Pacific Rim

[caragnafog dog]

http://kojimatweets.tumblr.com/post/55082988386

The mecha designer of Metal Gear Solid and ZOE made a promo poster for Pacific Rim

I fucking love Metal Gear Solid.

[SEELE-01]

I'll go and watch it in the week, but still I have my doubts... And the sour taste of half-baked-uncredited rip-off

And just to be sure I'll write down in situ all possible references to Eva...

[soul.assassin]

Why, you're mad?

It's been said many times that PR =/= Eva.

[SEELE-01]

Why, you're mad?

It's been said many times that PR =/= Eva.

Sorry, Eva has been now for so long in my sub-conscious that the first impression is hard to remove...

[arkiel]

Saw it. Loved it. The character bits get close to melodramatic, though.

[SEELE-01]

Saw it. Loved it. The character bits get close to melodramatic, though.

EVA RIP-OFFf!!!

[Clover]

Movie was absolutely nothing like Eva, which was kinda disappointing.
Still good, though.

[beaverteeth92]

So I just saw this and it was amazing. Everything I hoped for and more. Also I didn't catch any blatant shoutouts to Evangelion and the only similarities were in a few scenes with

SPOILER: Show

Rinko Kikuchi's childhood

that were mindfucky.

Anyone catch any really subtle references I missed?

[Dastardly]

EVA RIP-OFFf!!!

Yes and no.

I just saw it as well, and I can tell you and everyone here (im new on this forum, but by NO MEANS WHATSOEVER am I new to EVA), that approximately 90% of EVERY SINGLE SCENE of pacific rim has a DIRECT analog to Evangelion, but twisted around just a little.

EVA SCENES MIMICKED IN PACIFIC RIM (SPOILER FREE):

Mako is Misato, if Misato looked like Rei, and was a pilot.

Prying open the entry plug to save Rei.

A young Misato standing up in the floating escape capsule.

Misato attempting to shut down the Jet Alone reactor core (all the jaegers resemble jet alone in a loose fashion, primarily in how they function, if not in appearance)

LCL fluid in the entry plug.

The battle inside the volcano. In an earlier, unrelated scene, a jaeger uses reactor coolant to freeze and break off part of a kaiju's body.

The prog knife.

Rei's failure to synch with unit zero, and subsequent berserkification of unit zero.

Following up on THAT, is the classic "Shut the system down!", "I cant!!!!! ITS NOT RESPONDING", AND when they finally unplug it, the jaeger keeps going....

PAY ATTENTION OR YOU WILL MISS IT! VERY briefly one of the kaiju screams. In this particular screaming scene, viewed from the angle of the camera, combined with the glowing parts inside its mouth, the kaiju in question seems to mirror almost EXACTLY the classic image of Berserk unit one screaming with its mouth REALLY wide open, as viewed from the front. This particular scene is very brief, but UNMISTAKEABLE.

There is a fight scene that loosely resembles toji blasting Shinji, and vice versa.

The entry plug ejection sequence during the episode where the three pilots are using the simulation bodies in that underwater room.

Rie detonating her eva to save Shinji.

Pick an elevator scene. any of them.

the eva launch sequence (sans the bullet drive to the surface. In fact they KINDA did that, but in reverse, as the head portion of "Jypsy Danger" drops down a rail system to land on the main body before locking in place.)

the gendo ikari helicopter scene.

Misato joining nerve for the purpose of revenge.

Hyuga and Aoba have their own character analogs. The Hyuga analog also resembles kensuke.

There is a teleconference scene in which the various representatives of the united world powers express displeasure with the organization controlling the jaegers (seele conference analog).

I could go on, but this is just what I remember off the top of my head. There were many more minor nods and references.

I leave it to you to decide: blatant plagiarism, or Del Toro is just as big an EVANGELION fan as us, and wanted to see a live action eva movie, but since it will never be made, he took it upon himself to make something as much like it as he could. Personally, I THANK HIM...

[FreakyFilmFan4ever]

I saw Guillermo del Toro's Pacific Rim in IMAX 3-D tonight. It was great seeing all of the aesthetics of the Ishirō Honda movies I watched growing up as a kid placed in a film with a more spectacularly used budget than The Avengers Movie and a script smarter and more immersive than anything else I've seen this summer.

It was totally a lot better than those quaint little movies Zach Snyder, Michael Bay, or Roland Emmerich make.

[chaosakita]

But I think the thing about Eva is that while the fights are pretty awesome (although I don't particularly care for them myself), all the robot stuff is mostly a way to explore the characters. I have a hard time imagining that would be the case for a major film like this. The reviews look decent though, so I might see it anyways.

