The Meg (2018) - Review
Originally published April, 2019If there is anything we are not short of, it's shark movies. You could probably build a 3 story home out of DVD boxes of all the shark movies that exist. You can also safely assume that 99% of them are not good—Jaws being the top 1% of the shark movie economy. Yet, despite the fact that a majority of these movies with plots that focus on sharks eating people are bad, that doesn't stop them from being entertaining or successful. So, they keep getting made. Case in point: The Meg made over $40 million on its opening weekend, and it's just another shark movie.
You might be wondering if there is something special about The Meg that sets it apart from the other shark movies out there. The short answer is: nothing. The one thing that this movie had that others didn't was a big budget for special effects, but that doesn't change anything in terms of uniqueness or quality. It's a pretty film that's nice to look at, but there are a lot of things about The Meg that make it a pretty run-of-the-mill experience, even by shark-movie standards. It's still entertaining, but not surprising.
Pros
Decent musical score with some good songs in the background
Pretty film with lots of colors
Some actors really are really trying, while everyone else just seems to be having a good time
Rainn Wilson as the smug billionaire chews up all of his scenes, whether or not the jokes land
Plenty of references and indicators that this film knows it's bad
A rare example of a movie that has characters who recognize that people are still dead at the end of the film instead of just being super happy the terror is over
Not too long
Cons
Too many slow, emotional scenes with Jason Stathom who would lose to Keanu Reeves in an emotion-off
Trope after trope after trope after cliché after cliché after cliché
Jump scares in a movie that's barely trying to be scary
Sections of the film could have been cut or trimmed down based on how important they are to the characters and the plot, especially the beginning
The ex-wife character makes no sense
Plot & Thoughts
Jonas (Jason Statham) is the best of the best at being the best at what he does. What does he do? Saves people. There's not a definitive job title, but he was in charge of rescuing people from deep-sea situations—a very niche position. He's the best, except that, in the opening scene, he makes a hard decision and leaves some people behind in a rescue mission. Then he's the worst. He believed that something attacked a nuclear submarine, but no one is willing to go along with that theory, so he's shunned for no longer being the best.
Fast-forward 5 years and now there's this research facility close to China and Chinese people, who will appear later in the movie, to appeal to that massive populace of movie-goers in Asia. Or maybe it's just a research facility that is placed by the Mariana trench to conduct some deep sea research; my cynicism won't let me decide which. Anyway, this facility is run by your usual movie group of rag-tag scientists and engineers who are interested in making a big discovery using fancy technology and stupid decisions that no one would make in real life. Naturally, the whole thing is funded by a billionaire (Rainn Wilson) who only cares about the fame and fortune and not about saving the planet, or whatever. Yada, yada, yada, something goes wrong in the trench expedition, Jonas is contacted to rescue them because it turns out that he IS the best, a big shark shows up, uh-oh we gotta go kill it.
Sound like every other horror/shark movie you've ever seen? Of course it does. Did you need me to tell you this information in order for you to know? No, you could have guessed all this from the trailer. If you were already going to watch The Meg, you certainly didn't need to read the reviews; you probably knew what it was from the start. It's basically the Piranha 3D movie from a decade ago, but less silly. There are still jokes and some of those jokes are still funny, but it doesn't quite have the over-the-top goofiness of Piranha, which might be a positive or a negative depending on who you are.
The Meg is just wholly unoriginal and to expect otherwise is setting yourself up for disappointment. Yet, the part of the film that was perhaps the most intriguing to me had nothing to do with the actual plot of the film. I was completely perplexed about the point of the ex-wife character (Jessica McNamee). Her main purpose in the film is to motivate Jonas to do one more rescue mission and to be the best again, but after that, there's no point to her character because the actual love interest Suyin (Bingbing Li) is the main female focus for the rest of the movie. The ex-wife shows up again at some point to remind you that she still exists and it seems like everyone, including the ex, just says to Jonas "you should go with Suyin. She likes you." I guess they were friends and then it was a mutual break-up, but not really because she didn't believe him from the scene in the beginning? I don't know. It would have been simpler if she was his sister or someone else of significance in his life that would have brought him back, because that is really the only purpose this character serves.
Other than the weird ex-wife subplot, the movie is pretty straightforward. There are numerous references to Jaws scattered throughout its runtime, with even a camera-angle accurate retelling of a particular scene from Jaws with Chinese actors, who are wearing costumes that are reminiscent of the scene. It doesn't really improve my opinion of The Meg at all, but it caught my attention, nonetheless. I suppose it takes a few risks by doing this. Little moments where it reminds you of every other shark movie that has come before it might improve your opinion because you can recognize that it's self-aware, or it can hurt the experience if you consider the fact that The Meg is just a 90-minute cliche that is trying to be China's new Jaws. But maybe that's what you want out of a shark movie these days, because it's unlikely anyone is ever going to make one as good as Jaws anyway.
TL;DR (Conclusion)
The Meg is fine. I kind of like it for its sillier moments and excessive special effects. It's also a pretty routine experience that gets dull in spots. There's nothing that makes it recommendable and there's nothing that makes it unbearable. It's just a shark movie that made a ton of money for being in the right place at the right time. Watch it if you like stupid shark movies, or don't because you're not missing that much.
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