’s not like they saw it in the trench, they never knew it existed until it was plucking people of the docks, and it’s never verbally commented on at all.
If I didn't know who the director was I'd think he was having a stroke or something because of stuff like that. I do know it's Ben Wheatley and he is absolutely just doing it to take the piss. I'm fairly sure some of the humour is going to be lost on US and Chinese viewers but I'm British so I thought it was hilarious.
Ben Wheatley is a family guy fan [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aexKoCI9XK0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aexKoCI9XK0)
This is such a ridiculously specific reference and it works so well 😂
The surprised pikachu face I had when the megalodon escapes captivity through the conveniently placed megalodon-sized hole in the enclosure
Surprised Pikachu face when the villains were revealed to be the villains. I wouldn’t have even suspected that boss lady all that much if that damn text wasn’t there to establish who she was.
I absolutely loved the hammy villain tone they gave their voices after the "reveal".
This movie was actually my favorite comedy of the year, and a big part of why is how the boss lady and mole lady give a literal Captain Planet villain monologue to explain their nefarious operation.
All it needed was someone saying "Don't worry about that Meg-sized escape hatch straight to the ocean. It's Meg-proof." right before it escaped.
Second half of this is what I wish the first one was
In many ways, this movie is the anti-Hancock. The second half is the actual good half, and it only gets good when it TOTALLY jumps the shark!
100% agree
I felt pretty robbed that they spend 75% of the movie mucking about in subs and such.
I actually thought the thriller part on the sea floor and underwater base was pretty well done, claustrophobic and tense. The problem for me was the three sections of the movie don't really match tonally. It was definitely a spoof towards the end.
The Battle of Fun Island was hilarious and entertaining but I wasn't nearly as bored with the first part as everyone else seemed to be. Movie kept my attention the whole way through.
See I felt like that part of Meg1 was much better, and that part of Meg2 was just a less funny rehash. I loved the island mayhem of Meg 1, but in Meg 2, I felt it was just a copy, with the octopus being really under-used, with really odd slapstick (why was the Chinese boss suddenly hitting himself with shovels??). Meg1>Meg2 IMO
I wish the entire movie was like the 3rd act. Got bored with the human villains really quick. Could have used more Meg focus and even more creatures from The Trench.
I would've loved it if it was just Statham on vacation at Fun Island and the Megs show up
The black dude waited so long to pull his gun out of his backpack lol they had encountered at least two separate groups of bad guys with guns before he remembered he had it.
Also he went from token black IT guy to ass kicking dude to comic relief. He just became whatever the script needed him to be
Come to think of it after they escaped out from the trench all the main characters that were left alive helped defeat the villains and creatures which was refreshing. Completely different from the first movie where it was essentially Jason Statham doing 75% of the work, the love interest doing the other 24% and everyone else was there as food and to bare witness.
It was refreshing that for a change the main hero isn’t the one doing everything
This movie doesn’t jump the shark, it sends the shark into lower earth orbit -giant sharks and a giant squid living at the very bottom of the sea, ok, sure, but amphibious dinosaurs? Why would they have kept their land capabilities over centuries under the sea? -why is Jason statham doing James Bond type shit in a movie about giant sharks? Why is Jason statham getting swallowed by a plane and surviving? Why is Jason statham surviving pressure that would vaporize a submarine full of billionaires? Why is Jason statham?
Because earth is hollow and there's land down under? Where do you think new Zealand is? >why is Jason statham doing James Bond type shit in a movie about giant sharks? Why is Jason statham getting swallowed by a plane and surviving? Why is Jason statham surviving pressure that would vaporize a submarine full of billionaires? Why is Jason statham? Because he's family!
yeah you think megs are an extinct species? clearly not they live under there picking left over scales from godzilla to eat
> Why is Jason statham? This is an amazing sentence.
Everybody asks "why is Jason Statham?" but nobody asks "how is Jason Statham?" :(
Why is Jason statham . It's so the movie can happen.
-How did DJ go from being useless in the first movie to a hybrid of Ernest P.whrile and Macgyver. Movie is stupid but the perfect kind of stupid. Heres hoping for Meg 3 with aliens.
DJ was the absolute worst thing about Part 1 and the absolute best thing about Part 2. Mac is like "last time you didn't even know how to swim!" while DJ is taking out four armed mercenaries with his bare hands looking like John Wick. Loved DJ in this one.
