Pacific Rim Uprising - 環太平洋2:起義時刻

Pacific Rim Uprising (環太平洋2:起義時刻) is an 2018 film. The movie stars John Boyega, Scott Eastwood, Cailee Spaeny, and Jing Tian. The film is the sequel to the original film Pacific Rim.

10 years after the events of the Kaiju, the earth has fallen into a sense of peace that it hasn't experienced in years. However, the peace is disturbed when the Kaiju figure out a way back to earth. The forces of earth are not prepared to take on the new challenge as the troupes are not as well trained and not battle ready. Can they survive? Who will emerge as the new heroes?

This film takes the campiness of the first film and embraces it. Men are macho and the women are even more so. With teenage angst and father abandonment issues aside, the pilots need to get their act together and drift. However, the conflicts of the first film resolved, this generation in this film are just very inexperienced.

I however would not recommend this film if you didn't at least enjoy the first. This installment assumes you've already seen the first movie.

47 Ronin - 浪人47

47 Ronin (浪人47) is an 2013 film. The movie stars Keanu Reeves. The supporting cast include Hiroyuki Sanada, Kou Shibasaki, Tadanobu Asano, and Rinko Kikuchi. The movie is based on a old Japanese legend of the same name.

A "half-breed" boy, Kai, is found running through the forest and found by the local warlord. Taken in as a servant, he befriends the warlords only child and daughter, Mika. Kai is basically subjected to all sorts of mis treatment for his status. When the warlord is "killed", his samurai become masterless, thus Ronin. They seek revenge against Lord Kira. Because Kira has a witch as her assistant, Kai is brought in for his expert knowledge of witchcraft and how to combat it. They set out an elaborate plan to take out Kira and avenge their fallen lord.



Pretty simple story. Should be an easy sell. Looks of swords, action, and revenge storyline. BUT it was very hard to watch this. I've watched my fair share of samurai movie through the years out of Japan. This movie's cast was made up of mainly Japanese (from Japan), but the director was not. The screenplay, etc. was not. It was a "western" staff that hired a mostly "eastern" staff. And the movie felt that way. Over emphasizing "honor" and "duty" all the way to the climax. Over playing the half breed aspect. So, in the end, it felt awkward watching this. However, when the action takes over, the action wins. You don't care, you just watch the action. But when the story comes back into focus, its a mud field to get through.

I can't really recommend this. Even though many of the actors named above are some of my favorites. However, seeing Kou again made me want to re-watch Battle Royale again.

Pacific Rim - 環太平洋

Pacific Rim (環太平洋) is an 2013 film. The movie stars Charlie Hunnam, Idris Elba, and Rinko Kikuchi. The supporting cast include Charlie Day, Robert Kazinsky, and Ron Perlman. The movie is set slightly in the future with most of it taking place around the year 2025.



In the near future, alien creatures have come to earth from the bottom of the ocean and attacked the lands. When the attack first happened, the world joined together to create huge man helmed robots called the Jaeger. The nickname given to the alien creatures was Kaiju. Most of this was explained via newscast style. Fast forward a few years and the Jaeger program has matured and helmed by two people that can access one side of the brain to pilot the Jaegers. The pilots have to slip into dream state that allows them to access each others memories. Once connected, they can pilot the robots. However, the Kaijus grew stronger and attacks more frequent. Jaegar casualties started to increase and the world order decided to build a wall to keep out the Kaijus. Which only 4 Kaiju's left, they were retired to a base near Hong Kong. All the while, a pair of scientist decided to research the Kaijus and found out a way to destroy them. Well the pilots in fighting and the world order prevent the Jaegers from saving the world?



This movie was non-stop action. From the start to the finish. Sprinkled with some human angst storyline, you get the sense that this dog and pony show was only going to win on luck. Luckily, lady luck was on their side. The story was straight foward and sorta a glorified Power Rangers storyline. Big monsters attack land cities, marital arts big robots come to the rescue.



I enjoyed it enjoy to give a watch one recommendation. I would probably leave it on if came on regular tv. Background fodder approved for sure.

Assault Girls

Assault Girls is a 2009 film out of Japan. The movie stars Meisa Kuroki, Rinko Kikuchi, Hinako Saeki, and Yoshikatsu Fujiki. This film is has a lot of special effects and requires you to understand video games, specifically, hit points and experience points.

In the future, humans can join a virtual world called Avalon. In the game, they track these giant earth worms, hunt them down, destroy them, and gain experience points. At first the four main protagonist are in single player mode and hunt the worms alone. But the main computer tells them that they should team up to gain even more experience points and move up to the next level.

The movie is in English while they are in game mode. They would revert to Japanese if they talked to each other outside of the game. So, I didn't understand those parts. The movie was advertised as in English. When they spoke in English, the subs were in Japanese.

So, I can't say I completely understand the movie.

The movie was visually stunning. But the plot and story was weird to say the least. And it ran for about only 1 hour.

I would skip this unless you really want to check out the visuals.