It has been a few hours since I saw this movie, and now I am having to rethink a lot of it. I walked out of the movie happy, as I think most people would, but I do have a couple of grievances. The first movie celebrated the how international the Pan Pacific Defence Corps was, and I agree that this movie seemed to do the same (and without the terrible Australian accents!). The movie incorporated a lot of new and interesting characters, that still seemed to display a kind of diversity. There were way more female characters than the first movie!
However, I am a little disappointed with how they tied the movies together. I understand that they want it to be a little like a standalone, but referring to characters by name occasionally without telling us what happened to them really gets me? You keep mentioning Raleigh Beckett, but what happened to him? His picture isn't on the wall, he doesn't seem to be in any position at the Shatterdome? Okay, maybe he is at a different Shatterdome... but couldn't they throw that in?
Next, what happened to Herc Hansen? Maybe they realised that Max Martini shouldn't be doing an Aussie accent and decided not to get him in? I think a good head canon would perhaps be that he fell into a pool of alcoholism when he didn't need to be strong for his son any more. (Let's be real, I was hoping there would be a surprise and Chuck would be alive! Stacker could pilot a jaeger alone! Why didn't he save Chuck????)
And Mako! They killed off Mako! A disaster!
I kind of wish that they had developed Jake and Amara a little more (they just left that scene in the simulator??? They could have RAN with that?) Even Jake and Lambert's relationship deserved a little more love. I just feel like the characters developed a little more in the first movie than in this movie... (hear me about Hermann & Newt's relationship, Raleigh & Chuck's relationship, Chuck & Mako's relationship, Mako & Stacker's relationship. Hell even a bit of Herc & Chuck and Herc & Stacker in there... But this movie did have good characters!
Perhaps this movie had just lost a lot of the Guillermo Del Toro love... which, I think, is the only reason that Pacific Rim got a sequel. The detail that was put into the original production, simply because Del Toro wanted it to be lifelike and seem real (friendly reminder that they used an actual whole conn-pod prop in the original movie, I don't know about this one)
Also, I agree with a previous comment that mentions that this movie just didn't feel as high stakes as the original. Everything came and went so quickly, and I do understand that there was all that build up to introduce the characters etc, but remember the first movie (with a very similar story line, character wise) where we could have a washed up pilot come back and join with all the others who hate him at first, but then learn to love him and save the world together, befriending an orphan and piloting with her in the process? Same story, but a whole chunk of this movie was taken up with just getting to this part, whereas the original built up the action, and felt like it was really the only/last chance to stop the kaiju. In Uprising, it was the First.
But besides all that junk, I still really enjoyed it! I'll just be taking my score from a 10 to an 8, because this movie doesn't deserve to be held on the same pedestal as the first. Hope everyone else enjoyed it (and I'll miss you Del Toro!)
Review by seraphielBlockedParentSpoilers2018-03-22T10:47:03Z
It has been a few hours since I saw this movie, and now I am having to rethink a lot of it. I walked out of the movie happy, as I think most people would, but I do have a couple of grievances. The first movie celebrated the how international the Pan Pacific Defence Corps was, and I agree that this movie seemed to do the same (and without the terrible Australian accents!). The movie incorporated a lot of new and interesting characters, that still seemed to display a kind of diversity. There were way more female characters than the first movie!
However, I am a little disappointed with how they tied the movies together. I understand that they want it to be a little like a standalone, but referring to characters by name occasionally without telling us what happened to them really gets me? You keep mentioning Raleigh Beckett, but what happened to him? His picture isn't on the wall, he doesn't seem to be in any position at the Shatterdome? Okay, maybe he is at a different Shatterdome... but couldn't they throw that in?
Next, what happened to Herc Hansen? Maybe they realised that Max Martini shouldn't be doing an Aussie accent and decided not to get him in? I think a good head canon would perhaps be that he fell into a pool of alcoholism when he didn't need to be strong for his son any more. (Let's be real, I was hoping there would be a surprise and Chuck would be alive! Stacker could pilot a jaeger alone! Why didn't he save Chuck????)
And Mako! They killed off Mako! A disaster!
I kind of wish that they had developed Jake and Amara a little more (they just left that scene in the simulator??? They could have RAN with that?) Even Jake and Lambert's relationship deserved a little more love. I just feel like the characters developed a little more in the first movie than in this movie... (hear me about Hermann & Newt's relationship, Raleigh & Chuck's relationship, Chuck & Mako's relationship, Mako & Stacker's relationship. Hell even a bit of Herc & Chuck and Herc & Stacker in there... But this movie did have good characters!
Perhaps this movie had just lost a lot of the Guillermo Del Toro love... which, I think, is the only reason that Pacific Rim got a sequel. The detail that was put into the original production, simply because Del Toro wanted it to be lifelike and seem real (friendly reminder that they used an actual whole conn-pod prop in the original movie, I don't know about this one)
Also, I agree with a previous comment that mentions that this movie just didn't feel as high stakes as the original. Everything came and went so quickly, and I do understand that there was all that build up to introduce the characters etc, but remember the first movie (with a very similar story line, character wise) where we could have a washed up pilot come back and join with all the others who hate him at first, but then learn to love him and save the world together, befriending an orphan and piloting with her in the process? Same story, but a whole chunk of this movie was taken up with just getting to this part, whereas the original built up the action, and felt like it was really the only/last chance to stop the kaiju. In Uprising, it was the First.
But besides all that junk, I still really enjoyed it! I'll just be taking my score from a 10 to an 8, because this movie doesn't deserve to be held on the same pedestal as the first. Hope everyone else enjoyed it (and I'll miss you Del Toro!)