Jon Turteltaub’s 2018 movie The Meg (watch it at THIS LINK) delivered on its promise of being a “Jason Statham vs. a giant shark” adventure – and now director Ben Wheatley’s sequel Meg 2: The Trench is set to reach theatres on August 4th. In a newly released featurette, which you can watch in the embed above, Wheatley says his intention with this film was to make a supercharged sequel with bigger creatures and bigger action… and judging by the footage on display in the featurette, it definitely looks like this follow-up has a change of being better and more exciting than its predecessor.
The screenplay for Meg 2: The Trench has been written by Dean Georgaris, Jon Hoeber, and Erich Hoeber, the same writing team that was on the first film. These films are inspired by a series of novels written by Steve Alten.
Jason Statham is back in the lead as rescue diver Jonas Taylor and is joined in the cast of the sequel by returning co-stars Cliff Curtis, Shuya Sophia Cai, and Page Kennedy, as well as Sienna Guillory (Resident Evil: Apocalypse), Skyler Samuels (The Gifted), Sergio Peris-Mencheta (Rambo: Last Blood), and Wu Jing (Wolf Warrior II). Li Bingbing isn’t reprising the role of oceanographer Suyin in this movie, despite the fact that Shuya Sophia Cai’s character Meiying is the young daughter of Suyin.
Wheatley told Collider that he chose to direct Meg 2 because he “really loved” the first film. “I usually just go with my gut, so if something comes across from my agent and I like it, then I just go for it. So this came up and I just went, ‘Oh, Christ! Meg 2, I’ll do that! That’s brilliant!’“
Speaking with ComicBook.com, Wheatley said he was also interested in the project because “it’s an opportunity to do action on such an insanely large scale, that it’s just unbelievable. From doing Free Fire, which was, I thought, was all my Christmases came at once in terms of action, this is just unbelievable. And just doing the storyboards for it, just thinking and going, ‘Oh,’ it’s just … I feel a heavy responsibility for it, to make sure that it kind of delivers to all the big shark fans out there.“
Wheatley’s previous credits include Down Terrace, Kill List, Sightseers, A Field in England, High-Rise, Free Fire, Rebecca, and In the Earth.
Meg 2: The Trench has been rated PG-13 for action/violence, some bloody images, language and brief suggestive material.
I wasn’t very impressed with The Meg, but Meg 2: The Trench is seeming like a lot of fun to me. I’m looking forward to watching this one.
Are you interested in Meg 2: The Trench? What did you think of the featurette? Let us know by leaving a comment below.