I know, I know. I missed another day. Well, it is kind of a good news/bad news situation. The bad news is that my new job is not your normal 8 hrs a day, 5 days a week job and there will be times that I am working 10, 12, or more hours a day, as well as working one or both days on the weekend. Unfortunately, yesterday was one of those days and after work, I got cleaned up and hang out with some friends because I have been somewhat cooped in the house the past few weeks. The good news is that this weekend was my last weekend that I will be working for the foreseeable future so I should be able to get these last couple of movies taken care of. Now today’s movie is honestly a sequel that is somewhat unnecessary but is also a long time over due. See, if they were going to make a sequel to Deep Blue Sea, they should have done it years ago, not almost 20 years later. Well, I heard about this movie coming out a while ago and immediately made plans to pick it up once it was released. So let’s see what trouble awaits us with today’s movie, Deep Blue Sea 2.
The plot: 8 miles off the South African coast, a pair of men that are illegally hunting sharks for their fins when they hear a broadcast from Trent Slater warning them to clear the area. One of the men wants to go back but his partner convinces them to stay, just as their boat is bumped by a large shark. The two men get ready to catch the shark when they notice 4 more sharks swim next to it, then all 5 sharks swim in formation towards the boat and strike it, knocking the men into the water, where they are both killed. Trent arrives at the scene too late to save the men and as the sharks approach him, he uses a device to get them to break off their attack and follow him back to their floating lab Akhelios. Once there, he tells his coworker, Mike Shutello, about the sharks getting out and that hey have to figure out how they did it. Meanwhile, Dr. Misty Calhoun, a shark conservationalist working for 5 Oceans, is finishing up a class when she is approached by Craig Burns, who works for Durant Pharmaceuticals. Burns is there on behalf of Carl Durant, the company’s owner/CEO, to consult on a project, with Burns offering her $50,000 up front with the promise of more funding for 5 Oceans if she agrees to come out. Back at Akhelios, Trent goes to see Aaron Ellroy, the sites’ computer technician, and asks him about how the sharks could have escaped the enclosure and as they look at the video feed, they discover a tunnel that was dug underneath the electric fence. Aaron asks if they should tell Durant but Trent says not yet, as he has an idea on how to deter the sharks. The next day, Misty meets Burns at the docks, where he introduces her to married couple Daniel and Leslie Kim, a neuroscientist and neurobiologist respectively. Misty is curious about what is going on and discusses it with Daniel and Leslie but they aren’t too concerned. Burns takes them out to Akhelios on a motorboat and as they head inside, Trent is working on creating a barrier by the tunnel to keep the sharks from getting in. He returns to the lab just as Misty and the others enter and Misty asks him about the rings and after Trent answers, she notices that they are keeping bull sharks in the enclosure. Durant chooses that moment to enter and Misty questions him about the sharks, warning him that they are a disaster waiting to happen. Durant tells her he will explain everything and invites everyone to head up to the surface and as they do, Trent tells Misty that they need some more people like her telling the truth around there. On the surface, Durant throws Aaron into the water with the sharks and as Misty dives in to save him, Durant waits to the last possible second before telling Trent to call them off. As Misty and Aaron reach the platform, Misty is shocked at what she witnessed and asks Durant how he did that and Durant says he will explain everything inside after she changes into some dry clothes, while Aaron complains to Trent that the sharks were toying with him. Inside, Durant slips into his quarters and drinks from a vial of liquid when Burns enters and tells him about the sharks escaping. Burns is worried about the liability if the public learns that their sharks got out and killed someone but Durant is more excited that the sharks were able to solve a problem, meaning that their formula is working, and says that when he is done with his research he will kill them. When everyone assembles in the wet lab, where Durant explains that he has created a compound that can boost intelligence, testing them on the sharks. Wanting to show them an example, Durant has Trent sedate Bella, the alpha female of the group, and he and Mike bring it up into the wet lab. As Josh Hooper, the 4th crew member monitors Bella’s vital signs, Durant explains that what he is hoping to accomplish is save the human race but Misty thinks he has a God complex. As Durant speaks with the Kims, as he had used some of their research in his project, Misty talks with Hooper and learns that Durant had been taking the serum himself. Meanwhile, on the surface, the other 4 sharks manage to snag the boat that is tied up in the enclosure and push it towards the generator, causing it to short out and spill the fuel drums next to it. Back in the wet lab, Durant approaches Misty and Hooper and Misty asks why she was brought there. Durant explains that Bella has been showing some unexplained traits and Misty tells him that she is pregnant. Hooper and Durant don’t believe it and ask why it wouldn’t show up on their blood tests and Misty says that since they are altering the animals DNA, it might not have picked it up, to which Durant admits she might be right. Meanwhile, Trent is alerted to what is happening on the surface and after examining the situation, tries to signal the sharks but they don’t respond. He heads back inside just as the sharks begin attacking Akhelios and tells Aaron the situation. Hooper is getting a saliva test from Bella to confirm if she is pregnant but as he reaches in her mouth, she regains consciousness and attempts to bite him but he manages to get to safety and drop her back into the enclosure. On the surface, the generator finally explodes and causes power to go out on some of the fences. Meanwhile, Burns is writing an email describing Durant’s behavior since taking the drugs when the explosion occurs and as he wanders the corridors, the hull breaches and he is knocked off his feet by the influx of water. As the others