Movie Reaction: Pacific Rim: Uprising

Formula: Pacifc Rim + (Ender's Game / The 5thWave)

Not all sequels are built the same. They come from different places. Most sequels these days are planned ahead of time. Some trilogy or greater universe is mapped out and the success of the first installment is assumed. If it's a Star Wars or a Harry Potter, that works out. If it's a Golden Compass or an Eragon, it doesn't. The more traditional sequel is the result of an unplanned success. These are almost all star-driven and rarely have a natural story to continue as a sequel. Look at Legally Blonde or The Hangover as a good example. There's the reboot sequel too, which tries to update a classic for a new generation but keeps a connection to the original. Blade Runner and Tron are great flag-bearers for that type. Probably the least successful of all sequels s what I'd call the "concept sequel". That's when there's a story idea that someone is convinced is the star of the movie, not the actors. I'm sure there are a few successful examples of this, but all the ones that come to my mind are not. Remember xXx: State of the Union, Smokin' Aces 2: Assassins' Ball, or Cruel Intentions 2? The mighty Fast and the Furious tried a concept sequel with Tokyo Drift and it nearly killed the franchise.

Technically speaking, Pacific Rim: Uprising is a reboot sequel since it brings back actors from the first movie, but functionally, it is a concept sequel. The idea is that people want to see giant robots fight giant monsters. The exacts of how are almost irrelevant. The first Pacific Rim was fought above its weight class. The credentials and resources behind it didn't match the idea. It was a big swing for Legendary at the time. They gave Guillermo del Toro (not an Oscar winner at the time but already treated like one) nearly $200 million to bring this big idea to life. It was meant to make a star out of Charlie Hunnam and give Idris Elba the vehicle he needed to really become "Movie Star Idris Elba" (still waiting on that to happen, but it was worth a try). That film was an absolute treat because it was popcorn entertainment under the enthusiastic care of an auteur.

Pacific Rim: Uprising is more like what I expected when I first heard the description of Pacific Rim. Somewhat smaller budget. A less proven director. Big-name producer helping it along. A couple fresh-faced stars. A bit more targeted to a younger audience. This is a movie that feels like it exists to sell toys much more than the first one. Although, let's be honest, both were sold on the idea that these could make some pretty cool toys.

Set a decade after Pacific Rim, the world of Uprising is mostly rebuilt for the carnage of the first film. The kaiju, the monsters that came out of a dimensional portal in the Pacific Ocean are gone. The main threat now is from people trying to make their own Jaegers (large robots initially created to fight the kaiju). Jake (John Boyega) is the renegade son of Stacker Pentecost (Idris Elba), the hero of the kaiju war who sacrificed himself to save the planet. Jake has no desire to follow in his father's footsteps, but a chance encounter with a young girl, Amara (Cailee Spaeny), who built her own Jaeger leads to her being enrolled in the Jaeger pilot training program and Jake being employed as an instructor at the training academy. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention. Jake is a gifted Jaeger pilot. He's just running away from that life because rebels gotta rebel. Jake butts heads with his old frienemy Nate (Scott Eastwood), the senior instructor. Amara has trouble fitting in with the other young pilots. Well, it turns out that the kaiju aren't completely eradicated and all the named characters in this movie are the only ones available to pilot Jaegers to stop them.

Look, the story is pretty basic. The more movies I watch, the more I realize how much filmmakers rely on narrative shorthand to make things work. If this was the first action movie I'd ever seen, the beats of this wouldn't make much sense. Amara goes from outsider among the trainees to de facto leader in about three scenes. But, I've seen a dozen movies about training academies in which that exact thing happened, so I'm automatically filling in the blanks to make that story work. The movie never really explains why, at a massive Jaeger base, only two pilots and a handful of trainees are the only ones available to fight the kaiju. I didn't really question it though, because other movies have had stories about the A-team being sidelined so that the reserves have to step up, I assume all the beats necessary to explain it happening in this movie.

I remember hearing about a study that showed if you keep the first and last letter of a word the same and jumble the letters in the middle, you can still read the sentence because your brain unscrambles and processes it automatically. That's kind of what happens with Uprising. The screenplay isn't very good, but it fits more in it than it should be able to because it assumes the audience already knows where everything is going anyway. That means it can skip steps and still make sense.

The cast is reverse engineered for international appeal. The pilot trainee class is a checklist of markets Universal is hoping to appeal to (Russian, Chinese, American, etc.). The characters are mostly playing types, and that's fine. Cailee Spaneny isn't a strength or liability in the film. Going forward, she doesn't need to be the focus. Scott Eastwood is making quite a career out of being a classic leading man in a world not looking for a leading man. I think about his work in Uprising and The Fate of the Furious. He gets put in movies to be anachronistic. He's there for the lead to say "We don't need Captain America anymore". He's a good sport about it too (probably because he knows that there's always going to be opportunities for a classic leading man, even if it just takes a little longer to be handed a franchise now). Charlie Day and Burn Gorman are back, this time not used as much for laughs. That's a mistake, because, as much as I love Charlie Day, I can't take him seriously in a movie like this. John Boyega largely carries the movie. I'm not sure that he's ever going to be the "next big thing"-type of star. I don't think he has it in him to lead a great movie by himself like a Will Smith or a Tom Cruise. He is just what this movie needed though. He's able to add levity to situations without taking away the stakes. If this movie was too self-serious, it would be insufferable. He makes sure that doesn't happen. He's still a bit young for me to buy into him in the mentor role. Give him 15-20 years and he'll be marvelous in that mode.

Have I really gone this long without talking about the giant robots fighting the giant robots? Well, there's sort of a reason for that. If all you need is for the action to be big and loud, then Uprising is a success. It follows the sequel pattern of being bigger and louder than before. However, I wasn't as enamored this time. I spent most of the time wishing they were fighting away from the cities so that I could follow what was happening better. There was a lot of knocking over buildings, glass shattering, and missiles exploding, but I had a hard time connecting with what the Jaeger pilots were actually doing. The mind meld aspect I remember being key to the first movie. It's treated more like a nuisance in Uprising.

The enjoyment of this movie is inversely proportional to mow much you care to pick at it. The robot vs. monster action is fun, but it's not greatly staged. The characters are enjoyable without being indelible. The story is functional without being fully considered. It wasn't as much pure fun as the first movie, but there's still enough to like to feel like I got my money's worth.

Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend