How The Meg Would Have Been Different With Eli Roth Directing – Screen Rant

Jon Turtletaub'sThe Meg brought one of the most massive sharks theaters have ever seen, but his PG-13 horror movie would have been a lot different if Eli Roth, who was once attached to direct, had stayed with the project.

Creature feature horror has seen its ups and downs, but one constant in the genre has been the tried-and-true shark movie. Ever since the days of Spielberg's 1975 classic,Jaws, the apex predator of the seas has dared audiences to go back into the water. Turtletaub's vision forThe Meg, which is based off the bookMeg: A Novel Of Deep Terrorby Steve Alten, took on a more science-fiction/action lean that, coupled with its PG-13 rating, didn't deliver the blood and scares that most audiences would expect from a film about a 75 foot, prehistoric shark. Even so, the film's $130 million budget was decimated by its $530.2 million gross at the box office, which, in true summer blockbuster style, marked it as a success despite it not being what horror fans - or even star Jason Statham - wanted.

Related: The Meg: Why Being Rated PG-13 Hurt The Shark Blockbuster

The Meg, which follows a team of scientists who end up encountering a megalodon, a deep-sea creature that existed anywhere from 3.6 million to 23 million years ago, could have been a very different movie in another director's hands.

Eli Roth, who has made an incredible career for himself amongst horror fans with hit films likeHostelandCabin Fever, was attached to directThe Megat one point. The film first received buzz from New Line Cinema, who had the project back in 2005, and had Guillermo Del Toro attached as a producer, with Jan de Bont (Cujo, Speed) directing. The film's initial $75 million budget was too much for New Line, who decided to cancel it, leaving it open for another studio to pick up. From there, Warner Bros became attached in 2015 after the rights to the movie reverted back to Steve Alten. Dean Georgaris wrote the brand new script forThe Megand, in June 2015, Eli Roth was announced as the director.

Roth dropped out of the project, citing creative differences as the reason, which could have been meant Warner Bros wanted something a bit more friendly for a summer blockbuster than Roth might want to bring to the table. Roth is not only a fantastic director of horror films, but he's a huge fan of the genre, as proven by his series on AMC,Eli Roth's History of Horror, which got renewed for a second season. Someone with that much love for the genre likely wouldn't be able to make a killer shark movie without capitalizing on the sheer damage that could be done by a creature of that size to many unsuspecting individuals.

Recently, creature features have shifted back to pure horror roots rather than capitalizing on ridiculous levels of schlocky comedy, as was done in SyFy's series,Sharknado, and a slew of other B-horror movies. Alexandre Aja, who directed sleek, viscerally horrifying films likeHigh Tensionand the 2006 remake ofThe Hills Have Eyes, took on alligators in 2019'sCrawl.This ended up being a highlight for fansand a pleasant surprise, likely because they were expecting something more along the lines ofThe Megand got grisly creature violence instead.

Next: Killer Shark Movies: How The Genre Changed Over Time

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Jack Wilhelmi is the horror features editor at Screen Rant, and has been with the site since 2019. He is a lifelong fan of the horror genre, and loves any excuse to discuss genre-related topics, since none of his friends dare challenge him in horror trivia. He has been published on the independent horror blog Morbidly Beautiful, and has covered major genre film festivals such as Cinepocalypse in Chicago. He has also served as a judge for the Ax Wound Film Festival.In his free time, he is a devoted dog dad to a high-spirited rescue pup named Peter Quill and enjoys volunteering with various animal rescue organizations. Jack likes to travel and explore dark tourism-related and other various haunted locations. He enjoys studying psychology, the paranormal, and will watch literally any schlocky B-movie on the planet for a laugh. Follow him on Twitter @JackMacabre or his dog on Instagram @quillthethrill.

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How The Meg Would Have Been Different With Eli Roth Directing - Screen Rant

Reviewed and Recommended by Erik Baquero