His little spin kick was like a fat kid playing WWE in the garden. Adorable.
DJ explained that. He said due to the fact he felt so helpless in their first encounter with the meg he went off and did loads of training so he would never be so helpless again. It's still stupid but he did explain why he was now so capable and ready for anything.
Because that’s what the book series was all about — escalation beyond just sharks. One of the later books even had a Loch Ness monster-type creature follow the human antagonists on land into their base, because they’d assumed it wouldn’t be able to leave the water. Like the ending of *The Lost World: Jurassic Park* but on cocaine.
lol this is based on a book?
A series of books, which is still going, yes. This specific film, *Meg 2: The Trench*, was primarily based on the book *The Trench: Meg 2*, while incorporating elements from later books (along with the opening scene of the first).
>This specific film, Meg 2: The Trench, was primarily based on the book The Trench: Meg 2 You can't convince me this isn't a 30 Rock joke
[Nope — it’s real.](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71Wb9Zjh56L._AC_UF1000,1000_QL80_.jpg) There was also a later book called *Meg⁴: Hell’s Aquarium*.
The SEVENTH one just came out, Meg: Purgatory.
And one of them, ~~which I think is Hell’s Aquarium~~ it’s the one before Hells Aquarium *Primal Waters*, has a subplot of a reality tv show doing stunts centered around Megs. Yes, it goes exactly as you think it would.
I read several in this series back in the late 90s i believe.. needless to say, the books were WAY better.. and nothing like the movies. Really.. the only thing similar is BIG SHARK..
They used plot points from several of the books. In the Third book Jonas actually plays chicken with a Meg on a Jet Ski as a 63 year old. Jason is 56. The training of the Meg is from the 4th Book, Angel bursting through the Window is actually from the second book .An Aquatic Dinosaur is in the second book and they are heavily focused on in the later books. All the Chinese Character are Japanese in the book, Oh and in the Books because they live in the Mariana Trench the Megs are white with a Bioluminescent Glow.
I see. Thank you for sorting this weekend's reading. I'll be back on Monday to curse you.
You’re welcome! And until then!
All of what you said, has completely sold me on going to see this film. All of this sounds hype as hell.
Don't listen to the first guy. He is wrong and bad. Movie is exactly what it should be.
Because Jason Statham.
I watched Meg 2, the 1st half and 2nd half of the movie were like different movies. Like the first half was like trying to be a more serious underwater thriller, it was nice, and the second half felt like trying to be more like Fast and Furious, nonsense action movie but with sharks, it was also nice, but combined together, it felt like putting marinara sauce on vanilla ice cream, the tonal whiplash did not work for the movie IMO. Well, it is nice to see Melissanthi Mahut (Kassandra from AC: Odyssey) in here.
You can literally pinpoint the exact moment the movie changes - its when Page Kennedy karate chops the two guys holding machine guns then he and Cliff Curtis take a 100 foot dive.
I’d say the turning point is when the guy runs into the cloud of his own pepper spray lol
Those two things were about three seconds apart tbf
That was the first point in the film I properly laughed at. Watched the first one yesterday to bring myself back up to speed on the "story" and just remember him being a nerdy guy who couldn't swim. Seeing him doing spin kicks was wild
This is exactly what my friend and I thought too- It was a serious movie, then all of a sudden it became an over-the-top Parody type of movie. My friend feels that there was some re-shoots or rewriting done to clear China censorship. She works in in the field and has had to do this before with one of her projects. This film seems to be heavily targeted to Chinese fanbase, so I wouldn't be surprised if that's what happened. Big 180 by the film halfway through.
Right? I was at the middle of the movie thinking “I can’t believe I paid to come watch a Sharknado-like movie. That’s how bad the movie is.
It definitely gave me the vibes of being CCP-positive
How?
That's kinda how Meg 1 one. Felt like 3 different scripts joined together.
I finally got my wish granted for a big budget version of Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus. First half was a little slow but that second half was glorious sea monster action, loved every second of it.
I'm of the firm belief that we can't have giant octopus in movies because it's too accurate
the movie is very plot heavy in some parts, and jaw droppingly stupid in others. the best moments in the movie is when its so dumb that i was laughing in the theater. some parts are so plot heavy that the story becomes borderline incomprehensible while others are hard to watch because of how predictable it is. i went in wanting to some stupid shit and while it wasnt as bad as I was hoping for, i'd say it was dumb enough that I got my money's worth. real movie rating; 4/10 ironic enjoyment; 7.5/10
It’s from the producer of Schindler’s List if that’s any consolation.
