THE LOST WORLD: JURASSIC PARK & JURASSIC PARK III - Jurassic Park 25th Anniversary Retrospective | PART 2

Part 2 - Life finds a Way

THE LOST WORLD: JURASSIC PARK

(May 23, 1997)

Because of the success of Jurassic Park, Speilberg immediately wanted to do a sequel. Michael Crichton was also asked by fans to write another book. Although he was initially hesitant to produce a continuation to his first novel, he eventually managed to work out an idea.
In 1995, the novel titled "The Lost World" was published. The film adaptation began production a year later. This time, Crichton had no involvement in the film whatsoever, preferring to let Spielberg do his own sequel to the film version of Jurassic Park.
Like before, the film deviates a bit from the book's plot and dark tone. 

It's revealed that a second island was used to manufacture and raise dinosaurs before they were moved to the original park. John Hammond sends a team of people to the island in order to document and observe the dinosaurs in their natural habitat so he can convince the world that the island needs to be left alone.
However, this is complicated by the fact that a team of hunters has also been sent to the island to capture dinosaurs and bring them back to a different theme park in San Francisco.
Eventually, both teams (referred to as Hunters and Gatherers by Spielberg) end up colliding with each other and have to survive the island together.

Aside from Richard Attenborough returning as Hammond, the only main character to return from the last movie is Ian Malcolm, played again by Jeff Goldblum. Goldblum is once again great in the role. He's no longer the wise cracker from the previous film, his experiences on the island have clearly affected him. The other characters are a bit of a mixed bag. The Gatherers are all pretty good, Vince Vaughn is especially entertaining to watch. The Hunters however are pretty much there to be eaten and not that interesting, with the exception of the character of Roland (Pete Postlethwaite), a Captain Ahab type determined to hunt a Tyrannosaur.
Ariana Richards and Joseph Mazzello have brief cameos in the film as Lex and Tim. One character in particular has drawn up some criticism, Kelly (Vanessa Lee Chester), Malcolm's daughter. Many folks wonder how she can be Malcolm's daughter, being that she's African-American. It's not that hard to figure out, remember this exchange from the last movie:
Grant: You got any kids?
Malcolm: Me? Oh, hell yeah, three. I love kids. Anything at all can and does happen. Same with wives, for that matter.
Grant: You're married?
Malcolm: Occasionally. Yeah, I'm always on the lookout for a future ex-Mrs. Malcolm.

And then there's this line from The Lost World:

Malcom: I'm not the one who dumped you here and split for Paris so don't take it out on me. 

How can people not connect the dots or draw their own conclusions? And as for that gymnastics scene? At least she did something that contributed to the action and saved her father!

Of course the dinosaurs in the first movie were amazing, but for The Lost World, it was clear that the production team had to up the ante. A few new species were introduced such as the Stegosaurus, Pachyephalosaurus, Parasaurolophus and the Compsagnathus. And even some returning creatures, including a pack of Velociraptors, 2 Adult Tyrannosaurs as well as an infant one.
The animatronics, puppets and CGI are once again top notch, giving us some of the most tense, scary and downright thrilling sequences. The Lost World even manages to include scenes from Michael Crichton's first novel, including the scene on the beach where the little girl is attacked by the Compy's as well as using one characters death for another character in the film involving the little green critters.

While The Lost World serves as a sequel to the first film, it's also a semi-remake of the 1925 silent film 'The Lost World', which was based on a novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. And nowhere is that more evident than in the climax. The 1925 film ends with explorers to an island of Dinosaurs bringing back a Brontosaurus back to London, only for it to escape and go on a rampage.
But this film ends with a Tyrannosaur being brought back to San Diego, only for it to escape and go on a rampage. This is the highlight of the film for me. We even get to see the it eat David Keopp, the man who wrote the screenplay and is listed in the cast as "Unlucky Bastard".
(I can't make that up!)

