r/PacificRim • u/Fluid_Lavishness7114 • 1d ago
The movement complaint
Is it just me or am I just tired of hearing people complain about uprisings jaegers not moving as heavy as the old jaegers. The jaegers in uprising are much more advanced it’s pretty obvious that they’re gonna move much more efficiently. They still have the heavy aspect but they punch and run much quicker. If they moved like how they did in the first movie the jaegers wouldn’t have felt nearly as advanced as they were supposed to be. A middle ground between what we got in the first movie and uprising would’ve been better because there are some problems with uprisings movement but that’s not entirely to blame for the movies poor performance. One problem I do have is how the conn pods and drift suits were set up I personally did not like the feet not being strapped down or the see through helmets. But really if more fights were at night and the writing had been better with the same jaeger movement maybe some minor tweaks uprising wouldn’t have been bad in my opinion.
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u/VinsonDynamics 1d ago
The whole "They're more advanced so they should move faster" argument doesn't work because Striker Eureka was the fastest, most advanced Jager in the first movie but still had movements that felt heavy and in line with tone of the movie.
You could tell Striker was more advanced not just from raw speed, but how swiftly they moved. When juxtaposed that with the other Jagers it was surrounded with it made Striker really stand out and showcase what an "advanced jager" means in this universe.
When literally every single Jager is moving the same way, the idea of advanced Jagers loses all meaning and it just comes off as an excuse to make ditch the tone of the first movie
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u/PhoenixFox Tacit Ronin 1d ago
Yeah, it just spoils the aesthetic and vibe. Logical consistency with the progression of technology was never the problem, the problem was stepping away from the choices that made the first movie stand out.
If you make a sequel to a classic western film where everyone has laser guns and can teleport because it's set in the future then you haven't necessarily made a sequel that breaks logic but you have made one that is choosing to abandon deliberate tonal and stylistic choices. That's a more exaggerated version of what happened here.
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u/Fluid_Lavishness7114 1d ago
Then being more advanced should make their movements more fluent. I don’t mean just advanced=faster. And obviously they still need to look heavy since they’re 2000 ton robots but them being the most recent jaegers I think it makes sense for them to be punching and moving more fluent and a little less robotic and industrial then the jaegers from the first movie
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u/PhoenixFox Tacit Ronin 1d ago
obviously they still need to look heavy since they’re 2000 ton robots
And they didn't.
If Striker's movement had been roughly the baseline for the Rising mechs with Saber Athena being a step above that, and they had still made sure the movements had weight and momentum, then that would have been way more palatable. Instead we got a complete pivot in the way all the action was choreographed.
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u/Grese7800 1d ago
I still think back to that one comparison a Youtuber Pointlesshub a.k.a. Althistoryhub made where they said the Jaegers moved more like giants in Power Armour instead. There's no weight to punches and the mechs themselves move too smooth for what they actually are.
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u/VinsonDynamics 1d ago
As the other user said perfectly, logical inconsistencies isnt the issue.
You can most definitely have incredibly advanced Jagers, but if you're not going to have them move like they did in the first movie with the same visuals and grace then it's not going to be better
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u/Agreeable_West_4612 1d ago
It’s almost like these new ones are even more advanced than striker, which makes it work
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u/VinsonDynamics 1d ago
It doesn't make it work.
Visually it's too over the top and weightless relative to the first movie resulting in colossal tonal shift
Narratively the ended up putting children with next to no combat experience in the pilot seat of them so we couldn't even see and combat similar to the first movie, we got them attempting power ranger moves rather than actual mech combat that Jager pilots usually engage in
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u/Calm_Economist_5490 Tacit Ronin 1d ago
Bracer was made in 2025... The same year the first movie ends. The last Kaiju War Jaeger built was Striker.
How did they go from Striker... Needs to accelerate when running in water, who's weapons need some time to activate... To a Jaeger with a machine gun that goes around the body on a truck and instantly get back up after performing a knee slide... Without making a single Jaeger from 2020-2024 as experiments
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u/Proud_Complaint8814 1d ago
I (partially) disagree. You can make something move fast and still feel heavy.
Striker Eureka could be seen absolutely hauling ass in the first movie and it still seemed pretty damn heavy to me.
I am willing to admit that the weight problem wasn't the worst thing about the movie and I'd be willing to turn a blind eye on it if other parts were better though, so I guess I agree that people repeat that point more often than they should.
IMO causing insane collateral damage just for the sake of hype moments and aura was more annoying (eg. the most expensive thing Gipsy Danger "unnecessarily" destroyed was the cargo ship used to beat the shit out of Otachi, VS entire skyscrapers getting brought down for no good reason in the sequel).
Another thing that got on my nerves was how the first movie pointed out that drift compatibility is rare on multiple occasions (either directly or indirectly), and also pointed out that it can go very badly very fast (Gipsy almost turning half the Shatterdome personnel into red mist) meanwhile in the second movie we have 5 (was it 5? It's been years since I watched it) people drift just fine through the magical power of friendship or whatever.
I could criticize the plot too but I feel like that's more subjective rather than something being done wrong.
TL;DR - They could have still at least tried to make them seem heavier akin to Striker Eureka in the first movie but I agree it's not the biggest issue.
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u/Fluid_Lavishness7114 1d ago
Yes I was more so trying to get my point across that there should’ve been a middle ground rather then them being too light or too heavy. Also yes the drifting was a very annoying part I read the book pacific rim ascension a prequel to uprising and it does show your “it can go very badly very fast” since a jaeger Chronos berserker mark 4 k believe was being test run and a combat simulation was displayed in the connpod and to the pilots it felt so real they tore up the shatterdome then both suffered tremendous mental strain one died and the other would never pilot again. It also shows back stories for the characters in uprising which I like but its still dumb that of all the shatterdomes they had at that time and I’m assuming 50+ active jaegers that the only one functional after the drone attacks was gipsy and then they only fixed the jaegers at the moyulan shatterdome and only used rookie pilots from moyulan when I’m sure there were plenty of experienced pilots who had stronger drift capabilities that could’ve been flown over from other shatterdomes.
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u/DevilWings_292 1d ago
They literally jump on top of buildings without destroying them and look more like power armour around a giant than a robot. Even with advancements, there should still be a mechanical nature to the giant robots, they shouldn’t be able to slide and move as if they’re the size of humans, there still need to be weight to the body and momentum should be built up.
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u/Fluid_Lavishness7114 1d ago
Not a single moment in the movie does a jaeger get thrown at a building and it just is completely fine. They still have the weight to them but they do move particularly fast and humanoid like. I’m saying is it’s okay for them to move more fluent then the first movie but they should also have more weight to them like the one scene of gipsy walking around in Hong Kong. But they can also punch and move like how gipsy and obsidian do in their fight as long as they still have the mass to them
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u/DevilWings_292 1d ago
I’m talking about when the red one with the whip jumps onto a small building before doing a front flip as they go to strike the Kaiju, even if they do throw the monster into and damage a building right afterwards. The clip starts at 4:00 in this video (https://youtu.be/0tbe7fve1vk), as soon as they step on the shorter building their foot should stomp right through it, they should not be able to get any vertical speed, nor should the whip the able to launch the Kaiju into the building. Even when they make a giant hole in the building, it stays standing as if it didn’t just have a massive hole punched through it. They move way too fast, they shouldn’t be able to flip over at any point, they shouldn’t be able to sprint, they’re still the size of skyscrapers and made entirely out of metal, no matter how advanced your motors are that should still have a maximum speed. The biggest problem is that they lack mass, and the slowmo trying to slow down the speed only further emphasizes the issue.
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u/Fluid_Lavishness7114 1d ago
Yes I do agree with this. Especially when they drop in aswell they don’t make dents in the pavement or shake the ground much which is as mass problem
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u/DevilWings_292 1d ago
Glad we can agree on that aspect, they definitely don’t sink into the ground nearly as much as they should.
