Movie Review: Pacific Rim Uprising

Certificate 12A, 111 minutes

Director: Steven S. DeKnight

Stars: John Boyega, Scott Eastwood, Cailee Spaeny

Pacific Rim Uprising is the sequel to Pacific Rim and it begins with a man narrating, giving a summary of the previous events. Giant monster called Kaiju were sent from an alternate dimension by beings called Precursors through something called the Breach. The Kaiju were defeated by giant piloted robots called Jaegers and the man’s dead father, Stacker Pentecost, was responsible for saving the world, and dying in the process – but he is not his father.

The Kaiju War is Over

It’s been 10 years since the Breach was closed and the war was won and Jake Pentecost (John Boyega) is more interested in partying than saving anything. He squats in the remains of a former mansion partially destroyed by Kaiju, because half a mansion in the relief zones is cheaper than an apartment. Jake mostly seems to be exchanging salvaged material from the ruined areas for food, but as the film opens he is in a Jaeger scrap yard along with some criminals intending to steal a capacitor from a scrapped Jaeger.

When they get to the capacitor, someone has beaten them to it, and Jake’s compatriots are not impressed. He manages to track down the person who stole it, who has built a (small) Jaeger for themselves, and it is not exactly a huge surprise when the thief turns out to be female. It’s rather more of a surprise when she turns out to be quite a bit younger than expected – a teenager, only 15 years old. the Jaeger builder, Amara Namani (Cailee Spaeny – who is actually older than her character but looks rather younger due to being quite small), and Jake have to flee in the mini-Jaeger, Scrapper (Amara built the Jaeger so that next time Kaiju invade she won’t have to wait to be rescued – the reasons why are revealed later), when the Pan-Pacific Defense Corps arrive at her warehouse wanting their stolen scrap back. Despite putting up a good show, they are eventually captured.

Re-enlist or Get Locked Up

Jake’s adoptive sister, Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi), now the PPDC Secretary General, tells him that the only way he can get out of this is to re-enlist, and start working as a trainer. Amara and he are both shipped to the Moyulan Shatterdome, the PPDC Pilot Academy. Jake is not really happy to be back, nor is his former friend Nate (Scott Eastwood, The Fate of the Furious) that happy to see him. The Jaeger pilots may soon be obsolete anyway; Shao Industries, run by Liwen Shao (Jing Tian), is developing Jaeger drones. Dr. Newton Geiszler (Charlie Day) is now working for Shao, although Dr. Hermann Gottlieb (Burn Gorman) is still working for the PPDC.

More Kaiju, Of Course

Jake and Nate accompany Mori to a meeting in Sydney in the Jaeger Gipsy Danger, where a vote will be held on whether or not to authorise the use of the drones. Prior to the meeting, a strange Jaeger comes out of the water and attacks, causing quite a bit of devastation. Mori spots something odd about the new Jaeger, but is killed before she is able to fully transmit it to anyone. Then more Kaiju appear and attack, with the destruction of all life on Earth the ultimate goal. So Jake, Amara, Nate and the cadets will have to step up to save the world.

Reviewing Pacific Rim Uprising

The film is available in 2D and 3D, with the 2D version being the one watched. As it makes heavy use of CGI – giant robots and Kaiju not actually being available, and they’ve moved past “people in rubber suits” – the film would probably have worked well in 3D, especially during the fight scenes. And, really, the fight scenes are what it is about; Jaeger vs. Jaeger and Jaeger vs. Kaiju. The big battle between Jaegars and Kaiju takes place in Tokyo – where else would you have a battle with giant monsters and giant robots? Tokyo does not come out of it very well, as both Kaiju and Jaegars cause quite a bit of damage to the city in the process. The big battles themselves are pretty decent and are exactly the sort of things that would be expected; lots of damage, lots of weapons and lots of buildings coming off second best in the process.

The interaction between Jake and Nate is a bit weak. It looks as if there is supposed to be some tension between the two of them, but there isn’t really; Nate doesn’t really seem that annoyed with Jake for quitting and Jake doesn’t seem that irritated with Nate’s behaviour. So there isn’t really any big reconciliation between the two, just some slight friction being transformed into a fairly typical relationship. The interaction between Jake and Amara is far superior; there actually seems to be feeling there, and the odd bit of humour. That between Amara and her fellow cadets is variable. There are a couple of surprises in the film; some things do happen that are expected, but why they happen is rather different.

The final scene of the film hints at another sequel, and this, and more, is definitely stated as being the intention if the film is successful enough. This film does pretty much what it is expected to do, it has big monsters and big robots fighting, with a bit of people-stuff in-between. Pacific Rim Uprising is not great, but it is decent fun to watch.