Everyone knew that Jurassic Park was going to be a tough act to follow, given how insanely popular it ended up being. As of now, there are 2 groups of people: Those that despise this movie for having bland characters, dumb plot elements and not living up to the original at all, and those that genuinely love the movie who are able to overlook, admittedly minor nitpicks and enjoy an adventure just as exciting as the last film.
Me? I'm in the latter category. Every time I watch this movie I find new things to like about it, I just recently got a Max Steiner vibe when listening to John William's score while watching the movie for this retrospective. As a reminder, Steiner scored the original King Kong. Even small things like the way the T-Rex scratches its neck while it walks through a neighborhood are character details that I appreciate.
I'll always like 'The Lost World: Jurassic Park' as the kid who was obsessed with Dinosaurs and had a lot of the toys from the movie (and sadly lost/broke all of them), and as the adult I am now who still appreciates it.  

JURASSIC PARK III 

(July 18, 2001)

'The Lost World: Jurassic Park' was a huge success and a sequel was all but guaranteed. But the process of trying to get a script and plot outline was a bit of a mess and there wouldn't actually be a finished script during the filming.
As fate would have it, Steven Spielberg was busy with other projects and was unable to direct the film. Although he was able to serve as executive producer, Joe Johnston was chosen to be the director.
There would be no third Jurassic Park novel by Michael Crichton. Like the last movie though, JP3 would incorporate scenes found from the last 2 books into the film.
But did it all work out in the end? Well...Kinda.

Alan Grant (Sam Neill)returns to the series, coerced into joining a couple (William H. Macy & Tea Leoni) who want to fly to Isla Sorna, the island from the previous film, to serve as their guide. Unbeknownst to him, the couple are secretly looking for their son who got stranded on the island after a parasailing incident. From there, they end up on the island where they are pursued by the inhabitants and typical Jurassic Park shenanigans ensue.

Reactions to Jurassic Park III range from mixed to negative. And it's not hard to see why.

The talking Raptor in the plane is dumb. Most of the characters are boring and Amanda Kirby is probably the worst character in the whole series. You thought Lex's screaming was bad? Fay Wray would probably kick Amanda's ass while telling her to shut up. The fact that Grant and Ellie didn't end up together is a major disappointment. 
And now, we need to talk about the Spinosaurus. Now don't get me wrong, I like the Spinosaurus and I think it's a pretty cool dinosaur. It's just the way they used it to kill a T-Rex. It feels a tad disrespectful to kill off a beloved icon of the series, just to introduce a new bigger, badder predator. And the worst part is that it was done partially out of spite, the Paleontologist who helped with the production of the last Jurassic Park's is not a big T-Rex fan and wants you to think that the animal was primarily a scavenger instead of a hunter, even though there is plenty of evidence to suggest otherwise.

The first 2 movies ran just over 2 hours, but the third one only runs about an hour and a half. I feel like this ties into the fact that the script wasn't even done during filming. It feels more like I'm watching a Sci-Fi original movie. (Well, one that actually put in a BIT of effort).

Now that's what I don't like about the movie.
Truth be told, there's a lot to like about this movie. The special effects are still on point, I like the redesign of the Raptors, there are some really good action pieces and Sam Neill is easily the best actor in the movie.
I also like the look of Isla Sorna in this movie, instead of a lush jungle we're in a more misty dark area this time. The setting adds to the tension.
And then there's the birdcage scene. The movies have been teasing the presence of Pteranodon's for a while and now we finally get to see them in action. The whole scene is great.

While Jurassic Park III is objectively the worst movie of the series, I don't feel comfortable calling it that because I don't hate this movie. I will say that it is my least favorite of the series. Whenever I have myself a Jurassic marathon, I don't feel disappointed or hesitant to watch it. It's nowhere near as bad as sequels like Speed 2, Batman and Robin or Son of the Mask. It's just an OK movie and OK is better than awful.

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.

