The Megalodons, often individually referred to as The Meg, are the titular main antagonists of the 2018 sci-fi action film with the same name and its 2023 sequel Meg 2: The Trench.

They are a prehistoric species of shark-like monstrous previously thought to be extinct before being discovered in the depths of the Mariana Trench by the underwater research facility, Mana One.

Their vocal sound effects were provided by Hunter Platin.

Appearance[]

Megalodons appear very similar to the average great white sharks, albeit 3 times larger. They were the largest species of shark to have ever existed.

Their jaws are wide enough to easily swallow several humans, and their bite force surpassed every living animal on Earth. As Suyin states, a meg could bite a whale in half and crush through its bones.

Due to having lived in the unexplored depths of the ocean for millions of years, several of the modern-day members appear to have evolved adaptational characteristics. The Meg has extra gills which could account for lower oxygen levels, along with gnarly skin that has a more-brownish tone.

Story[]

Past[]

Megalodons lived roughly 23 million years ago from the Early Miocene to Pliocene epochs.

It can be theorized that due to the Earth's naturally changing climate, coupled with lowering sea levels and loss of suitable nursery areas, a majority of the species' members died out. However, a sum of survivors managed to retreat into the unexplored depths of the ocean, remaining uncontacted for 3.6 million years.

The Meg[]

During an expedition by the American SSBN Rogue in the Philippine Trench, a Megalodon came into contact with the submarine and heavily damaged the vessel.

This attack forced a deep sea rescue mission led by U.S. Marine, Jonas Taylor. As Taylor's team attempted to rescue the remainder of the crew, the unseen Meg returned and began to ram the hull of the sub. Taylor was forced to leave behind two of his men before the submarine exploded from the collisions.

5 years later, the Mana One, an underwater research facility 200 miles off the Chinese Coast, conducted a new deep sea exploration mission in the Mariana Trench. This mission, led by Jonas' ex-wife, Lori, sought to explore a deeper section of trench which had been concealed by a thermocline of hydrogen sulfide.

After the mission submersible, the Origin, successfully passed the thermocline, the crew released a number of lamps to illuminate the underwater ecosystem. This new light, however, drew the attention of a Megalodon, which charged and rammed the submarine, causing it to lose contact with Mana One. Lori, along with the other crew members, Toshi and The Wall, successfully managed to restart the power. Yet their attempts ended in vain as the light once again attracted the Meg to ram the submarine, this time causing Lori to sustain a major injury.

Out of desperation, the station manager's daughter, Suyin Zhang, attempted to rescue the crew by pulling them up with a glider. However, per recommendation of Chief Operator, Mac, station manager Dr. Minway Zhang had already assigned Jonas to come out of retirement and attempt another expedition to save the Origin. When Suyin reached the Crew's submarine, a giant squid grabbed onto her glider as she was preparing to fire a grappling hook. Before Suyin's glider could be crushed, the Meg returned and killed the squid, revealing itself to Suyin and Jonas who had recently arrived to the area.

The Meg then circled back in an attempt to attack Suyin's glider. However, Jonas fired several flares which distracted the shark and gave Suyin an opportunity to escape. Jonas then successfully came into contact with the Origin and rescued Lori and The Wall. Before he could rescue Toshi however, the Meg returned and charged towards the two submarines. In an attempt to save them, Toshi closed the hatch doors and restarted the Origin to distract it, sacrificing himself as the Meg crashed into the sub, causing it to explode. The explosion from the Origin however, would release enough heat to cut a temporary hole through the thermocline, allowing the Meg to leave the deeper section of the Mariana Trench and towards the upper levels of the ocean.

Several hours later, the Meg came in contact with the Mana One Station. While the station's O-level glass tunnels were being toured by Suyin's daughter, Meiying, the Meg appeared before the girl and chomped on the glass, causing the entire station to shake. Jonas, Suyin, and Mac all rushed down to Meiying's side and discovered the jaw marks left behind on the tunnel. Gracie, one of the station's whales, then started to tap on the glass, crying. Suyin, noticing she was alone, asked what happened with Gracie's mother, Lucy. The Meg then appeared and killed Gracie, ripping her apart and leaving behind her tail.

While the thermocline hole was still open, another Megalodon, notably male due to its smaller size, had also managed to escape through. The male started hunting ships in the area, and managed to destroy 3 shark poaching boats, alerting Mana One to its location. The Mana One team arrived to find the ship wreckages, and in doing so, also located the male Meg. Jonas was then sent out into the water while attached to a rope and with a tracking rifle in hand. After swimming very quietly towards the Meg, he successfully managed to shoot a tracker onto its fin. However, when the crew attempted to reel him back, the vibrations from the rope alerted the Meg towards their location, and it began to swim towards Jonas. The crew started the ship while continuing to reel Jonas back with the Meg in pursuit. In a final attempt, the Meg breached the water and lunged itself towards Jonas, only for it to miss as Jonas very narrowly reached the ship.  