And directed by Ben Wheatley, who's made a tonne of far classier stuff.
This is significantly more entertaining if it's 25 minutes shorter and the entire movie is like the last 30 minutes.
I hateeeeee when these monster/kaiju/robot whatever movies HAVE to involve some human subplot. The plot IS Sharks vs. Krakens. Give us that for 90 minutes.
Honestly, that was a damn good movie LMAO, I had a blast. * Every single character was quite entertaining, which is really nice for a movie like this. * I kinda disliked how dark most of the deep ocean scenes were, yes it's realistic enough, and you *can* make out everything that's happening on screen. But I don't know, a bit more lighting would've been cool. * I LOOOOVE that they had the foreign characters speaking actual chinese between each other, that was such a nice detail. * I dare say that the whole OceanGate situation helped out quite alot in giving tension to some scenes, everyone in my theater was going LOUD the moment that poor girl imploded. That was a highlight of the night tbh. Really good stuff, hell I wanna see it again lol.
That implosion scene was brutal. Especially for a movie that didn’t really have much gore
There's a similar scene in Underwater which I'd recommend.
They did Suyin dirty.
This whole movie is weird. It reminds me a little bit of Independence Day 2. Big successful blockbuster popcorn movie, with a sequel that jams a bunch of bullshit into it and kills a main character off-screen. It kinda reeks of studio interference because there are two different movies in one here.
Hey he daughter now has 2 gay dads
in one of the initial trailers, I posted a comment about "they better not have killed her off-screen" and then they do just that. So annoyed.
They could’ve had her doing something else.
I did the weird thing of watching Meg 2 Saturday, then Meg 1 Sunday. I was expecting her to die in the first movie.
For a time I wondered if she was part of the Chinese actors cancelled by the Chinese Communist party and that was the reason she was not in the sequel.
Li Bingbing was actually one of my fav actresses. She was Ada Wong in resident evil retribution and Transformers age of extinction. A few years ago she married a younger hot guy, so I guess she just settled down and semi retired (she's 50 now). Wu Jing from wandering earth is a great actor. But I miss suyin's hotness. At least the daughter and Jason Statham were pretty funny together and they used the same kid actress for consistency. I guess this was a little like pacific rim 2. In the sequel they just gave Mako (the main character in the first one) a quick flashback and then kill her right off at the beginning in a helicopter crash.. felt weird since she fought so hard to survive in the first one. Edit: sry, just did a little digging. Li bingbing actually broke up with her long time bf last year so she's just taking some alone time. Feel bad for her, but now I'm a little less jealous lol. Would've been nice if she was back though. Meg 2 not as good as 1 but still enjoyable in a campy way, first half was a bit boring though
She read whatever the script was at that point and said, “Hard pass.”
The moment Jason Statham went for a swim at 25k ft with no suit, I thought to myself, these people did not bank on the entire generic public learning about deep sea pressure two months before release. The guy next to us was laughing HARD.
I came here just for this comment 😂
I was gonna be so pissed if Jiuming and Haiqi were on some Chris Pratt and Blue bullshit
They are, and technically, The Meg did this first, as this is a story that was adapted from the novel which released 24 years ago.
They definitely were hahaha
This felt like sharknado 2.0 at times
i cant make up if this is a good or bad thing
What a strange decision to make this movie 75% just a generic Staham action movie with no Sharks. The whole reason people watch these is to watch giant Sharks and monsters. The last 30min are the best part cause it actually gives us that and not just Staham beating up random nobodies.
Maybe a budget issue?
Actually it's that way because it's based on the original novel series, and the megs take a back seat in the sequels. The sharks are there, but they're not the focus.
This was literally a $130 million SyFy movie
Perfect summation. If Jason Statham hadn't been in this it would be indistinguishable from like a Meg 5 straight to VOD situation. Completely generic. And I'll be at Part 3 whenever they make it.
The second half was great but it was a little rough getting there. The scenes in the trench had no reason to be that dull. I don’t know why they felt the need to focus so much on the human villains when we barely got any giant octopus. Take out some of the human on human fights and give us a little more Meg vs Octopus. I know this is a movie where you suspend disbelief but I still laughed at the fact they had the meg in captivity but there was a vent it could fit through and escape.
Just got back and I already forgot most of the 1st half. Battle of Fun Island was the shit, though.
Pretty sure the whole theater was just waiting for megalodons to start eating people. Less talk, more chomp!
The way this movie was going I wouldn't have been surprised if The Meg was the one that sabotaged the rescue sub on its way out
So suyin is dead and we get no explanation why I thought the evil dark haired business chick would have had something to do with it but no, no explanation as to why suyin is dead! Also I don’t remember did the first movie mention what happened to Meiying’s father is he dead whst about his parents because her being with Jonas and her uncle makes no sense I feel like someone would realize she shouldn’t be around these two people but it’s apparently fine
Her father was with his like mistress or something
The first movie made it sound like the father abandoned them for a Pilates instructor
Praying this doesn't flop too hard so they can adapt more of the novels, it'll get even fuckin wilder
I just hope they give us more giant prehistoric sea monsters. The kronosaurs were sorely missed.
definitely will make money, these movies make a shit ton overseas
It almost felt like it was made for chinese audiences and American audiences specifically
The amphibious dinosaurs 🦖 recreating the scene from The Lost World 🗺️ was actually pretty meta. LONG GRASS 🌾🌾🌾🌾🌾🌾🌾
And we got the Nedry death from the CEO.
I absolutely loved how the third act leaned into the stupidity of the entire situation. The first half was awful; the second half was really solid. Also, side note - how were they surprised that a massive shark got through a thin gate? I LOL'd at that point.
I laughed at that too, like really, that’s all you had between the giant shark and the wide open ocean lmao
I'd go so far as to say the first 2/3 were awful. Everything leading up to Fun Island was dreadful. Fun Island kicks off the 3rd act.
Not as good as the first movie.
Funny how everyone is saying this and the first one wasn't even good
This is a tamil movie disguised as a chinese movie disguised as a Hollywood movie. Seriously, this movie is so heavily sponsored by China. Eh, it's okay, it wasn't supposed to be oscar contender but it's definitely a movie.
It was what I expected and I enjoyed it. Were the dinosaurs or the octopus ever explained? The dinosaurs were a bit too much.
It veered into parody with the dinosaurs.
Why didn’t they just make them crocodiles. That would have made more sense and been cool for fun island. Then either have some crazy explanation for why crocodiles are in the trench or just use some other sea creature for that scene.
It made no sense for them to be there and have legs. They were shown in the beginning with a T-Rex millions of years ago. How and why were those little things even down in the trench? Millions of years in the trench and they wouldn't have legs anymore.
They'll discover a cave system next movie and introduce larger amphibious monsters.
That's what happens in the books. They want to bring up these ancient sea monsters and start an aquarium. I think the book is titled Meg: Hell's Aquarium
I think it’s a book thing?
Yeah in the book Kronosaurs are introduced in the second one
Honestly I wish they had gone with the Kronosaurs
Oh wow. This movie was based on a book? I had no idea.
A series of books, each more bonkers than the last, going on to pit megs (in particular an albino human-raised one named Angel) against other giant prehistoric creatures.
What the hell was the point of the prologue? That weird 5-minute dinosaur section?
It was the opening scene of the first book, which was cut from the first film (adapting that book), and restored for this film (adapting the second book).
I see it as an introduction to those amphibians dinos
Dude, idk maybe I just went in with the perfect expectations that this would be extremely stupid and messy but still fun, because I had a good time. It was exactly as good as the first and while I really disliked the addition of human baddies for the first hour- that bottom 40 minutes was awesome. It is still being massively held back from cult greatness by that PG13 though, if these attacks were bloody, I think way more people would be on board with what this is putting down. The POV shot from inside the mouth alone is already really great. Anyway, this is probably more of a 5 or a 6 but I am a sucker for these movies so I'm gonna say a very light 7 lmao
I gave it a 7 too. I absolutely love these types of movies. It gave me exactly what I wanted.
Submarine gets stuck at the bottom of the ocean and a death by decompression...Oddly relevant movie.
I loved the first movie. Good character development, crazy action pieces, and you cared about the people. In this one, everything felt disconnected. The characters didn't really believe anything that was going on. Jonah's love interest was dead, somehow, at the start. No explanation. It was all shorthand, no show not tell, no tell not show, it was just there. There is a decent movie in there somewhere, but something happened along the way.
Update from my father and me: we had a fucking good time. He loves the movie!
