The outlook is a little less sunny for “Meg 2: The Trench.” Though director Ben Wheatley was determined to make every penny count, the sequel’s reported $129 million budget still sets the break-even bar significantly higher than “Mutant Mayhem” or even “Oppenheimer” (which was budgeted at $100 million). That “Oppenheimer” is expected to gross as much in its third weekend as “Meg 2” is in its opening weekend is great news for the former, and slightly worrying news for the latter.
Domestic box office numbers only tell part of the story, though, and the good news for “Meg 2: The Trench” is that movies about Jason Statham punching giant prehistoric sharks in the face travel very well around the globe. The first “Meg” movie, released in 2018, grossed 72.6 percent of its mammoth $530 million worldwide total at the international box office (per Box Office Mojo), and ended up being a pretty sizable hit following a domestic debut of $45 million. If the sequel follows a similar trajectory, it should end up in the $350-400 million range.
Reviews for “The Meg” were mixed (personally I think it’s very entertaining, and delivers pretty much everything you’d want from a movie about Jason Statham fighting a giant prehistoric shark), whereas reviews for “Meg 2: The Trench” lean more negative. Then again, this is the type of movie where bad reviews can be a selling point.