access what happened in the wet lab, they see Burns body float by and are shocked. When they check the computers, they notice that all of the sharks are in the lagoon and Durant wants to know what killed Burns. Misty sees Bella swim by and notices that she is no longer pregnant and says that the drop into the wet pool must have triggered labor and her pups killed Burns. Realizing that they have no way of calling for help down there, Mike decides to try and swim to the surface to use the sat phone there but as he is swimming, one of the sharks bangs into him and knocks him unconscious. Trent swims out to rescue him and Misty gives him CPR to revive him but as Mike then leans over the wet pool to taunt the sharks, one of the sharks leaps out and bites his head off. As everyone reacts in shock over his death, the pressure in the complex begins to buckle, causing the wet pool to explode outward, filling the lab with water and separating everyone. Misty and Trent end up together and as they try to figure out a way out, Misty asks him how he ended up working with Durant and why he stayed. Durant ends up on his own and heads towards his quarters, where he drinks the last of the formula he had on him. As he leaves, he encounters Misty and Trent and as they tell him there is no way to the surface now that everything is flooded, he tells them that there is an access that is used for maintenance work that they can get to, but then gets into an argument with Misty when she says they need to destroy the sharks before they reach the open ocean, as he wants to save his research. Elsewhere, Aaron and Hooper ended up together and make their way to the crews quarters but when the swarm of shark pups approaches them, Aaron manages to get onto a mattress that is above water while Hooper ends up being killed. Daniel ends up on his own and after avoiding the pup swarm, he starts looking for Leslie. Misty, Trent, and Durant reach the pump room where the maintenance hatch is but as Trent heads inside, Misty hears Daniel calling out for Leslie and goes to try and find him. While she is looking for him, Trent closes the door and breaks the lock, trapping her on the other side. Trent notices what he has done and punches Durant, then goes to the door as Misty gets there. He tells her what Durant did and she tells him to go to the surface and call for help. He tells her to try and find another way out and promises to come back for her, then argues with Durant over his actions. Leslie had been knocked unconscious by the wave surge but when she comes too, she goes looking for Daniel and finds him but ends up being killed by the pup swarm. Trent and Durant reach the surface and Trent calls for help while back in the complex, Aaron manages to avoid the swarm briefly by floating on the mattress but when they attack the mattress, he makes a break for it and encounters Daniel, snapping him out of his shock. The two men make theor way through the complex and find Misty, who had used a blow torch to cut away the lock the air duct. As they all hug, Misty asks about the others and they tell her that they didn’t make it. Misty tells them about the way out and they open the door but when Misty hears the swarm approaching, she tells them to go, then uses the blow torch to try and keep the swarm at bay. When the swarm goes around her and enters the duct room, she warns the others, then makes her own way to the surface. Aaron and Daniel climb the ladder but when the water starts rising, Daniel ends up being bit in half by the swarm. Aaron makes it to the surface, followed by Misty, who had swam up through the wet lab. When a Coast Guard drone flies towards them to confirm Trent’s call, but as the wave to show they need help, Bella leaps out of the water and grabs the drone, dragging it underwater. As the structure starts to sink underwater, Trent spots the boat and says that they need to swim for it and they reluctantly get into the water and swim for it. Suddenly, Aaron is dragged underwater and Bella appears between Misty, Trent, and the boat but it ignores them and swims straight for Durant. Durant dives underwater and screams at Bella, seemingly chasing her off but as he surfaces and gloats, Bella swims underneath him and kills him. Misty and Trent reach the boat and as they try to get it started, one of the sharks approaches them and moves to attack them but they both fire flare guns at it, setting it on fire and it sinks to the bottom of the ocean. As Trent works on getting the boat started, Aaron surfaces and while Misty helps him on board, he explains how he avoided being killed. Trent gets the boat started and they go to leave but Misty stops him, saying that they can’t allow the swarm or the other sharks to escape to the open ocean. Trent then pulls out a key he grabbed from Durant, and reveals that Durant’s paranoia over anyone stealing his secrets would help them as he pulls out a second key, then pulls out a box that contained a self destruct panel. Using both keys, Trent activates it and they all watch as Akhelios blows up. Misty, Trent, and Aaron believe the explosion killed all of the sharks but three weeks later, an injured Bella and the swarm are seen swimming near a populated beach.
As far as sequels go, this wasn’t bad, but I expected a bit more from it. The acting was good, with Danielle Savre (Misty), Rob Mayes (Trent), and Michael Beach (Durant) doing good jobs in their roles. The story was almost exactly like the original movie, with a corporation using sharks for scientific research, only the research was different; with the original being for a cure for Alzheimer’s while in the sequel, it was simply for a way to make people smarter. One thing I was disappointed with is that this is pretty much a sequel in name only, as there is no reference to the original movie whatsoever. This was a let down as there was plenty of ways they could have worked some sort of reference to the original movie into this sequel, and even with it being an almost exact copy, it would have helped with some set up. The special effects were not as good as the original movie, and we don’t really get such a great death scene like Samuel L. Jackson’s from the first movie, but they were still good enough to make the movie entertaining instead of hurting it. It isn’t as good as the first but this is still an entertaining movie and worth watching if you are up for some sharky good entertainment.
Rating: 3 1/2 out of 5
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