The Jason Statham action sequel The Meg 2 gets an official title as it begins filming. The audience-entrancing power of the shark was proven again when 2018’s The Meg chomped its way to $530 million in grosses at the world wide box office.

Such huge box office numbers obviously guaranteed that The Meg would get a sequel and indeed a follow-up has been in development for several years with Statham taking an active creative role. Solid news on the promised Meg 2 began emerging in late 2020, when Ben Wheatley was announced as director, taking over for Meg helmer Jon Turteltaub. Wheatley indeed began hyping his new project immediately, teasing the “insanely large-scale action” to be featured in the shark sequel and indicating that the new movie could feature not one but two man-eating megalodons. Statham himself soon got into the sequel-teasing act, saying filming on The Meg 2 would commence in January 2022.

Related: Jaws 3D Wasted Its Multiple Sharks Concept (But The Meg Did It Better)

It turns out that Statham was not lying when he indicated The Meg 2 would kick off filming in the early months of 2022. As reported by Variety, the film has indeed begun shooting at Leavesden Studios outside London. The report also confirms the film’s title as Meg 2: The Trench and says Statham’s Meg co-star Bingbing Li is expected back as Suyin.

Jason Statham in The Meg.

It’s yet to be seen what other cast members from the first Meg will be joining the sequel but at least one actor, Jessica McNamee, has expressed interest in once again jumping into shark-infested waters with Statham. Obviously the challenge for any action sequel is finding a way to top the original film and it seems The Meg 2 will do so by doubling the number of megalodons menacing Statham and the rest of the cast. The title Meg 2: The Trench also indicates that the movie will be going into even deeper ocean waters this time, which should spell deeper trouble for everyone involved.

Obviously any time shark movies like The Meg are brought up the Jaws franchise is sure to be mentioned. If the Jaws series stands as any kind of example for what the Meg films could do from now into the future, it seems the law of diminishing returns is doomed to kick in rather quickly, as Jaws 2 was infamously nowhere near as good or as successful as the blockbuster original Jaws (though it was certainly much better than the third or fourth entries in the franchise). Perhaps The Meg 2 can indeed buck the Jaws trend and actually surpass The Meg both in terms of quality and box office returns.

More: Where To Watch The Best Shark Horror Movies (Including Every Jaws)

Source: Variety