Pacific Rim

I wanted to support this movie, it was an original idea, I really like most of the people involved with it including but not limited to Guillermo del Toro, Charlie Day, Charlie Hunnam, and Idris Elba. This movie isn't a rip off of the Transformers, its an homage to the kaiju movies of years past, movies like the old Godzilla movies, or movies of monsters similar to that.

Going into the movie, I knew it had some pretty good ratings, it was sitting at around 70% on Rotten Tomatoes. I know a lot of Guillermo del Toro's movies, and a lot of them have different monsters and creatures in them, and every single one of them that I have seen have been really well created, so I had very high hopes for what Guillermo and his team could create with this movie.

I am not the biggest fan of action movies, but this movie is definitely not a normal action movie. There are some great action sequences and also a lot more heart in this movie than I would have thought going in.

The premise of this movie is that a wormhole sort of crevice opens up in the deepest part of the Pacific Ocean, that these monsters, referred to as Kaiju, are traveling through. Kaiju is also the term used to refer to the Godzilla type Japanese movies with large monsters attacking cities. In response to these monsters slowly coming through the portal the world bands together to create giant robots names Jaegers, which is German for hunter, there is a screen before the movie even starts that states this about the words Kaiju and Jaeger, so I am definitely not spoiling anything.

The Jaegers require a 2 man team, and the 2 people mind meld in order to be able to fight as one, as the neural load to control one of them is too much for one person. So teams tend to be made up of people who are related to each other, as they have had similar experiences. These teams are able to kill the Kaiju, and in many cases keep them out of the cities on the northern Pacific coastline.

When the global funding for more Jaegers is cut, the few remaining teams must band together, bringing teams from China, Australia, and Russia all together.

There is a really interesting theme in this movie about dealing with loss, and also with family. There are some very sad moments in the movie, as well as some very emotionally compelling moments. This movie does a great job of showing what drives its main character, and establishes his motivation in the movie.

The movie has a little bit of humor, with Charlie Day being responsible for most of the laughs in the movie, but I would not call it a funny movie, but there is enough humor to break the tension from time to time.

I think this movie is really what I wanted the Godzilla movie made in the late 90's to be. Its entertaining, it has some great characters, it has really cool monsters, and some amazing action scenes. This is a good popcorn movie, it isn't going to blow your mind, but it will definitely entertain you. In my movie rankings, I am putting it ahead of World War Z as I found it more interesting and movie entertaining overall, but it did not reach the levels that were achieved in Iron Man 3.

6. Pain & Gain
5. World War Z
4. Pacific Rim
3. Iron Man 3
2. Star Trek Into Darkness
1. This Is the End