‘Meg 2: The Trench’: Review

Dir: Ben Wheatley. US/China. 2023. 116mins

Lacking the killer instinct of its ferocious titular beasts, Meg 2: The Trench lumbers through the waters, failing as both a gripping thriller and a cheeky ’so bad it’s good’ piece of late-summer escapism. Director Ben Wheatley, who takes the reins from The Meg filmmaker Jon Turteltaub, tries to replicate the mixture of scares and silliness in the 2018 original, but the novelty of watching Jason Statham square off against massive sharks has drifted away. While this sequel introduces some new terrifying creatures to go along with those merciless megalodons, even audiences simply looking to hoot and holler at campy action-horror antics may find The Trench rather too wet.

 The plot is frustratingly complicated when mindless carnage is really the selling point

Opening in the UK, China and the US on August 4, this Warner Bros. release could struggle to match The Meg’s surprise $530 million worldwide gross, despite the addition of action icon Wu Jing to the cast. With ’Barbenheimer’ still swimming strongly — and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem offering additional competition — The Trench faces crowded theatrical waters, perhaps eventually finding its sea legs on streaming.

Statham once again plays Jonas, a deep-sea diver who works for the Zhang Institute, a benevolent oceanic research centre that has been raising a megalodon under the watchful, loving eye of its benefactor Jiu-ming (Wu). But during an underwater expedition, Jonas and his team discover a secret mining operation happening at the bottom of a deep trench — the same trench where megalodons lived during the first film. Soon, our heroes are fighting new Megs and other predators that are set free after a titanic explosion on the mining rig.

The Trench wants to inject some emotion into this otherwise self-consciously irreverent creature-feature through the relationship between Jonas and Mei-ying (Sophia Cai), who survived The Meg and became a surrogate daughter for the crusty but sensitive deep-sea diver. Invariably, though, their fragile bond will mostly be an excuse for Wheatley to thrust Mei-ying into one perilous situation after another so that Jonas will have to rescue her. Similarly, the initial journey to the bottom of the ocean spells disaster for Jonas’s crew but, because the supporting characters are so thinly drawn, it’s hard to care about the fate of these anonymous individuals.

Most audiences will venture into The Trench to savour huge sharks wreaking havoc and, in that regard, this sequel is oddly withholding in its first half, focusing more on claustrophobic tension and narrative twists as Jonas and Jiuming unlock the mystery of why there is an uncharted mining base in this vast trench. But the screenplay — credited to Jon Hoeber, Erich Hoeber and Dean Georgaris, who all worked on the 2018 original — does not wring much suspense from these would-be character-driven moments. The proceedings get a little livelier (and bloodier) once the Megs start chomping on people but, even then, the plot is frustratingly complicated when mindless carnage is really the selling point.

To a degree, a picture like The Trench can laugh off its clunky dialogue and stiff acting by claiming that nothing should be taken too seriously — after all, who expects dramatic profundity in a flick about out-of-control super-sharks? But the impish dark humour that Wheatley unleashed in smaller films such as Sightseers and Free Fire is barely in evidence here, the film setting for broad humour consisting of exaggerated line-readings and over-the-top kill sequences. This sequel never outdoes the fairly ridiculous original, which wasn’t especially inspired but at least had a little more freshness to its knowing cheesiness.

Statham has often laced his stoic performances with a sly sense of humour, subtly acknowledging the preposterousness of his B-movies while confidently delivering the necessary thrills. But the Meg films do not capitalise on his athletic grace and martial-arts flair, instead straitjacketing him to dull dialogue he cannot bring to life. As in the first film, Jonas does outlandish things to save the day, but there is little joy in his character’s amped-up heroism. (The same is true of Wu, who fails to shine in an underwritten role.)

A towering octopus and some dinosaur-like monsters will further complicate matters but, while the forgettable Jaws 2 is referenced, The Trench actually feels more like a misbegotten Jurassic Park sequel, the bland terror and chaotic destruction dutifully doled out. Playing a lowly engineer who ends up showing off some action-movie savvy, rapper/actor Page Kennedy at least has a little fun with his stereotypical comic-relief character. (He also sings the end-credits song ‘Chomp’, which allows him the opportunity to bellow “I’m a megalodon!”) But for a film that sells itself as a popcorn pleasure, The Trench offers little to sink your teeth into.