Tangent: Pacific Rim 2 Worries Me. It Worries Me Quite a Bit.

People who know me will tell you that I will forgive almost anything where giant robots are involved. I am an admitted fan of Battletech, Warmachine, and Warhammer 40,000. My second favorite anime is Big O. I play Terran in Starcraft. I supported the Kickstarter campaign for indie miniatures game Mechadrome for no other reason than that it involved robots. I saw all 4 Transformers films in theater, opening night, even though I knew the later 3 were going to be crap. I'm a firm believer that as long as you halfway give a shit about your product, it's hard to go wrong with giant robots. Which isn't to say that I'll give anything with giant robots a pass, sometimes no amount of heavy metal can polish a turd.

I'm looking at YOU, Robotech.

Needless to say, I loved Pacific Rim. The 2013 robot punch-fest was a pet project of amazingly awesome visionary director Guillermo del Toro. It is a fantastic example of everything that I love about the giant robot genre (I refuse to call it "mecha"). It's fight scenes pretty much kicked all of the ass, which quickly gained it a cult following. It managed to clear almost double its budget at the box office as well, which made it seem pretty likely that we would see a sequel. 

Del Toro has spent a significant amount of time and money fighting for that sequel, but it seemed like the film was going nowhere fast. Legendary Pictures and Universal Studios were going through a rough patch so, despite del Toro's best efforts, the film was stuck in development hell. Imagine my joy when they announced that the movie was finally going forward. Imagine my horror when I learned that Guillermo del Toro had been kicked off of the project.

That's right, they decided that a film that really only succeeded because it was the product of a visionary director could succeed without that vision. Not only that, but they have decided to throw out del Toro's script in favor of one penned by Prometheus scribe John Spaihts, because that movie wasn't a giant turd. Del Toro and co-writer Travis Beacham are going to be credited for having created the characters, and that's that.

Admittedly, to say that del Toro was "kicked off" the project is a little dramatic. He is still going to be one of the films producers. How much influence he'll actually have, though, will be in question. I'm going to try and remain optimistic, but it's hard to believe that sequel will retain the charm of the original without its creator at the helm. 

I guess all I can do for now is follow Guillermo's advice: Dream of Kaujus and Mecha.