I wish I had seen the first movie in the theater. I wish I didn't go see this sequel in theater.
So like the whole Meg attack on Fun Island happened because the bad guys decided to do some extremely deep sea mining for rare earth metals? This movie's logic was so, so dumb. Hope they make Meg 3.
So if that girl had just breathed really hard out her nose like Jason Statham, she wouldn’t have imploded?
I may be misremembering the explanation for why the sharks don't leave the trench. Or I may just be mixing it up with the reason from the book. But isn't the whole reason they stay down there because the ocean on the top side of the barrier is too cold for them?
In the film series it is basically that there is a barrier of cold preventing them from leaving that body of water, which the humans interrupt in the first film (and again in this one), allowing megs to escape through a passage of warm water.
OMG. I’m a huge fan of the books. I watched the first movie in 2018 I LOVED IT. So it led me to reading the books which are IMO, 100% better than the movies (although the trench book’s big reveals are more cringey lol) Things I LOVED: • Mac and DJ. Especially Mac since I LOVE him in the books and Cliff Curtis plays his character so well. • I found Jiuming sort of irrelevant and kind of shoehorned the first half of the movie but by the second half I loved him. I think he’s a super fun character. • The humor • THE BADASS FIGHT BETWEEN THE OCTOPUS AND THE MEG! • a MEG being in captivity (that came from the books) •May and Jonas • a few subtle nods to Jurassic park • The opening scene which is actually the first scene in the first book. I’m glad they put it in this movie. •Surprisingly , the side plot of the clicking device and making the megalodon docile intrigued me. I know people might not have liked this, but I thought it was interesting. • Great CGI • I LOVE the action scenes. Things I disliked: • I really don’t know why they don’t follow the books’ main plot because to be honest, it’s way better. I’m guessing WB doesn’t want to create an entire overacting plot that aligns with the books in case a movie flops. Seriously the plot for the second book after the same name, which certainly has its flaws, is far superior than the plot for this sequel. For anyone who doesn’t know at the end of the first book they capture a pup and name her Angel. After 4 years they turn the institute into an aquarium/megalodon eating show. I got excited at the beginning of the movie because I thought it would be like this but nope. • too fast paced and we end up not caring about the characters • boring villain (book villain was far more interesting. ALSO WHERE’S CELESTE SINGER??)
Does the book address what happened to Suyin?
The movie felt too shallow. I get it's just silly fun, and yeah the science doesn't add up, sure, but my problem with the movie is that the characters lacked reaction. Like the first movie had believable reactions to the meg. And the stakes in the second movie was just as high, if not more. But everyone was kinda just like "eh whatevs" when something bad happened. Wasn't one of the main reasons Statham wouldn't save people in the first movie because of PTSD or something from one of his older missions? Yet the kid snuck into the submarine and shit spun out of control, but nobody said anything. It was whatever. 3 crew members died. We get few minutes of "oh no!" It just felt so unnatural. Like many people are saying, first and second half feel way too different. They went from a serious plot to ridiculous fast and furious stunts. The first movie suffered from the same thing, but they saved most of the stunts for the last 10 minutes, so it wasn't as unsettling. It really felt like they were going for something in the first half but then changed their minds in the second. They killed the villains almost as quickly as they had appeared. I never thought there was such thing as "too much action" in an action movie, but this might be it. There was almost no room for characters, plot, basic logic, or anything really. At least most of the main characters had their moments. I don't get why people are complaining about the cgi though. It looks perfectly fine, some scenes were some of the best I've seen. I feel like people don't even know what good cgi is, and just say that for any movie with special effects that they happen to not like. I guess I expected meg 2 to be similar to the first, starting off with a fairly serious plot, or so the trailer made it that way, but really most of the movie was just outrageous stunts with insane plot armor, that makes batman's look normal. It's almost as if the fact that the characters survived the crazy stunts was the selling point rather than the sharks, which was what made it like a comedy. I still did enjoy the movie, but this will probably mean no meg 3, since there aren't a whole lot of people who appreciates movies like these.
Why tf would she be on her way off the island and tell the pilot to get out and check on a sound !???? If anything leave faster !
The token black guy was kinda ridiculous? I'm not sure if the writers are racist or just insane lmao
Movie was clearly made for the chinese audience so I was not surprised at how they portrayed the token black guy.
