Bullet Points: Deep Blue Sea 2
I have never heard a single living person say that “we need a sequel to Deep Blue Sea!” But then again, I don’t get out much anymore so maybe people were screaming it at the top of their lungs and I’m just ill-informed. I enjoyed Deep Blue Sea and I’m willing to give any sequel an opportunity to take their story and make it something special.
Synopsis: A wealthy scientist gathers experts together on an aquatic base to study the potential health benefits of his Dr. Frankenstein-like experiments on some bull sharks. It’s pretty much the same as the first movie…
- Finning is not a good idea: I never knew that “shark finning” was a thing but apparently people capture sharks and chop their fins off to sell on the black market. It’s a wild idea. Catching a shark can’t be easy and chicken tastes really good. Just eat chicken people! You don’t need to run around catching incredibly difficult and rare animals to eat their fins!
- Give me the news: Misty Calhoun (Danielle Savre) might not sound like a name that suggests she’s one of the top minds on sharks in the world but she knows her shit. We learn that by sitting in on one of her lectures in her small shark college and we see some big Pharma guy offer her a bucketload of money to come to the floating science lab where she’ll meet billionaire Carl Durant (Michael Beach) and learn all about his wacky plans.
- Not so Great: The original Deep Blue Sea featured Mako sharks. This sequel, that is probably closer to a remake, reimagines the sharks as the aggressive Bull sharks. It doesn’t bring anything to the story, to be honest. In fact, I’m not sure why they made the decision to go away from the Mako sharks to a shark that doesn’t exactly drive fear into the hearts of people. If they wanted to make a change in Deep Blue Sea 2, why not make it a change for the better and go with the Great White shark, the most famous of the fearsome sharks.
- Hurry it up already: The movie does take way too much time to get to the action. There are a couple of shark attacks early on in the morning and then they spend the next 30 minutes or so talking. This isn’t Spielberg, folks. If you’re gonna give me killer sharks then I need to have them killing people and not just swimming around underwater.
- Baby killers: Speaking of the killer sharks… while they introduce the very aggressive bull sharks as the thing to fear, the actual killers of this movie are the tiny little baby sharks that come from a pack. I hate to break it to the filmmakers, but a dozen baby sharks might go to town on a fish but it’s definitely not something that I’m going to shit my pants over.
- I miss Sam Jackson: One of the biggest flaws of Deep Blue Sea 2 is that none of the characters connect the way they did in the original. The first film had Thomas Jane as the everyman, LL Cool J as the cool guy, Michael Rappaport as the funny man, Sam Jackson as the smart guy, and that hot chick whose name I can’t remember. This movie just has a really sexy chick named Danielle Savre and a guy with long hair. Michael Beach does his best job to give some Sam Jackson speeches but they’re nothing compared to the ones that Sam did but DBS2 did recreate one scene from the original that will give fans reason to cheer.
- Light up the night: The movie turns into a survival situation for all involved as they try to get out of the facility and into a helicopter before they all get eaten. Misty and the mysterious Thomas Jane knockoff have some sexual chemistry throughout the movie but nothing says “we’re gonna get it on” quite like sharing a mass killing of bio-engineered sharks. It’s a special moment.
It might not have been an amazing movie but it still gets a few Bonus Bullet Points:
- Danielle Savre in a wetsuit is a gift from God.
- Bella was supposed to be the ultimate killing machine as a shark but she was nonexistent for most of the movie.
The Verdict: I wish I could say that this movie was worth watching but saying so would totally destroy my credibility. This movie falls far short of the original movie and probably kills the franchise going forward. Any sequel should focus its effort on furthering the story driven in the first film but this movie just steals the story and does it with far less interesting characters. I regret watching this one.
