Pacific Rim: Uprising Movie Review

Pacific Rim: Uprising (2018)

Watch the trailer 
Written by: Emily Carmichael, Kira Snyder, Steven S. DeKnight, T.S. Nowlin, Steven S. DeKnight and T.S. Nowlin (story by), Travis Beacham (based on characters by)
Directed by: Steven S. DeKnight
Starring:  John Boyega, Scott Eastwood, Cailee Spaeny, Jing Tian, Rinko Kikuchi, Burn Gorman, Charlie Day, Adria Arjona
Rated: R

Plot
Once-promising Jaeger pilot Jake Pentecost abandoned his training to sell Jaeger parts on the black market. When an even more unstoppable threat is unleashed on the world, he's forced to react.

Verdict
This is nowhere near the original, but I didn't expect that. This is giant robots smashing monsters. It's entertaining enough to not be a waste, but you're better off to watch the original again. Character development is banal, you can guess most of the plot in the first few minutes. The biggest problem is that the robots aren't as awe inspiring as the original, nor are the battles.
It depends.

Review
The sequel to the 2013 film Pacific Rim, Guillermo Del Toro does not return which should be a big clue from the jump.

Jake Pentecost, son of Stacker.

John Boyega plays Jake Pentecost, son  to Stacker from the original. Boyega does fine, though the movie doesn't give him a lot of room to act. He's the prodigal son, re-enlisting as a Jaeger ranger to avoid jail. It's too trite. He manages to team up with a teen girl Amara who built her own mini-Jaeger Scapper that can be piloted by a single pilot.

Apparently there is only one Jaeger pilot and a bunch of recruits. The story hits a boring stretch. Jake is the greatest pilot ever that forsook it all, Amara has a lot of talent but didn't earn her way in. It's boilerplate story development and it resolves exactly as you think it would.

A movie about giant robots is going to play fast and loose with physics, but this movie takes it a bit far. There's a hybrid mini-Kaiju, which I thought might take the movie somewhere interesting. It doesn't. It's a missed opportunity. The movie takes a huge leap to the main plot, and it really didn't have to. Charlie Day returns as Dr. Newton. His arc is overly complicated as is his plan. I won't spoil it, but he's a kaiju sympathizer to a degree. The intricacies of that are wasted, but it does suffice to get fights between gargantuan beings.

Jaeger Gipsy Avenger.

The robots in the first movie looked cool. These movies are giant robots smashing things, but Pacific Rim just doesn't make it look as cool as the original. Even the designs of the Jaegers are disappointing.

A bunch of Kaiju on the rampage.

The monsters are bigger and badder as sequels usually treat them. There's even a mega Kaiju. We learn why they are on our planet though the reasoning is still flimsy. The battle culminates on Mt. Fuji, but that sounds better than it is. We see Scapper again. While I don't expect accurate science, one of the Jaegers travels high into the atmosphere. Movies have done this and made it look really cool. Uprising doesn't manage to do the same. While the Jaeger doesn't appear to leave Earth's atmosphere, there is still a lot of heat as it descends. It looks like a scene from spacecraft entering the atmosphere. Oddly the broken windshield exposing the pilots to the elements doesn't pose a problem with how hot the Jaeger is getting. I can give the movie a lot of leeway, but nothing about that makes sense. They didn't even try. The movie leaves ample room for a sequel. With the success at the box office this has, it's a good possibility it will happen.