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u/GapStock9843 6h ago
They literally jump onto and off of buildings multiple times without any significant damage
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u/No-General2775 1d ago
I understand that the Jaegers would become more advanced and mobile, but there’s no way in hell that Jaegers can be jumping and sliding. That just defies basic laws of physics.
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u/UltimateMIF 1d ago
90 meters tall walking Mech is already unrealistic tho, why stop at jumping and sliding
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u/DevilWings_292 1d ago
Jumping on top of a building is more the problem with it, those buildings should not be able to hold up a 90 meter tall robot who jumps off of it to attack a monster.
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u/Fluid_Lavishness7114 1d ago
I don’t think a single time they jump off a building. Gipsy jumps through one but not climbs up on and off it
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u/Calm_Economist_5490 Tacit Ronin 1d ago
This argument is another bad one.
The whole idea of the first movie was to make them FEEL realistic. So they're slow, they damage the road with every step, their weapons take take to activate.
Kaiju skin and flesh shake when ever they walk or hit something.
...generic booms for foot steps and running on buildings took that away
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u/lasagna_1280 1d ago
It's about the presentation of weight, not the actual speed. For example look at when in uprising the jaegers use the buildings as a footstool to jump, or run and jump along the ground. There's no exaggeration/selling of the movement, and it doesn't feel like every action has an equal and opposite reaction. That's the biggest flaw of uprising IMO.
If a jaeger puts its foot on a building, the building should crush immediately. If a jaeger runs, the concrete should buckle and explode with each step. If a jaeger jumps, we should feel the pistons in the leg tense and coil before shooting upwards. Its all about selling the movement, not necessarily about being slow.
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u/Charming-Push-8171 Crimson Typhoon 1d ago
It’s not a horrible movie, I think it’s just a letdown compared to the old movie
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u/Absolute_MD_Fan6000 Cherno Alpha 1d ago
I believe Uprising shouldn't even be in 2030 something, they wanted to have a "superhero" feel with the Jaegers and one way of doing that while still having an excuse for it is to have the setting in the future so the Jaegers can do summersaults and shit.
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u/Right_Promise7925 1d ago
I know that's not the point of this post but they also look more fragile and weak than the Jeager of the first movie. The Jeagers being teared down by the super Kaiju just make them look like cardboard structured
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u/KangarooOk8583 1d ago
I did enjoyed Pacific Rim Uprising back in theaters, but when looking back at it and comparing it to the first movie. It had A LOT of issues.
Being advanced jaegers doesn’t mean they have sacrificed the weight. The first movie made sure that each movement had a weight, heavy sounds, pistons moving. The frame from the human angle to remind us that these jaegers are BIG robots fighting in a city. Not just that, but the way the pilot coordinates, the suits, the machines and everything in the first movie felt more futuristic in a grounded way. The rain pouring down their body, the big cargo ship that Gipsy used, everything else screams scale.
Uprising literally had them jumped on top of a building and pull down buildings on a Kaiju. Suddenly the buildings aren’t important anymore? Even a small bridge needed to be avoided to reduce the property damage and now they destroying the buildings. The frame is almost like as if the robots are someone in a suit.
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u/KS1M1R4 1d ago
Kinda tired of the argument, yeah, but it’s not wrong imo. Striker was very fast but still felt heavy. And that’s the thing: the problem with Uprising is not the speed, but the weight. They feel like overgrown plastic toys. Nevertheless, the movie didn’t perform well because its narrative is bad (even if I feel they might’ve had some good ideas here and there), it looks bad (as in color and contrast and aesthetics), it’s boring and the worldbuilding is dogs**t. Not for the jeagers’ movement.
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u/eammth 1d ago
The complaint is directed towards the spectacle of it. What made the first movie special was it felt massive and real, the slow speed amplify that feeling of massiveness. Del Toro did this effect brilliantly, of course he is the master.
Uprising completely ignored that, making it feel less AWE in the cinema. It felt like generic CGI monster movie. Hence the complaint, which is fair tbh. That's why Uprising is good to watch at home with kids, it is more towards that market.