Shortly after, the team devised a plan to kill the shark by injecting it with etorphine-laced spearheads. One person however, would have to volunteer to come close enough to the shark in order to shoot it in a soft spot, such as the mouth or gills. Suyin volunteered to fulfill the task and was sent down into the depths in a polycarbonate shark tank and a rifle containing the poison. Afterwards, the rest of the crew started chumming in order to lure out the Meg towards Suyin. The giant shark returned, attracted to the bait before eventually attacking the cage containing Suyin and even going as far as attempting to swallow it, damaging the crane and Suyin's mask in the process. This attack however gave Suyin the perfect opening to inject the poison in the shark's mouth.  

Jonas intervened and freed Suyin from her cage just as she passed out from oxygen deprivation. The shark returned and chased them before getting snagged in the cage's cables. The poison eventually acts, killing the Megalodon and leading the crew to haul it onto the boat, with Minway somberly remarking the team did what humanity always has done, "discover, then destroy". The Wall takes a picture with the dead shark before falling overboard following a prank. Their moment of triumph is cut short, however, when the larger Meg (implied to be the one that attacked them earlier) surfaces, swallowing The Wall whole and snatching its smaller congener, destroying the ship and fatally wounding Minway Zhang in the process. The beast then returns and heads towards Jaxx, only to be distracted by Heller when the latter splashes around to get its attention, saving his younger colleague at the cost of his life. After giving chase, the creature is deterred by an helicopter called in by Mana One's owner, Morris, distracting it long enough for the surviving crew members to reach Mana One, though Minway succumbs to his wounds on the way.  

The following night, Morris enlists a mercenary team to personally track down the Meg with the intent to kill it with depth charges, dropping said charges where they located the giant shark thanks to a GPS tracker one of Morris' men put on its dorsal fin earlier. However, the plan goes south when Morris and his mercenary team realize they accidentally killed a whale, resulting in the team quickly departing and Morris falling overboard as the boat suddenly accelerated before the Meg eats him while feeding on the whale carcass along with smaller regular sharks.  

The next morning, Mana One discovers the prehistoric shark is headed for Sanya Bay in China and that Morris lied about contacting the Chinese authorities regarding the prehistoric creature, prompting Jonas and his crewmates to slay it themselves. Upon arrival, the shark swims close to the crowded beach, but does not attack the swimmers until a woman spots it, alerting the other beachgoers and generating a massive panic movement, which in turn triggers the Megalodon's predatory instincts as it then attacks and kills many unfortunate people in its way. The rampage only stopped when Jonas' crew placed a speaker playing whale calls into the water, distracting the giant shark at the last moment as it was about to attack the swimmers that got isolated during the attack. Taylor and Suyin proceed to board submersibles and work together to defeat the shark, but a news helicopter ends up crashing onto the ship, leaving the surviving Mana One members, including Meiying, adrift in the sea. Suyin was therefore forced to abandon the fight to save the others and leave Jonas alone against the prehistoric behemoth. Taking advantage of the damages sustained by his submersible, Taylor sliced the Meg's belly open with the damaged, yet sharp side of his sub before getting out and clinging onto the creature, ultimately stabbing the latter's eye with a metal pole. The severely wounded Megalodon loses blood, attracting many smaller, modern sharks that swarm it and devour it, ultimately ending the creature's brief reign of terror and avenging the deaths of most of the Mana One crew members.    

Following the Meg's defeat, Taylor and his newfound friends celebrate their victory aboard a wedding ship which got interrupted by the shark's arrival. Underwater, a noise can be heard, implying that at least another Megalodon may have traveled its way out of the Trench through the breach in the thermocline.    

Meg 2: The Trench[]

5 years after the events of Sanya Bay, Suyin Zhang has since passed away, and Mana One, along with the rest of her father's company, has been taken over by her brother, Jiuming Zhang. Sometime during this time skip, Mana One discovered and contained an injured Megalodon pup, which Jiuming named Haiqi and raised at the Oceanic Institute in Hainan.