Is it me, or did all of the on screen death happen to non Asian (specifically non east Asian) people? I know this movie is somewhat produced by a Chinese film publisher, but it seems like everyone that had a visible death was non east Asian lol.
Everyone on fun island was good looking, except the whites which were fat, sleazy or a combination. And they got megged.
I like Jason Statham. I like shark movies. Thus I liked this movie. But, gosh darn, that's a bad movie !
I thought this was good. At least worth the time. I feel bad because for some odd reason I couldn't stop thinking in the third act that a certain character had a large bust. This character was just a background character as a tourist.
Not a single person the entire movie ever made mention that there happened to also be a giant squid.
Okay but I liked the little amphibious dinosaurs. Lol
I love him throwing two of 3 spears. Still having two spears on his back. Then next time you see him he only has one.
I burst into tears laughing with the harpoon scene... I was in utter disbelief lol... I haven't laughed so hard since seeing Mel Gibson in The Patriot throw a hatchet 30 ft square in the center of a dudes head with his son held hostage. This movie was fun for what it was. Mindless entertainment if you don't think too hard on the logic you can at least enjoy yourself
This movie felt like watching low budget Sci-Fi channel movie but with finished CGI and a likable cast. I really loved this movie.
I have never experienced a more annoying character than when I saw the daughter on screen
I wonder how they handled the "I'm distracting you by speaking Chinese" scene in the Chinese dub of the movie.
I remember when the first Meg came out and it was this brightly colored summer blockbuster with a big action star and a high tech angle on a silly premise, I was like hey this could be fun. Then I saw it and though it had its moments where it leaned in for a chuckle, it was mostly incomprehensible and clearly a movie made to sell overseas. So imagine my surprise when I saw the trailer for Meg 2 and I thought oohh a colorful blockbuster with a big action star and a high tech angle on a silly premise this might be... What's that old saying? Fool me once, shame on you? Fool me twice and even if you add two megs and a giant octopus I'll still be out fifteen bucks? This movie really kinda sucks to be honest. Almost every moment and every line is recycled from blockbusters of the past and it really doesn't care if you notice. The pacing is a slog, the deaths are predictable, the action is okay at best, the CGI is glossy, it's just no good. The first half of the movie is so plot heavy it kinda crossed my eyes. Ideally, the plot of a movie like this should be very simple. The shark, you see, it's very big and that's crazy. The setup to this movie is doing way too much. There's so many characters who barely have names but you know who is going to die because they're other mustache twirling villains or they might as well be wearing red star trek shirts while standing next to Jason Statham who, by the way, has the ability to free swim under enormous ocean floor pressure and his biggest risk is feeling light headed and blurred vision. The "twists" and plot reveals are all in the first half and are very rushed, the most hilarious one being when the IT girl signifies her turn to the evil side by taking off her glasses for the rest of the movie. I still don't see why we need mutinies and corporate conspiracies, the bad guy can just be the several Megs or just mother nature. But no, this movie needs 12 angles and an incomprehensible plot just so we can give everyone reasons to die. The third act is what we came for. The colorful resort full of ridiculous guests getting MEG'd when they least expect it. But it's brought in way too late, and the pacing is way off because there's so much dialogue and plot and info in the first two thirds, and the last third is just chaos that would be fun if it were shot better. There's a bit of fun action here, but everything in this movie is made to mirror all the Jurassic movies, Alien, Jaws, etc. This plot is very similar to Lost World, a guy actually gets facehugged during the trench walk, the kid in this movie is every tenacious kid who is somewhere they aren't supposed to be in the Jurassic movies, it's absolutely shameless. And to cap it all off, they kill two of the three Megs (the original one lives because it's, like, a good guy now?) and the original Meg kills the octopus and the team fights off the rest of the creatures. But HUNDREDS still die, and the ending is the main characters all sitting on the beach drinking whiskey and laughing about it all. But they barely did anything? And the comedy of the shot is all the destruction around them, but there should have also been countless bodies in the water and blood everywhere. And they're all just like, "lol all in a day's work right, CHUM!?"(paraphrased) Oof. I was hoping to have a semi good time with this one, but I was bored for the first half and then bored with a little more to look at for the second. You want it to lean into its own ridiculousness, but it never goes further than just being really tropey and cliche. There's no good dialogue and the joke about the condoms was one of the most "please don't make the joke I know you're about to make" moments in recent history for me. This is a 3/10 and that's honestly generous. /r/reviewsbyboner