So long...

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JURASSIC PARK - Jurassic Park 25th Anniversary Retrospective | PART 1

In coming up for idea's for new types of posts to do for this blog, I have a considerable list of retrospectives I wish to do. One of them was for the Jurassic Park series and with this year being the 25th Anniversary of the original film and 'Fallen Kingdom' coming out soon, I figure now is the perfect time to do so.
So ladies and gentlemen, without any further ado...

Part 1 - Welcome to Jurassic Park

JURASSIC PARK
(June 11, 1993) - June 11

Some people may not be aware of the fact that Jurassic Park began it's life as a novel. It all started with an idea by Michael Crichton, he conceived an idea of Dinosaurs being brought back to life through genetic engineering and put into a theme park for everyone to see. It may sound ludicrous, but hey, the MIT guys Crichton spoke to seemed to support it.
This rousing adventure and cautionary tale would end up becoming a best seller, but before it ended up being published, Crichton told one of his friends about it and he become adamant about wanting to make a movie based on Crichton's story. That friends name was Steven Spielberg.

Crichton himself would help to write the initial screenplay, which would then be revised by David Koepp. It ended up being very different from the novel. Some might say it's bad to deviate from the novel, because most movies based on books that change a ton of stuff NEVER go on to be classics, am I right? The novel was very dark, detailing a ton of violent and disturbing sequences. It's hard to say weather or not it would have become the major success it ended up being if it had kept to it's source material.
The basic story outline remains the same: Scientists are able to bring dinosaurs back to life and placed in a theme park/zoo on a remote island. The man behind the whole project, John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) is pressured by his lawyer to bring in experts to verify the safety of the park after a previous incident. He invites 2 paleontologist, Alan Grant (Sam Neil) and Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), Chaotician, Ian Malcom (Jeff Goldblum) as well as his grandchildren (Ariana Richards and Joseph Mazzello) to go on a sneak peek tour. But the park security systems shut down, the dinosaurs become loose on the island and they must try to survive.

Before 1993, if you were to ask someone what the greatest Dinosaur movie was, you'd probably get the answer of 1925's The Lost World, One Million Years BC or even the immortal 1977 classic: The Last Dinosaur with Richard Boone.
Needless to say, Jurassic Park knocks them all at least 3 miles out of the ballpark. And it's not hard to see why.

Jurassic Park has an all around great cast, every single performance in the movie feels natural. I believe Sam Neil is a credible Paleontologist, I buy Jeff Goldblum as a quirky, mathematician obsessed with Chaos Theory and I get a lot of joy out of seeing Richard Attenborough excited at the prospect of the park he's created and I also feel bad when I see him realizing it's all falling apart.
Even the kids are great. They can be annoying at parts, between Tim's fanboying over Grant and Lex's screaming (Even Fay Wray would tell her to calm down). But it doesn't last for very long.

We've come a long way from seeing Dinosaurs portrayed as stop-motion puppets or super imposed lizards with fins spirit glued to their backs.The Academy Award winning visual effects of Jurassic Park are the stuff of legends, flawlessly combining practical animatronics and new computer generated imagery. You've probably heard the names Stan Winston (Animatronics), Dennis Muren (CGI), Phil Tippett (Dinosaur Supervisor) and Michael Lantieri (On Set Effects) before.
The main idea was not to see Dinosaurs portrayed as typical movie monsters but more as actual animals and the production team spared no expense (lol) in getting the best of the best in the business to work on the project. 
Even Paleontologist, Jack Horner was brought on to make sure that the Dinosaurs were brought to life on screen as accurately as possible.
It really is amazing to see the results of their labor. When Alan Grant says "It's...it's a Dinosaur!", that reaction pretty much mirrored everyone's reaction to seeing that Brachiosaurus for the first time. If you get a chance, I highly recommend picking this movie up on Blu-ray just to watch the bonus material. I mean, I can't be the one to give away all this movies secrets.

