Pacific Rim - Movie Review

Who's in it?

Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba,  Rinko Kikuchi and Charlie Day

What's it about?

If H.P. Lovecraft wrote Japanese mech anime/manga and shoved every western action film cliche in to make a script, the result you get is Pacific Rim. The base idea is so...basic really, monsters called Kaiju (actual Japanese for strange beast) come from a dimentional rift beneath the sea and attack earth and us as humans band together to build giant robots called Jaegers to fight and stop them. And this ladies and gentleman, is unashamedly cool. The Kaiju look like a mix of Halo's Grunts, Mass Effect's Krogan, Gears of War's Locust Priests, Cloverfield's monster and Cthulu.

Who needs a Halo movie?!

  

These Jaegers are controlled by two pilots, and they both have a 'neural handshake', kind of like Avatars connection from the marine to the avatar but it's so much more clever. With this memories are shared, and if you 'go down the rabbit hole' you can basically see the memory from a third person view in your co-pilots memories. This is smart, but it's the secondary story arc is where the movie really is actually smart, but I'm just leaving that as a surprise for you who watch it.

Just imagine a giant robot punching him in the face, awesome eh?

Any Good?

Now when I said the main story is so basic and the pretty much the whole script one big cliche, that doesn't take away from the movie being AWESOME. This movie is what Transformers should have been, just robots fighting robots and not alien invaders from another dimension. The sound work for the film was incredible in terms of the fighting, when a hit made contact you could really feel it. The effects were on par with Man of Steel's but on a HUGE scale. The Jaegers moved so fluidly they could have been real, and the Kaiju look like they've been ripped from R'lyeh (Cthulu's sunken city) or from Halo themselves.

The Kaiju basically are him with no wings

While this awesomeness is going on, Charlie Day's Newton makes a game-changing discovery and must meet up with Ron Perlman's black market dealer named Hannibal Chau. Let me just repeat that, Ron Perlman. Black market dealer. Yep, it's just as amazing as it sounds, even if for some reason Perlman had to really ham up the acting. Chau is easily the best character in the movie for me, and that's not just because of his ridiculous(ly cool) metal plated shoes. 

I haven't looked this good since Hellboy!!

Charlie Hunnam's acting was so-so (which is odd, he's really good in Son's of Anarchy), but then again the whole cast was at best so-so. Idris Elba was just cringe worthy as leader of the Jaeger forces Marshall Stacker Pentecost, but his story really does hit you in the feels when it's all revealed. Rinko Kikuchi was the typical held-back-woman-badass-wanting-to-be-a-fighter character but turned all gooey anime girl when Hunnam's Raleigh Becket was around, but she really doesn't do much else other than just a character to prevent plot holes and explain one of the story's high points. Ron Perlman and Charlie Day worked fairly well together, but the dialogue and execution were just pure cheese. 

 Pacific Rim 2: Cliche Harder!!

The secondary characters are the type you'd see in literally every movie ever, douchy scientist disagreeing with main character scientist, douchy Jaeger pilot disagreeing with main character pilot, and that one Joseph Gordon-Levitt looking guy in the Jaeger equvilant of NASA's Houston with epic sideburns. That being said, the douchy Jaeger pilot (Robert Kazinsky's Chuck Hanson) was the best acted of all characters, he really did irritate me and that's how I knew he was the best actor in it. That is, until he had the stupid "douchbag has a heart of gold" moment that is in literally EVERYTHING. 

 Hey uhhhh..say that again?

Now, don't let the pure cliche/cheese/cringe worthy script and acting put you off, this movie really is badass. Don't go to see it for the story (it's merely a nice addition with some good, if seen many times before, high points), go to see it for the GIANT ROBOTS FIGHTING GIANT ALIENS. If you go to this expecting a great story of earth saving and all that you will be disappointed. I went to see this in the way I go to see most movies I watch; completely blind, and I don't mean the fact that I basically am as blind as a bat without my glasses. I mean I don't read any reviews, watch any videos on it, I go to movies with no prior research so I'll form my own opinion and ultimately won't be disappointed. All I'd known about this movie was it was Jax Teller (Charlie Hunnam in Sons of Anarchy) and Clay Morrow/Hellboy (Ron Perlman in SoA and Hellboy) together in a movie, and it had put Guillermo Del Toro with Perlman again like they did in the fantastic Hellboy movies.  

So yeah, wanna go see my new movie?..

Honestly I was never a big fan of mecha anime or manga, but I really did enjoy this. Like I said, if you want to see the movie but not be disappointed just go in expecting Megazords fighting Lovecraftian Godzilla style monsters and you will like it, and it is a really good time when you watch it like that. As I mentioned, this is what Transformers should have been, or at least what the final fight with the giant fire spitting robot-thing in Thor should have been. There are more movies I can draw similarities from, worse films thank god, but if I even hinted at them it would tell you the films 'twists'. It's a great movie for entertainment value and I probably would go and see it again, if just to watch the fights again. If you're a Neon Genesis Evangelion or Full Metal Alchemist fan you'll like this, the same goes for fans of the old (good) Power Rangers and Transformers or just simply play Hawken I suggest just going to see it for fun, just don't expect a lot and it is great.

Jaegers are cooler, I promise!!

Warner Bros. are really pushing this film, they've youtube gamers building Jaegers and competitions for people from different countries designing Jaegers themselves, and its that pushing that has created this beautiful thing: 

This is our (Ireland's) Jaeger!!

Oh, and if there's any guys who are reading this and their girlfriend/boyfriend won't go to see this with you, just show them this:

He does this all the time in Sons of Anarchy, like seriously, watch it

Rating?     

Tell myself and Maaaaaaaaaaa Cherry what you think of the review or the movie if you get to see it on Twitter, Facebook and the comments below, we always love hearing your feedback,

The (sigh..) Eldest Gorgebag