[Kid]

Boy oh boy was I close to walking out on this movie. It is fine for PR to have similar things to Eva, but one scene I thought was going to push it too far

SPOILER: Show

As soon as the scientist said the kaiju DNA was identical I thought he was going to add "...it is also identical to our DNA"

[arkiel]

Del Toro made a lot of weird decisions there.

SPOILER: Show

We didn't see the brother die in the Drift, "Drift compatibility" is never really explained or has its rules observed, and creeper Pentecost has apparently been carrying around a little girl's shoe all this time.

The dialog was pretty bad; why didn't Pentecost tell you he was sick? Because you just showed up, assclown! If Pentecost raised Mako, why the fuck does she sound like an actress that doesn't know English being spoon-fed lines? Why doesn't she have that charming British accent? Etc., etc.

I think the whole thing would have been vastly improved if Mako had spoken absolutely no English. I'm of the opinion that English is probably the best language out there for any venture that implicates a multi-linguistic community, but seeing Raleigh switch from Japanese to English would have been much more impressive than watching Mako enunciate everything deliberately/obviously in English (or maybe not. Tone plays little role in the Japanese language, so making it sound 'right' in the mouth of a non-speaker could be vastly easier).

More thoughts as they come.

[Dr. Nick]

I do feel this salient point needs repeating: if Eva is the only mecha-related thing you've seen prior to PR, you're only going to spot the Eva shout-outs and miss everything else.

the eva launch sequence (sans the bullet drive to the surface. In fact they KINDA did that, but in reverse, as the head portion of "Jypsy Danger" drops down a rail system to land on the main body before locking in place.)

Hi there.

[gains.cwa]

I've seen it twice in preview screenings already and I'm going back again this weekend to give them my money.

Trying not to spoil, I'll write about it generally.

It's got some visuals from Eva but it's really not complicated enough to be an Eva story. Like most of Del Toro's work, the actual plot is straightforward so it's the world-building that gets the details. There's no time for deep characterization. Mako's flashbacks were affective and had me feeling for her but I never connected to her like I would to an Eva pilot. It is a passionate film but with simpler emotions.

The Jaegers and Kaiju . . . Just amazing. There are visual cues to Eva here but they encompass mecha from numerous anime and American cartoons. Gypsy Danger has the profile of The Iron Giant but Striker Eureka is more Gundam in style. The most Eva looking one, Coyote Tango, the Japanese model, only appears in grainy flashback. The Chinese Crimson Typhoon is a cross between an Invid Shock Trooper and Maximillian from The Black Hole. The Kaiju avoid Toho licensed monster appearances but there are some Gamera references and even a bruiser that moves like King Kong. And seeing them fight is titanic. They move quickly but never lose the sense of weight you'd expect from a machine hundreds of feet tall.

I highly recommend seeing it, and soon.

Besides, you don't want Grown-Ups 2 to take the box office weekend do you?

[SEELE-01]

Ok, then Del Toro may be a closet fan of Evangelion and he put all those references there but he can't say so because he previously said that he didn't wanted PR to look like anything done before in mecha anime...

[Blue Monday]

More thoughts as they come.

SPOILER: Show

Didn't the early "script" that was floating around have Mako's character speak only in Japanese? Doing a whole language barrier thingy between her and Raleigh's character, overcoming it through the Drift?

That probably could've been a lot more interesting, I guess. But whatever.

Also, when the Gypsy Danger deployed the sword for the first time against Otachi, someone in the cinema chimed "Well, why didn't they just do that in the first place?"



Those blades are straight-up Category 4 killers, man.

[KnightmareX13]

just came back from seeing it.
eva ripoff: no
There were some parts that did remind me of Eva but as a whole the movie would be like trying to but a round peg in a square hole. The fact is that most of anything has already been done so in any work you are likely to see stuff that will be similar to previous works

[Gendo'sPapa]

I was fist pumping my way through the whole movie. It's my favorite movie of the year so far! Not that it's been a good year so far but whatever. When they pulled out the sword I couldn't get any more excited!

It's no Eva but it certainly makes a Live Action Evangelion more pointless than ever.

[FreakyFilmFan4ever]

It's no Eva but it certainly makes a Live Action Evangelion more pointless than ever.

True. But it also might make it more trending now than ever in Hollywood. Can you imagine if this movie inspires Hollywood to make a ton of unimaginative live-action films for Gundum, Eva, or any other "giant mecha" anime out there?

I really hope this stays a one-shot deal. The movie didn't appear to be made with a sequel in mind, as everything wraps up so nicely in this movie that "Pacific Rim 2" would literally have to start from scratch in order to build its premise. But if that's the case the studio might have to look for other Japanese intellectual properties in order to make another movie with similar aesthetics and therefore a similar profit margin. This could include pulling a dumb move like getting the rights to Eva, Gundam, Big-O, or something like that.

I guess time will tell...