And do I even need to mention the iconic score? John Williams created a score that really emphasizes the awe, wonder and terror of what you see. It's just incredible.

I watched this movie all the time as a kid. Being a big Dinosaur lover already, I fell in love with this movie. I've probably watched it so many times, I'm sure I could recite certain whole scenes on command when asked to. I, like many others was amazed by it and scared by it. 
Spawning sequels, a ton of merchandise, theme park attractions and even a "Weird Al" Yankovic parody song, Jurassic Park continues to be a cinematic marvel, revered by critics and audiences alike. It's appeal doesn't appear to be going extinct anytime soon.

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.

So long...

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RAMPAGE (2018) | Gryphon's First Impressions

I feel sorry for kids today, because they will never know the joy of actually playing games at an arcade. Classics like Area 51, Revolution X, too many Racing games to count and of course, Rampage!

Yeah, it'd be hard for me not to play a game where you get to be a monster completely destroying city after city.
When I heard they were going to be making a film adaptation, my face morphed into it's skeptic position. Do you remember the original story of the Rampage arcade game? It's about Humans who were turned into monsters by experimentation, the whole thing was very tongue in cheek and you wanna try and make a serious big budget movie about that? Then I heard that it would star Dwayne Johnson and immediately I knew what kind of movie it would be.

The story itself was changed, but also simplified. The monsters start out as normal animals mutated by a pathogen. I'm guessing George was changed to an albino Gorilla to avoid being compared to Kong and Lizzie was made to be a Crocodile to avoid the wrath of the lawyers at Toho. And Ralph is still just a Wolf, because how many other giant Wolves do you know of? Yep, just a regular normal Wolf...with Porcupine quills...and Flying Squirrel flaps.
Huh, that's weird. But at least he looks cool, right Kaiju Kidd?

As I said before, Dwayne Johnson is in the movie and he's the character you expect him to be, wise cracking and overly manly. He's actually the reason my Mom wanted to see this movie, she loves Dwayne Johnson and will pretty much watch any movie with him in it, even a freakin' monster movie! But he does a really good job in his role and I really believe the connection between him and George, it can be very heartfelt and really funny at times.

The rest of the cast do a very good job in their roles, but if you wanna see the most over the top, scenery chewing, cartoony villain's in an action movie, go see Rampage.

As far as the monster effects go, Weta Digital once again do a good job. Ralph and Lizzie are entirely digital characters, while George is a motion capture performance by Jason Liles. Liles does an outstanding job of giving George a wide variety of emotions, I could really feel when George was happy, sad, enraged or being a snarky little a-hole.

As of this review, Jason Liles has been announced as one of the actors doing motion capture work for King Ghidorah in 2019's Godzilla: King of the Monsters. I am so on board!

There is one thing you need to know about this movie, it is what it needed to be: Big, dumb and loud. Like I said, the original Rampage games aren't meant to be taken that seriously and this movie fully embraces the silliness of the concept. I feel people were expecting WAY too much from Rampage, y'all do realize monster movies are meant to be fun right? Not all of them have to be serious, award winning masterpieces.
So if you have even a small interest in Rampage, do yourself a favor: Go out and see it for what it is, a good time. And don't think about it too hard, you'll just scramble your brain.

Besides, it's far better than any movie that uwe bole would crap out.
-mic drop-

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.

So long...

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ROBOT SPIRITS OBSIDIAN FURY, SABER ATHENA & GUARDIAN BRAVO | FIGURE REVIEW

The first 3 Robot Spirits Jaeger's from Tamashii Nations were pretty cool figures, but can the next batch be just as good if not better?

Let's start with the rogue Jaeger, Obsidian Fury.
Obsidian Fury has a nice, sleek design. It looks a lot like a Football player, with the huge chest and very broad shoulder pads. The entire body has a very muscular design which is sculpted very well, and the back has a very prominent spine.

