Jeremy’s Tophunder №77: Pacific Rim

5 min readMay 4, 2020

This might turn out to be one of the shorter recaps I write.

I mean, it’s a movie about gargantuan sea creatures that travel through an interdimensional portal and attack coastal cities, and the giant mechanical human-piloted robots that defend humanity.

Like, do I really need to explain the reasons why this movie made my list?

There were a few different movies that competed for the spots that I’ll (loosely) call the “Epic Space Monster/End of the World Movies.” There was obviously this, but also the 2014 remake of Godzilla and it’s sequel, Godzilla: King of the Monsters, Armageddon, 2012, Independence Day, Super 8, Tremors, all of the Transformers movies, Jurassic World, and Mega Shark Versus Crocosaurus. Several of those movies ended up making the list (and some are ranked much higher than others), but the reason I went with Pacific Rim for one of those spots was because it was the only one with 30-story tall mecha-robots that battle with the epic space monsters.

Pacific Rim is the kind of movie that Michael Bay wishes he could make, or at least I’d like to think that it is. It has everything that a Michael Bay movie would want to have, but it’s a movie that actually has a reasonably well-told story and some actual heart to it. You actually (kind of) give a shit about the characters.

But if we’re being honest, that was never really my complaint with Michael Bay movies. Generally, I don’t have too many complaints about Michael Bay movies. I actually like them, as I’ve told you. If I’m being fully honest, the character development parts of Pacific Rim are the points when I’m the most bored. When I was watching it earlier, I got up to get a snack and didn’t even bother to pause the movie — I knew all I was missing was Idris Elba trying to convince Charlie Hunnam to come back and be a pilot again, and I wouldn’t be missing any scenes where — again, I can’t stress this enough — giant robot warriors are defending Earth from giant undersea space monsters.

If I were ranking every movie on my list by its best 30-to-40 minute stretch, Pacific Rim would be ranked much, much higher on the strength of the sequence in Hong Kong. It’s absolutely incredible. Just watch:

And this is only covers, like, the first 25 percent of the total scene. Don’t worry. There’s more.

And if you’re thinking, “I’m just not seeing quite enough by way of improvised weaponry — could they maybe work in a sequence where the giant mecha-robot picks up a full-sized ocean liner and wields it like a baseball bat?” then don’t worry, we’ve got you covered.

Feel like you’re getting it?

Pacific Rim isn’t the most mindless movie on my list, but it’s up there. And that’s not a criticism, either. It was directed by Guillermo Del Toro, who has been nominated for five Oscars in his career, winning two (for Best Director and Best Picture for The Shape of Water). He specifically populated the movie with some characters with rich backstories and motivations, and spent a decent chunk of time examining themes of unity and togetherness and loss and rebirth. And for the most part, he did them justice. It’s just that I don’t really care. The epic scale of the action sequences render everything else in the movie irrelevant for me. The story could be written by an Oscar-winning director or by a 10-year old telling a story to their mother who is only half-listening while doing other things, and I wouldn’t really care much either way.

A sequel was released in 2018. I never saw it, probably because I’m an idiot. It got substantially worse reviews (the original was 72 percent positive on Rotten Tomatoes, the sequel just 44 percent), but that almost makes me want to see it more. The consensus reads, “Pacific Rim: Uprising won’t win any points for subtlety or originality, but it delivers enough of the rock ‘em-sock ’em robots-vs.-kaiju thrills that fans of the original will be looking for,” so, yes, that sounds like exactly what I want.

I really don’t have a ton to say about Pacific Rim, other than it’s some of the best special effects work I’ve ever seen, the action sequences were everything I ever could have wanted (and more), and it was one of the rare movies that actually far exceeded any expectations I had for it. I was expecting an all-action, no-story summer blockbuster, and ended up getting an all-action, decent-story summer blockbuster. The cast was actually really good — Idris Elba, Charlie Day, and Burn Gorman are all great, Rinko Kikuchi did a really nice job with a surprisingly satisfying character, and Charlie Hunnam in the leading role brought just enough to the table to make everything work.

Pacific Rim isn’t a movie that will leaving you thinking about anything specific. It might not even be a movie that will leave you thinking about anything at all. For me, it’s just a movie where a bunch of huge things beat each other up. That’s all it is. But that’s all it ever had to be.

(For a refresher on the project, I introduced it in a Facebook Post on Day 1)

Here’s our progress on the list so far:

2. A Few Good Men

4. Dazed and Confused

6. The Fugitive

7. The Dark Knight

9. Saving Private Ryan

11. The Big Short

13. The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

15. Skyfall

17. Ocean’s 11

18. Air Force One