If you’re one of the many movie fans who are chomping at the bit for the sequel to The Meg, there’s good news. After several years of development, the Jason Statham-led shark thriller is closer than ever to becoming a reality. And now, it looks like it’s more real than ever – because The Meg 2 finally has a name.
When Jon Turtletaub’s aquatic blockbuster became the surprise hit of the summer in 2018, it was not a surprise that a sequel was quickly put into the works. Given the ongoing pandemic, it isn’t too much of a surprise that it’s taken more than three years for that sequel to get off the ground. Last year, Jason Statham updated fans and said the shark-infested sequel would start filming in early 2022. Sure enough, The Meg sequel began production in January. And now, according to Variety, it officially has a name – Meg 2: The Trench.
While the film’s title is short, it gives us a lot of clues. First of all, a lot of the action in the original film took place in the Mariana Trench, so we might be able to expect that the characters will return there for the sequel. But the significance of that title runs even deeper.
Some fans may not know that The Meg was adapted from Steve Alten’s 1997 thriller Meg: A Novel of Deep Terror. It looks like the upcoming sequel will follow a similar pattern – the follow-up to that novel was called The Trench. Whether or not the new movie will closely follow the plot of the book remains to be seen. But one thing seems certain: there will be megalodons. And they will be scary.
Besides the new title, and the confirmation that Jason Statham will be reprising his role as rescue diver Jonas Taylor, a few more details about the film have come to light. Last year, it was revealed that Jessica McNamee has been cast to play Taylor’s ex-wife in the sequel. And it’s known that Jon Turtletaub will not be returning to helm the installment. Directorial duties have been passed to Ben Wheatley, of Netflix’s Rebecca and Free Fire fame, who hasn’t hidden how excited he is for the film’s massive production scale.
A lot of factors played a role in the 2018 feature’s unexpected success. The world is a much different place than it was when we first got sight of that enormous shark on the big screen – but that doesn’t mean fans won’t return for another look. While we probably can’t expect Meg 2: The Trench to be one of 2022’s movie releases, if all goes well, we could be in for another thrill in the summer of 2023.