Obviously, the majority of the body is painted black. But the extra detailing and panel lines still stand out pretty good. The visor on the other hand is a bit hard to see. It's supposed to be a bright orange, unfortunately the coloring is a bit dull. It's a clear plastic piece that I feel could've been enhanced by some extra paint.

Next up we get one of the more unique looking Jaeger designs to come from 'Uprising', Saber Athena.
Next to Lady Avenger, Saber Athena is one of my favorite  Jaegers from the new movie. I just love her design, a mix of grace and elegance with ferocity and strength.

It's also nice to see another Jaeger with a more dynamic color scheme. Although, if you've seen clips of Uprising with Saber Athena, you'll see some black paint on the wings which the figure does not have.
The silver compliments the figure nicely and Saber's eyes as well as the PPDC logo's are nicely painted on.

I like all the wing like paneling on Saber's arms and legs. Along with the big wings on the back and the booster rocket, this Jaeger looks like it was designed to be fast.

Guardian Bravo is the third and last Jaeger released by Tamashii Nations so far. Off the bat, I love Guardian Bravo's color scheme! The red, white, grey and black look great together, highlight a bit of the finer details and really helps this Jaeger stand out from the rest.
It looks similar to Ratchet from the original G1 Transformers. (That's the only serious comparison between Pacific Rim and Transformers I will ever make).

The most detail on this Jaeger has to be on the back. Specifically the workings on and below the jet pack.

There's one little detail that looks really odd to me. The head overall looks good, but it looks like there's a mouth sculpted into the head.

Articulation remains mostly similar from the past Jaegers, but all have slight differences.

While all are capable of extending their arms out and moving forward/backward, full rotation is impossible.

With all the Jaeger figures, their heads can move forward but full head rotation has also been tricky or difficult. Saber's head on the other hand can turn all the way freely.
Saber's wings can move up, down, inward and outward.

Let's get to the accessories.

Yes, open hands. Moving on to the cool stuff.

Obsidian Fury comes with 2 Plasma Chainsaw's. Both of them look great and the way they attach to the arms is pretty neat too.

You have to remove the arm panels on both sides, place the Chainsaw pieces into the arms and place the arm panels back on top. It really looks like it's coming out of Obsidian's arms and I love that.


Saber Athena actually comes out of the box with open hands attached. Her alternate hands are actually closed for holding things.
What things you ask? Freakin' SWORDS!

Saber comes with 2 small Plasma Swords and 1 big Plasma Sword. All three of which look really nice and can be placed in the hands easily.

Guardian Bravo also has 2 hands for holding 2 Arc Whips.

The Whips do look nice, but they are made of really soft plastic which is bendable but does not stay in place. That also makes placing it in the hands a bit of a hassle, I'm always afraid I'm gonna bend and break it when placing them. Best advice I can give on that is take it easy.

Unfortunately, Guardian Bravo does not come with any pieces for his arm guns. I would have really loved to see that. I'd bet that the Diamond Select figures would have it

And to answer your question of weather or not I will review any of the Diamond Select figures: I don't know.

The same scale applies to these Jaegers as well. Intersetingly, these 3 are all different heights. Obsidian Fury stands at 7.5 inches, making it the tallest of the Jaeger figures. Saber Athena is 6.5 inches and Guardian Bravo is the shortest of the figures at a little over 6 inches.

All in all, these are 3 great figures to add to the collection. It's nice to have all the main Jaegers featured in Pacific Rim Uprising. I wonder if Tamashii Nations will release figures for the other Jaegers featured in the film. I wouldn't mind having figures of November Ajax and Valor Omega. There has to be a Jaeger Drone figure in the line and a larger, more detailed Scrapper!

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.

So long...

If you would like to see more from The Gryphon's Lair, Be sure to give my Facebook page a 'LIKE' to see updates and other related stuff. Thanks for reading!

