Here's What 'Pacific Rim 3' Might Have Looked Like - Collider
The Big Picture
- Pacific Rim had the potential to become a long-term saga, but it never reached the same level of success as major sci-fi franchises like Star Wars or Star Trek.
- Plans for Pacific Rim 3 were in place, with hints at the return of original characters, but the mixed box office results of Pacific Rim: Uprising prevented the franchise from continuing.
- The underwhelming response to Uprising and the decline of monster movie blockbusters made it unlikely that a third Pacific Rim would ever be realized.
Being a 17-year-old film nerd when Pacific Rim was first hitting theaters in July 2013 was such an exciting moment. Not only was director Guillermo del Toro returning with a new feature after five years, but this was a property that belonged to my generation. Pacific Rim was an original property, not a rehash of an older superhero, TV show, or toy. Jaegers, Kaiju, Hannibal Chau, they all had the potential to be terms that belonged to my generation the same way words like Klingons and DeLorean had such special significance for previous eras of sci-fi geeks. Watching the posters and trailers for Pacific Rim, teenage me was stoked at the possibility of a new long-term saga beginning that could go on into my young adult life.
A decade later, the potential of Pacific Rim as a new Star Wars for 2010s kids never quite panned out. Though the film itself was a terrific burst of imaginative fun, it only spawned a subpar 2018 sequel (Pacific Rim: Uprising) and one Netflix anime program. That's a far cry from the endless comics, sequels, and TV shows that Star Wars and Star Trek are still spinning decades after their respective stories began. Pacific Rim, for good and for ill, is now destined to become a cult curiosity for folks of my generation rather than an ongoing sci-fi saga that spans countless movies. Even with all the franchise potential that made 17-year-old me so stoked in 2013 unrealized, though, there are still crumbs of what could've been. Over the years, a handful of details about what a Pacific Rim 3 could've looked like have emerged, giving die-hard devotees to this universe a chance to imagine what another trip to The Breach could've looked like.
The Earliest Talks of 'Pacific Rim 3'
In December 2012, seven months before Pacific Rim hit theaters, one of the film's screenwriters, Travis Beacham was hired to write a script for Pacific Rim 2. Right away, the film's primary financier, Legendary Pictures, was envisioning grand plans for this Guillermo del Toro movie to kick off a massive franchise even before audiences got a taste of the inaugural film. But studios rarely plan to just create one sequel to a lucrative movie — they want a whole mess of follow-ups. Two years later, in October 2014, del Toro confirmed that Pacific Rim 2 was being written with a potential third installment in mind. At the time, del Toro said that characters introduced in the second installment would become even more important in Pacific Rim 3 while this later entry would pick right up from the plot of Pacific Rim 2.
However, the mixed box office results for the original Pacific Rim always made getting that first sequel, let alone a second follow-up, off the ground a risky proposal. By the end of 2015, the inevitable bad news dropped that Pacific Rim 2 had been shelved. Eventually, a new incarnation of a Pacific Rim sequel was green-lit, with Steven S. DeKnight in the director's chair. This project would eventually get the name Pacific Rim: Uprising and DeKnight's public comments on the production revealed that a third Pacific Rim was on the horizon. There had already been tons of discussions about the future of this franchise, which had molded DeKnight's approach to Uprising's ending.
That ending comes shortly into the credits of Pacific Rim: Uprising and depicts human scientist Newt (Charlie Day), whose mind has become possessed by the alien race known as the Precursors, tied up by the film's human heroes. Uprising protagonist Jake Pentecost (John Boyega) walks into the room and speaks to Newt. Pentecost tells Newt to let the Precursors know that the humans are preparing to invade the home of these otherworldly foes. While the first two Pacific Rim movies saw alien beasties wrecking shop on Earth, the plan now for the future of the franchise was to have human heroes like Pentecost travel to an alien world and dish out justice there.