At the 10th anniversary of the Institute, Jiuming presented Haiqi, now an adult female Meg, to the station's audience, revealing her to the world as the first and only Megalodon in captivity. The next day, Jiuming attempted a swimming experiment with Haiqi in order to test their bond, per Jonas and Meiying's disapproval. As Haiqi spotted Jiuming, he began to send signals to her via a clicker, one click to come, two clicks to go. Initially, the experiment goes fine, with Haiqi listening to the signals. However, Haiqi quickly began to act disobedient and charged towards her trainer, forcing Jiuming to pull the cord on his suit to retract him out of the lagoon. Later that night, Haiqi's absurd behavior continued as she charged through a vent in her lagoon, successfully managing to break through and escape into the open ocean.

In the morning, Jonas and Jiuming, now stationed at Mana One, lead a routine submarine exploration into the Mariana Trench. During the descent, their submarines encountered Haiqi, who began to chase them down to the thermocline. Knowing she cannot follow them through, the two increased speed and quickly entered the thermocline before Haiqi could reach them. Haiqi however, followed their heat signature and passed through the thermocline before continuing to chase them.

A few minutes later, 2 larger Megs from the Trench approached the two submarines and Haiqi. However, their arrival signaled Haiqi to stop chasing the subs and go with them instead. Jiuming, curious of this behavior, opts for the subs to follow them via Haiqi's tracker. Upon their arrival, they discover the 3 megs in a mating session, leading Jiuming to conclude this instinctual gathering to be the cause of Haiqi's unusual behavior.

By following the Megs, the group also discovered an illegal underwater mining station run by mercenary, Montes. Realizing they've been discovered, Montes sets off an explosion to cover up their activities, killing his crew while also ripping a hole in the thermocline and grounding Jonas and Jiuming's submarines. The two groups were therefore forced to use exosuits to walk towards the station. While the remaining members were nearing the station, they were swarmed by a group of Snappers. To get rid of their attackers, Jiuming lit an underwater flare which attracted the Megs to their location. The sharks eat several Snappers and scare off the rest before they began to chase the group. Before one Meg could reach them however, they successfully enter the station and shut the door on the shark. Ultimately however, 3 crew members die with only Jonas, Jiuming, Meiying, and security officer Rigas who survived the ordeal.

Upon entering the station, it is revealed that Jiuming's financier, Driscoli, along with a Mana One Analysis, Jess, are double agents working with Montes. Jess releases the station's escape pods, intending on leaving the 4 trapped in the trench. Montes, however, enters the station and confronts Jonas, having a personal vendetta against him. Jonas successfully knocks out Montes, and the 4 get the idea to steal his submarine. To distract the Megs, they turn on all the station's lights, attracting the sharks to attack the station and providing them an opportunity to escape. Montes regained consciousness before the station is destroyed, and also returned to the surface by going out in an exosuit and hanging on to a buoy. While they resurfaced, mercenaries, sent by Driscoli, successfully take over Mana One.

The rupture in the thermocline from the explosion earlier had allowed the Megs to leave the Trench. One Meg came into contact with Mana One's control room, which was inhabited by Montes and Jess, who was also on a video call with Driscoli. Seeing the Meg, Jess confidently told Driscoli not to worry as the glass was completely "Meg-Proof". This confidence would lead to her demise as the Meg easily broke through and ate Jess, while also flooding the control room as Montes narrowly escapes.

Jonas, Jiuming, Meiying, and Rigas, now accompanied by Mac and DJ, attempt to escape the now occupied Mana One Station in a motorboat. Yet even while using only paddles to decrease vibration, their boat was already being circled by a Meg. Seeing the group, 4 mercenaries take another motorboat to chase after them. However, they use the motor, which causes much more vibration and lures the shark away from Jonas' group. Before one mercenary could shoot at them, their boat was swallowed whole by the Meg. While the mercenaries boat was being eaten, the group used the opportunity to steer their boat away from the area.

The group travel to a nearby Thailand resort called "Fun Island", while being pursued by Montes and now Driscoli in a helicopter. Upon reaching the beach, they attempt to warn the tourists of the approaching Megs, yet to no avail as the island was already in panic due to gunshots caused by Montes' group. Seeing a jetski, Jonas gets the idea to go out into the water and lead the sharks away with the vibrations, while also attempting to kill them with explosives taped to harpoons.

Victims[]

Trivia[]

• They were initially on the Villains Wiki, but were removed as they lack a proper moral agency due to them just being regular hungry predators.
• In the beginning of the sequel, the megs are shown to have lived 65 million years ago in the Dinosaur Age. This is very inaccurate because the megalodons didn't come to existence until the Late Oligocene to Early Pleistocene epoch of the Ice Age era.
• They are the current icon of the One-Line Article template.

Navigation[]

Neutrals

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