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SOFVI SPIRITS RAIJIN | Figure Review

In addition to the Jaegers, Tamashii Nations is also releasing Kaiju figures under their Sofvi Spirits branch.

(Sofvi = Soft Vinyl)

As of this review, only one Kaiju figure has been released, with 2 more on the way later in the year.

Today we are looking at the figure based on the Kaiju known as Raijin. Raijin himself is a great looking Kaiju.

His head has this fierce, venus flytrap looking outer mouth with rows of teeth and multiple eyes on each side. And it's inner face also has multiple eyes and teeth. But if you'll notice, the teeth on the lower jaw are individually sculpted, while the ones on the upper jaw are sculpted into the gums and painted individually, a practice that isn't exactly foreign to Bandai vinyl figures.
But while the lower teeth are painted on the outside, the inside remains the same color as the face. The same face color applies to the gums and the tongue.

And looking down the throat, you can see some blue paint to indicate the luminous inners of the Kaiju.

The body is mostly painted dark brown with some lighter brown air brushing on body and the limbs. The back of the head and tail however, are simply just brown.

The claws and nails are painted a dark brown color which looks great, on the front side anyway. The back of them remains unpainted and retains the same brown color of the body. The claw on the back of the foot (I think it's called a Dewclaw?) is also unpainted.

You know how most of the Kaiju have the luminescent lines all over thier bodies? Raijin...sort of does. They're there and are noticeable, I just feel there should have been more. Look at Raijin's belly and you'll see 2 of the lines are unevenly painted. Were there supposed to be more on the body?

Being a vinyl figure, there isn't much to Raijin in terms of articulation. The arms rotate and the legs move forward and backward, with full rotation hindered by the arms.
The wrists also appear to be twistable, but I would not recommend doing this. It can loosen it up and a piece of the arm blocks it's movement and trying to force movement could pop it off.

Raijin fits nicely in scale with the Robot Spirits Jaeger figures. He stands at 8.25 inches tall and 11.75 inches from head to tail, keep that in mind when trying to clear shelf space.

Aside from the mixed paint work, Raijin still looks pretty good and the sculpt and detail more than make up for that.
If your looking for a cool Kaiju figure to have on your shelf to go with other Kaiju or Jaeger figures, Raijin is a good choice to go with.
I will say though that $40 might be a bit too much for this figure, if you can find it at a better deal, then do go for it.

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.

So long...

If you would like to see more from The Gryphon's Lair, Be sure to give my Facebook page a 'LIKE' to see updates and other related stuff. Thanks for reading!

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Pacific Rim Uprising | Gryphon's First Impressions

This review has been edited from its original version. It has been reformatted for culturally sensitive reasons.

As much as I loved Pacific Rim, I would've been happy if there wasn't a sequel. I felt that the first film was a nice, self contained story that wrapped up nicely.
If there was going to be another movie, I would still go see it. I'm always up for movies like this.
And after much deliberation, a sequel was finally released.

I basically gushed over the first film and now the only question is: How does this one compare? Well, I figured I'd go over most of the same points I made in the last review.

THE STORY

This time, Guillermo Del Toro only serves as the producer for this film, Director duties were handed over to Steven S. DeKnight. DeKnight was previously a writer on shows like Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Smallville and Daredevil.
So going in, I knew that I probably wasn't going to get a deeper movie than the first one. So I just sat back, watch the movie and tried to appreciate it for what it was. And it was pretty good.

The story goes in pretty much the way I expected it to. With the Kaiju no longer around, Jaeger parts are being sold on the black market while other nations attempt to create their own Jaegers. The Pan Pacific Defense Corps still keeps a few of them handy on the off chance that the Kaiju should return, while a new company is creating Drone Jaegers.

And then the movie has a pretty ridiculous plot twist, and I mean that in a good way, it was a good twist in the way that I didn't see coming. The trailers would have you believe that this new Shao Corporation goes rogue and starts opening new drifts to unleash the Kaiju threat, but when you see that Newt Geiszler has been continually drifting with a leftover Kaiju brain, this is your first sign that something more sinister is afoot.

