You know what’s cool? Giant Godzilla aliens invading Earth. You know what’s cooler? Giant Godzilla aliens invading Earth and fighting GIANT ROBOTS!
This is literally, word for word, the plot of Guillermo Del Toro’s “Pacific Rim.” The story follows a guy by the name of Raleigh Beckett, who works with his brother to pilot a giant robot, called a Jaeger (German for hunter) against the giant monsters, or Kaiju.
The movie opens with the brothers moving to kill a Kaiju headed straight for Anchorage, Alaska. Before the battle starts, the older brother looks over to our hero and says: “Don’t get too cocky, kid” at this point my friend, who was watching the movie with me, leaned over and whispered: “You know his brother is gonna die, right?” I nodded, and proceeded watch our hero scream in anguish as his brother was torn from the Jaeger, and became finger food for the monstrous Kaiju.
This is just the beginning of predictable plot twists and bad storytelling.
The movie tries to have a romantic sub-plot between our hero and his co-pilot Mako Mori, but it sucks. The movie tries to make you worry about the General commanding the Jaeger program with mysterious nosebleeds: I don’t care.
Why did Del Toro, director of great movies like “Pan’s Labryinth,” a movie with a great story, botch a plot so badly? I want to see giant robots! The characters are no better than the plot. They are boring, and exist only as cannon fodder, and their deaths hold no significance. The Jaeger pilot team consists of a pair of Russians, a creepy set of Chinese triplets, two beefy Australians and Mako Mori, our hero’s faithful sidekick.
However, Pacific Rim makes all the superficial characters and terrible plot all worthwhile because the Jaegers and Kaiju are super cool, at least to my 10-year-old brain, and the fights between them are ridiculous, with buildings, boats and everything else becoming a deadly weapon. Also, the Jaegers and Kaiju both have special weapons like plasma cannons and huge swords for the Jaegers and acid and EMPs wielded by the Kaiju. And honestly, the pure insanity of what is happening on screen will easily distract you from the flimsy plot and characters. Who cares if I don’t like the characters, that Jaeger just used an elbow rocket! AN ELBOW ROCKET! Besides the great fights, the movie also boasts the best villains in a movie since Justin Bieber in “Never Say Never.”
So through all the cardboard characters, an inconsistent plot with holes big enough to drive a truck through, and predictable twists, this movie still is way more entertaining than anything else this month, maybe the year. I think the reason this movie has been getting mixed reviews is because half the critics who watched it wanted masterful storytelling, or a deep plot. But they watched the wrong the movie. No, this movie made for teenage guys and lovers of explosions. And for that small audience, this movie is the finest thing on the silver screen.
