Pacific Rim: Uprising

Pacific Rim: Uprising follows Jake Pentecost (John Boyega), son of Stacker Pentecost, who left the Jaeger program a few years before his father's death, but is now forced back into the program. This is the second Pacific Rim film, but I wouldn't be surprised if there are more to come.

If you have not seen the first movie, that's ok. There is a quick recap of it in the first few minutes of this sequel. I have seen the first, and it was good, but I wasn't totally in love with it. I know this goes against most guy's opinions. Seriously, every guy I know that has seen Pacific Rim loved it. I personally felt like it was another transformers movie with a twist (and without the eye candy, Shia I love you!). Those guys that loved the first movie, do not like this sequel. They say that it is not enough alien (Kaiju) action and the whole first hour is just ok. I, on the other hand, completely disagree.

I really enjoyed Uprising. I don't need aliens attacking every five seconds to find enjoyment in a film. I guess the lack of alien attacks bores some, but not me. I felt like there was a great build-up to the aliens in this film and that when they showed up it was adding to the enjoyment and excitement. I liked how they showed advancement in the program, and how the Jaeger program was becoming more Transformers-esque. In this movie, Liwen Shao (Tian Jing), has been working to create Jaegers that are controlled by humans from a long distance. Basically robots. The humans would not be inside the Jaegers, but would instead control them and fight from a distance.

My main problem with the whole movie is that the plotline doesn't add up with the first movie. I do not remember any mention of Jake Pentecost before Uprising. Jake tells us that he left the Jaeger program a couple years before the great Kaiju battle and that he was working alongside Nate Lambert (Scott Eastwood) before he left. How is that possible when Nate Lambert left the program after the death of his brother? Nate worked with his brother in the program up until his brother died and then he left and didn't come back until the original Pacific Rim movie, when Stacker Pentecost brought him back. Jake's story doesn't fit in here, and that bothers me. I can understand wanting to make a sequel (seems like there's a lot of them lately), but you cannot make a sequel by recreating the storyline. That's not how this works. That's not how any of this works.

Overall, I liked this movie, and all the guys that are disappointed can get over it. Honestly, the first Pacific Rim was boring. It received a 6.9 out of 10 on IMDb, and this sequel received a 6.1/10 simply because all those guys are sad they didn't get Kaiju attacks for 2 hours. Sorry guys, not every movie can be two full hours of battles. Wars get old fast...or haven't you noticed?