I went into this with as little expectations as possible. I had a feeling I wasn't going to get a movie as amazing as the first one, but for what I got, I was still impressed.

THE CHARACTERS
The only returning cast members are Rinko Kikuchi as Mako Mori, along with Charlie Day and Burn Gorman the scientists Newt Gieszler and Hermann Gottlieb.

The new cast includes John Boyega as Jake Pentecost, Boyega always makes an entertaining and charismatic lead. I also really loved the character Amara. For her first major film role, Cailee Spaeny did an excellent job.

Unfortunately, aside from them and maybe Scott Eastwood Jing Tian's characters, the rest of the cast aren't that memorable. Not only that, but to me, there seem to be too many side characters. I don't hate the Jaeger Cadets, I just felt like there were too many of them with not enough character development for me to really care about them.

With this many characters, it feels like 'Uprising' is trying to be a movie pilot for a Pacific Rim television series.
Actually...I wouldn't mind that at all.


THE JAEGERS/KAIJU

Uprising has a ton of awesome looking Jaeger designs, my favorites being Lady Avenger and Saber Athena.

And then there's Scrapper. I love Scrapper! I want a Scrapper, right now!
There are only 3 (technically 4) major Kaiju in Uprising and all of them are really cool.

And the fights between them are honestly the highlight of the entire film. If you go into this looking to watch giant robots and monsters fighting each other, The Shatterdome attack and the final showdown in Mega-Tokyo deliver in just the right way.

There is one thing I wanna bring up. I don't really get why people are complaining about how the Jaegers move too fast in this movie.
On the one hand, I kinda understand. Big machinery tends to move pretty slow and the Jaegers from the last movie were mostly lumbering giants.

On the other hand, it's been 10 years since the last movie. Don't you think Jaeger technology would have advanced beyond what the past ones were capable of? Also if you remember from the last movie, the Jaegers were mostly in the water. Things tend to move slowly in water anyway, and when we do see them on land, they move considerably faster.
Lastly, this is science fiction. Can we not just sit back and enjoy without thinking too hard about it?


THE MUSIC

Honestly, I don't remember much of the score from this movie. I'd have to wait until I get my hands on the soundtrack itself to fully make that judgment.
I do remember hearing the Pacific Rim theme from the first movie, slightly rescored, but still awesome.

I was worried at first because the trailers included this stupid hip hop song which did not fit the mood of the movie. While that song is not in the movie, there are still some hip hop and rap songs in the movie. Are they distracting? Yes, but unlike the trailer it doesn't get in the way of the more epic parts of the movie.
With the exception of one particular song that is played for humor during one big scene. I mean, it was funny, but it was still a pretty big WTF moment.

WILL THERE BE A THIRD ONE?

As we saw in the final scene, (that should have been placed in the middle of the credits) Uprising ends on a cliffhanger. It's implied that if there is a sequel, it will deal with the Jaeger pilots going to the Kaiju world (called the Anteverse) and bringing the battle to them.

It sounds like a good idea. But as we saw before, the first Pacific Rim wasn't exactly a box office hit until it reached international audiences.
As of right now, Uprising seems to be following the same path. The combined Domestic and Foreign gross has more than surpassed the films budget so a sequel is indeed possible.

In my opinion, Pacific Rim Uprising is nowhere near as amazing as the first one. But that DOES NOT make it a bad movie. It's still a pretty good follow up to the expanding Pacific Rim universe. I highly recommend it and I will continue to anticipate updates on the potential sequel.

Till next time, I have been your host Gryphon

and I hope you've enjoyed your time here in my lair.

So long...

If you would like to see more from The Gryphon's Lair, Be sure to give my Facebook page a 'LIKE' to see updates and other related stuff. Thanks for reading!

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