MEG begins to emerge and meets her nemesis.

Some time in the early 1980s, a teenage kid from a suburb in south New Jersey took pen to paper and wrote the opening chapter to a proposed sequel to one of his favorite film franchises, Jaws. The plan was to have the entire eastern seaboard of the United States in harms way when a long thought extinct creature emerges from the depths. The creature was Carcharodon megalodon, the ancient ancestor to the great white shark. 60 feet of pure terror! On paper, this proposed JAWS IV: MEGALODON sounded like it was going to be so cool. You'd think that I was writing about the origins of author Steve Alten's story but alas it is not. That young kid was me and I loved sharks and of all the sharks in the ocean I thought it would be awesome to see a giant shark on the attack. After reading Steve Alten's novel MEG I couldn't wait to see it turned into a film. In the ensuing years, for every new book in the MEG series we were greeted by a lackluster low budget film that seemed to hinder the development of the movie I really wanted to see. Decades later, it looks like MEG is finally going to reach the surface.

Last year it was announced that Steve Alten's novel will finally become a major motion picture from Warner Bros./New Line Cinema. The film was to be directed by Eli Roth (Cabin Fever). Roth had stepped away from the project and was officially replaced by Jon Turteltaub (National Treasure). Now according to Deadline, the film now has its star. It is reported that Jason Statham (The Transporter, The Expendables) has signed on to star in the film. We don't know who he would play but it seems likely that he will be Jonas Taylor, the central human figure of the franchise. In the adaptation of Alten's novel, Taylor attempts to stop the title creature, a long believed extinct 60 foot long man-eating shark, that is terrorizing the Pacific and the China coast.

Could Jason Statham be playing Jonas Taylor in Jon Turteltaub's adaptation of Steve Alten's MEG?

Finally, after all these years of enduring sad knock-offs we may finally get to see the true "Jurassic Shark" make its big screen debut. Alten has written three sequels The Trench, Meg: Primal Waters, Meg: Hell's Aquarium with two more books to come Meg: Night Stalkers and Meg: Origins. It's a fun series to read and I have no doubt the film will capture the fun and excitement of seeing a giant shark terrorizing the ocean.

Stay tuned for more details as they become available.