Murray Hamilton was set to return for Revenge. He died before filming began.
Also, from the trivia section:
"The original script features a cameo for Richard Dreyfuss's character from the original Jaws (1975), marine biologist Matt Hooper. In Hooper's scene, he calls the Brodys and is greeted on the phone by Thea, who knows him as "Uncle Matt". Hooper is established as being close to Michael and Carla, who calls him "my second favorite marine biologist", and he gives them his condolences about Sean's death. Hooper and Michael discuss their careers, the late Martin Brody, and Hooper's once spending Christmas with the family with Martin dressed as Santa Claus. The scene ends when Michael heads off to summon Ellen to the phone to talk to Hooper."
Jaws Revenge had a lot of potential. It had a great cast. We saw Amity again. Mrs Taft, Mrs Kintner, and Mr Posner (now the Mayor of Amity, where he was a selectman in the first two) made cameos. The spirit of Martha's Vineyard instantly takes us back to the look and feel of the original film. The dialogue was intentionally rough and scrambled, with background conversations and muddled sentences that would run over one another. That was lifted directly from the original, and made the dialogue organic and realistic. Michael Small, in my opinion, gives us the best score since the original film and he even adds layers to it that I find impressive. YouTube the main score for Revenge and you'll notice the subtle additions to John William's score and it's pretty spectacular. Revenge was also the first PG-13 Jaws film. It was set, initially I believe, to be a darker sequel. The opening scenes in Amity were great. Sean's death was horrific, contrasted by the Christmas choir.
We all know the faults with Revenge, which I blame partly due to rewrites and a mismanaged production schedule, so I won't dabble on them. But I can sense the direction they tried to go in. The film was more focused on the story of Ellen Brody (after Scheider denied a return offer due to him being killed in the beginning instead of Sean), and we can see they tried to make it work. The scenes with Mike and Thea were touching, replicating the scene from the original with Martin and Sean. The film was given a large budget, shot on location in the Bahamas and Martha's Vineyard (beautiful underwater cinematography by John McPherson and Pete Romano by the way), SEVEN sharks were built for this film - it was all good intentions!
If you want to look at a disaster film, look no further than Jaws 3D. Absolutely awful. Not a single trace to the original film or the sequel, why? Because it was hastily rewritten into a "serious" sequel when before it was set to be a spoof. The 3D was awful, as was the shark effects. The underwater shots were AWFUL. The climax with the STILL photo of a shark "swimming" towards the screen was embarrassing. None of the actors in the film felt like Sean or Michael Brody from the original film (sorry Dennis Quaid). There was no Jaws score present. No Amity. Nothing remotely familiar. It might as well have been a different shark movie, because the premise is interesting but not within the Jaws universe. It felt, looked, and performed like a bad TV movie. Revenge, by contrast alone, looks 10x as good.
The people who say Revenge was the worst of the bunch - I have never understood it. I think most of all it's the stigma attached to Revenge. Whereas Jaws 3D was an 80's sequel lost in a resurgent wave of 3D movies, Revenge was a much bigger anticipated, heavily marketed sequel that is much well known by estimation. The "so bad it's good" stench is attached to the film, and of course the infamous tagline along with it being the last in the series seem to make people assume it's the worst, when in reality it's much better in final form and apparent efforts than Jaws 3D.
Just my opinion.
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