This credit scene made it clear there were some concrete plans in place for a third Pacific Rim, and those ambitions could've even included the return of the original Pacific Rim's protagonist. Though Charlie Hunnam's Raleigh Becket was MIA in Uprising (save for Pentecost name-dropping him during a heroic speech), DeKnight confirmed in an interview that a potential Pacific Rim could've included the character. Of course, this and other specific ideas for Pacific Rim 3 were all contingent on one thing: Pacific Rim: Uprising becoming successful enough to justify the franchise's continued existence.
Why Didn't 'Pacific Rim 3' Happen?
Of course, that kind of box office success never came. Pacific Rim: Uprising's $290 million worldwide box office haul was down considerably from the already worrisome $411 million global gross of the first Pacific Rim. Combined with the mixed fan response to this sequel, there was no way another sequel was going to be viewed as a viable option by Legendary Pictures executives. The project would be shelved for the time being and all whispers of Pacific Rim being an important franchise to Legendary began to dwindle down. It didn't help that Pacific Rim's initial international box office success in 2013 was largely driven by China's box office, a market that's proven more difficult for Hollywood productions to thrive in recently. Making sequels geared heavily towards that marketplace like Pacific Rim installments is no longer financially viable.
Meanwhile, the erratic box office track record of big blockbuster monster movies in the years following Pacific Rim: Uprising has further diluted the idea of doing further entries in this saga. While the first Meg and Godzilla vs. Kong did solid numbers, Godzilla: King of the Monsters was a flop, and Meg 2: The Trench failed to make much of a splash. It's doubtful a third Pacific Rim, now removed by an entire decade (at least) from the hype of the original feature, would avoid being one of the underperformers in this subgenre. Plus, Legendary now has so many other big franchises to look after, like the Dune movies or even Pokemon: Detective Pikachu follow-ups. Back in 2013, the studio was ramping up its in-house production efforts and needed Pacific Rim to be its go-to franchise. Now that a new modern take on Arrakis has proven lucrative for Legendary, it doesn't need Kaiju and Jaegers as it did years ago.
It also didn't help that audiences just weren't as enamored with the characters of Uprising, who were supposed to be the central focus of the franchise going forward, as they were with the lead figures of the first Pacific Rim. While Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi) cosplayers can still be occasionally spotted at comic conventions, good luck finding anyone who remembers that Scott Eastwood was in Uprising, let alone any discernible traits about his character. With audiences proving indifferent to the first big expansion of the Pacific Rim universe, a third installment was put on ice.
A Third 'Pacific Rim' Will Never Be Realized
Yesterday's greatest ambitions for the future have a habit of becoming tomorrow's foggiest memories. Life is such an unpredictable experience, a reality that's just as true for everyday people as it is for big movie franchises. In 2013, the creative team behind Pacific Rim had grand hopes of turning this homage to classic monster films into something that could sustain stories for years to come. As late as 2014, Guillermo del Toro was still talking openly about the fact that this particular motion picture would stretch on into a third movie. Years later, those plans never came to fruition. Even del Toro's initial notions for what Pacific Rim: Uprising would've looked like never came to be.
Seeing all this potential for Pacific Rim 3 and the underwhelming creative results for Pacific Rim: Uprising is a bittersweet experience for somebody who adored the initial Pacific Rim. All that potential for a grand universe of kooky sci-fi mayhem that could belong to my generation never came to pass. Still, even if the concept of Pacific Rim 3 is now a reminder of what never was, there's also something comforting to be found in looking back on the comments on this unrealized sequel. del Toro clearly had so much passion and imagination for this fictional universe that it couldn't be contained in one movie or even just a solitary sequel.
A potential third Pacific Rim wasn't a reflection of a cash grab but rather del Toro's love for this domain of robots punching monsters. Plus, there's something to be said for how the prospect of an entire Pacific Rim saga made 17-year-old me feel so excited. In the middle of all the often overwhelming chaos of High School, I could find some solace in imagining what other stories might exist one day in the realm of Pacific Rim universe. Even if those prospects for subsequent installments never panned out, there was such joy in being a teenager and being excited by this blank canvas of a saga that could go anywhere. Considering the unrealized Pacific Rim 3 can be a frustrating experience, but it can also be a pleasantly wistful reminder of all those thrilling hopes for the future now frozen in the past.
Comments
Post a Comment