#megalodons

Megalodon Chaplain

None of these creatures have any instincts, and will attack absolutely anything - a boat, person, helicopter, each other, a wooden deck...

And one of the main characters almost definitely has Stockholm syndrome because he's convinced he's in a Free Willy situation and one of the sharks actually loves him (it doesn't)?

Oh also, this entire situation started because one of the sharks really wanted to fuck.

By the end of the film they have a lot of dead characters, one hell of a PR crisis to deal with, and a pregnant Megalodon because she was horny and by god she didn't waste the opportunity.

THE MEG (Dir: Jon Turteltaub, 2018).

Bigger isn’t always better, as this mega Jaws clone proves.


Jason Statham stars as Jonas Taylor, a washed up, alcoholic rescue diver held responsible for the death of two submarine crew in a botched rescue attempt. Called upon once again to rescue the crew of a stranded submersible, Taylor finds himself up against the Megalodon, a 75 foot shark thought to be extinct and soon heading for the coast of China! Is he up to the task? Will he end up as a Megalodon's dinner? Does anybody really care?

For those who have dreamed of a movie where Jason Statham battles a prehistoric beast, your wishes have come true. There is little more to The Meg than Statham vs Shark, although for some that will be enough.

Director Turteltaub’s movies rarely take themselves too seriously and The Meg benefits from his light touch. Once it gets going, the action barely sags and it never gets bogged down by the sort of fist clenching emoting that these movies have a tendency to. However, the flipside of this is that The Meg is populated by a few too many underwritten, cardboard cut-out characters and relies a little heavily on concepts and situations familiar from many other, much better, movies.


The computer generated special effects are impressive and while the audience has little investment in the characters to care one way or another if they end up as sharkbait, it is fun to see them get chomped on, one by one, by the massive Megalodon.

If it’s thrills you want, there are plenty, but it’s a shame that filmmakers tend to forget that movies like this don’t necessarily have to be the empty-headed entertainments they so often are. The original Jaws (Steven Spielberg, 1975) is testament to that. It's not a bad film but the formulaic, cookie cutter approach to filmmaking fails to lift it above any other number of forgettable action flicks.

Still, if rampaging monster movies are your thing it is certainly worth a look. If, like me, you have a soft spot for Jaws 3 (Joe Alves, 1983), you might enjoy this equally silly shark saga.

Check out my blog JINGLE BONES MOVIE TIME for a longer, more in-depth review of The Meg! Link below.

Howdy, with that movie, The Meg coming out soon, lots of people are going to ask about this particular shark. Despite being extinct for a lil over 2 million years, it is still one of the better-known sharks, feared for its terrifying size, which could bulk up to 20m.

Have my favorite chart for comparison!

They existed for most of the Neogene period, which was around 23 million to 2.5 million years ago.

A question that pops up a lot, and I suspect, will be coming around more frequently, is.

Could the Megalodon still be around?

The answer, is a solid no.

I'm not taking a solid stance and saying that we shouldn't question things when we see them, I encourage everyone to ask whenever they doubt something, and to find out more about everything- but to use the excuse of 'we haven't explored everything yet' and 'absence of evidence is not evidence of absence' to justify that a Megalodon or two could still be swimming around, is probably not for the best.

I see this question everywhere, on Twitter, comment sections, occasional conversations, and even a post on Tumblr is being spread with people asking if the Megalodon could still be alive.

Megalodons are extinct, for sure. I know there's always the flicker of 'what if', or 'we don't know everything', but enough people have approached shark experts with the hopes that the Megalodon may be alive, and they all give the same answer. The megalodon is extinct.

Why?

As cool as animals from the past are, new animals evolved over time. Sharks became smaller and faster than the Megalodon, and social hunting from animals like dolphins and orcas rendered larger solitary sharks obsolete. Because of natural selection, Megalodons died out. If it was somehow brought back today, it would die out because it's too slow, not intelligent enough (no hate, they're just not adapted for this ecosystem niche), and they would require a crudload of meat to stay alive. They're extinct.

If there was a Megalodon still alive, well, there would be proof. An entire ecosystem would have to be accounted for, Megalodons are huge. A hypercarnivore (an animal whose diet is equal to or more than 70% meat) would certainly leave a deep footprint.

Somebody would have spotted them by now, given how absolutely large they are. Where would they be? In the deep? Given how little food there is (plankton, angler fish, gulper eels to name a few) it's not so likely. A diet from a Megalodon would require it to come to the surface, and well, besides videos that have been confirmed fake, we have nothing else. The few sharks we see are often confirmed to be Basking sharks, sometimes Megamouths or sleeper sharks.

The remains. Lord, we'd see their remains, teeth, scales, if nothing else. They live, they die. And their remains would stay on the seabed, where they would be chanced upon by divers, who would immediately report findings, because the difference between a whale's and Megalodon's skeleton is obvious enough. And to date, we have more Megalodon fossils than remains. Which in itself, should be considered solid proof that they're extinct.

Thanks for reading my lil piece, a reblog would be fondly appreciated to clear up the misconception that Megalodons are somehow still alive. Enough people have asked shark experts about this, and all agree that they're extinct, long-gone. But rest assured, the deep is still terrifying.

Feel free to ask Dr David Shiffman on Twitter (@WhySharksMatter) on any shark inquiries!

The Black Demon is a huge, black shark found in the waters around the Baja California Peninsula. The Black Demon is said to be a massive Great White Shark that is said to be 20-60 feet in length and is black in color with a massive tail. Not much is known about the Black Demon because sightings are very rare however the two theories on what it could be being a surviving Megalodon or a Great White Shark with melanism making its skin turn black.