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And then we tried to watch Pacific Rim...
It was in ITV2 last night. And we got half way through.
I had this notion that it was a Good Thing; not quite sure why, but that was the fannish vibe I had gotten. (I also got Good Thing vibe re. Guardians of the Galaxy, and found *that* unwatchable, although for different reasons.) Anyway, I should backtrack a little...
When we went to see Black Panther one of the trailers was puzzling. It looked vaguely Transformer-y, had a young & nicely diverse cast - and seemed to be about giant robots punching monsters in the face. It wasn't until the final titles flashed up that I discovered it was for Pacific Rim 2.
Somehow no one had ever mentioned that Pacific Rim was about giant robots punching monsters in the face... Generally if a movie is dumb, but awesome, I pick up on it and set my expectations accordingly. Ah well. I don't know that it would have made a difference.
Anyhoo, it was on telly, Darcy said 'fancy watching it?' and so we did. Except this one didn't have a diverse cast (except for Idris Elba and the Japanese girl), instead it had a plethora of Riley clones, minus the charm & personality. (Seriously, I cannot remember the main character's name. Did he HAVE a name? I'm serious, did anyone ever mention it?) And Darcy commented that they all looked like 'human wallpaper, completely featureless'. I swear they could have swapped them round and I wouldn't have noticed.
Which might have been manageable if there had been a coherent story or the characters hadn't ALL BEEN SO VERY STUPID or the writing had been OK or... something. IDK. Basically the Honest Trailer is PERFECT, it's simply a film 'starring things your inner 9 year-old will love':
Giant robots!
Giant monsters!
Giant robots punching giant monsters!
Using shipping crates as brass knuckles!
Using a freighter as a baseball bat!
Bo staff fighting!
Colors!
A doggy!
Aw, that's got three arms!
Pew pew pew!
Whoa!
And that one part...
Where he's all like 'Ugh'
And the Kaiju's all 'Rarr'
Although on the plus side,Smurfette the female character wasn't sexualised (at all), again confirming the 'made for 9 year olds' theory.
Don't get me wrong, there is nothing WRONG with giant robots, especially since Darcy then discovered a movie called Robot Jox from 1989, from which Pacific Rim clearly has taken most of it's cues/ideas (just adding Godzilla). The film's plot follows Achilles, one of the "robot jox" who pilot giant machines that fight international battles to settle territorial disputes in a dystopian, post-apocalyptic world.
JUST LOOK AT THIS SEQUENCE (and see how the Pacific Rim robots are literally lifted wholesale). Bonus, this movie's hero has a memorable name, and I already care about his world:
(WHY DOES EVERYONE STILL LIVE IN THOSE CITIES IN PACIFIC RIM??!??? WHY DO THEY ALL RUN AROUND PANICKING, WHY ARE THERE NOT PROCEDURES IN PLACE??? WHY- ok, I'll stop. There are no answers beyond 'robots punching monsters in the face'.)
I had this notion that it was a Good Thing; not quite sure why, but that was the fannish vibe I had gotten. (I also got Good Thing vibe re. Guardians of the Galaxy, and found *that* unwatchable, although for different reasons.) Anyway, I should backtrack a little...
When we went to see Black Panther one of the trailers was puzzling. It looked vaguely Transformer-y, had a young & nicely diverse cast - and seemed to be about giant robots punching monsters in the face. It wasn't until the final titles flashed up that I discovered it was for Pacific Rim 2.
Somehow no one had ever mentioned that Pacific Rim was about giant robots punching monsters in the face... Generally if a movie is dumb, but awesome, I pick up on it and set my expectations accordingly. Ah well. I don't know that it would have made a difference.
Anyhoo, it was on telly, Darcy said 'fancy watching it?' and so we did. Except this one didn't have a diverse cast (except for Idris Elba and the Japanese girl), instead it had a plethora of Riley clones, minus the charm & personality. (Seriously, I cannot remember the main character's name. Did he HAVE a name? I'm serious, did anyone ever mention it?) And Darcy commented that they all looked like 'human wallpaper, completely featureless'. I swear they could have swapped them round and I wouldn't have noticed.
Which might have been manageable if there had been a coherent story or the characters hadn't ALL BEEN SO VERY STUPID or the writing had been OK or... something. IDK. Basically the Honest Trailer is PERFECT, it's simply a film 'starring things your inner 9 year-old will love':
Giant robots!
Giant monsters!
Giant robots punching giant monsters!
Using shipping crates as brass knuckles!
Using a freighter as a baseball bat!
Bo staff fighting!
Colors!
A doggy!
Aw, that's got three arms!
Pew pew pew!
Whoa!
And that one part...
Where he's all like 'Ugh'
And the Kaiju's all 'Rarr'
Although on the plus side,
Don't get me wrong, there is nothing WRONG with giant robots, especially since Darcy then discovered a movie called Robot Jox from 1989, from which Pacific Rim clearly has taken most of it's cues/ideas (just adding Godzilla). The film's plot follows Achilles, one of the "robot jox" who pilot giant machines that fight international battles to settle territorial disputes in a dystopian, post-apocalyptic world.
JUST LOOK AT THIS SEQUENCE (and see how the Pacific Rim robots are literally lifted wholesale). Bonus, this movie's hero has a memorable name, and I already care about his world:
(WHY DOES EVERYONE STILL LIVE IN THOSE CITIES IN PACIFIC RIM??!??? WHY DO THEY ALL RUN AROUND PANICKING, WHY ARE THERE NOT PROCEDURES IN PLACE??? WHY- ok, I'll stop. There are no answers beyond 'robots punching monsters in the face'.)
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Even poor Burn Gorman couldn't do anything interesting with his role. :(