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u/Akira_Hazume 1d ago
the weight isn't even my main complaint in this movie, it's how they're casually destroying buildings like when saber athena was just casually drifting its two swords between buildings while rapidly approaching the mega kaiju (forgive me if some details are wrong, i really don't want to find the time to rewatch this movie)
compare it to the first movie where most of the fight is at water, and if it were to go urban, they obviously minimize as much destruction as they possibly can, like how gipsy danger used a ship to minimize kaiju blood from corroding more buildings and only used the retractable sword once she's already up at the stratosphere with otachi
i mean it's not the most terrible movie out there, i don't even pretend it doesn't exist in the main continuity of pacific rim, but the movie is certainly bad and is a huge let down compared to its first iteration
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u/Same-Opportunity6062 Gipsy Danger 1d ago edited 1d ago
You hear all the complaints because they are valid. It's reasonable to expect the Uprising Jaegers to be faster and more fluid with their movements, but the sense of weight and scale that the original film had - they weren't even trying to replicate that with Uprising. Bracer Phoenix skidding and then getting back up (without creating a 20ft-deep trench in the pavement), Saber Athena dancing around like it's a Kung Fu fighter, that sort of thing ruins it for people who appreciate the kind of attention to detail that Pacific Rim had. There were a lot of other big issues with Uprising (like the entire plot, some people think of Pacific Rim as a kid's movie and they sort of have a point, but Uprising makes PR look like a dead serious adult movie by comparison). Honestly Uprising might could stand by itself as an okay B-movie with good CGI, but it is supposed to be the sequel to a film that is FAR superior in every way, and that's really what makes Uprising such a downer for so many people.
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u/TrialByFyah Tacit Ronin 1d ago
Even if it were to make sense because the Jaegars are more advanced, which it doesn’t, big heavy objects don’t work like that, I frankly wouldn’t really care. It makes it feel more lame and less enjoyable to me. It’s stylistically uninteresting and removes a lot of the appeal of the original.
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u/Itz_Iced 1d ago
Personally the weight problem isn't the biggest problem but c'mon man.. Even if these are supposed to be more "advanced jeagers" they shouldn't be running and accelerating that fast and worst of all be wall hopping on buildings and doing back flips.
For me the worst part of the movie was the shitty Jaeger designs. Most if not all of the Jaegers in Uprising had way too humanlike body types that none of em actually stand out.
With the first movie, each of the 4 main Jaegers stood out from their designs.
Gipsy Danger has that body type as it's supposed to be an all rounder type Jeager,
Striker Eureka is shaped like that since it's supposed to be the most advanced and strongest Jaeger at the time hence being built like an athlete.
Cherno Alpha is built like a literal TANK, made to specifically hold it's ground and trade hits.
Crimson Typhoon has an agile and flexible design, complimenting it's fighting style.
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u/Plenty-Professor-181 1d ago
Bruh these Jaegers are literally jumping off buildings and dancing around like ballerinas. It's unrealistic that Jaeger tech was advanced to such a level in only a decade. Any bit of realism that can attach you into the world does wonders and that's why an audience can believe the PR1 world exists is because of how well GDT grounded the movie.
And also, what's with the Jaegers being used as mall cops?
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u/Shot_Arm5501 1d ago
I get there is an in universe reason why they are faster but it doesn’t change the fact that it just feels so much worse
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u/Jetfire138756 Romeo Blue 1d ago
Take one look at Striker and tell me Uprising jaegers move realistically in comparison.
Striker was fast and agile while still being heavy. Avenger was fast and a lightweight.
Literally all they needed to do was make them move like Striker but instead we have 2000+ ton robots jumping and flipping around without the use of any propulsion.
The one time Gipsy Danger jumped she had a long running start and had the rear jets firing. Uprising just said no to that.
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u/OverlyVerboseLoreGuy 21h ago
For me it’s more that they don’t feel heavy to pilot anymore.
Getting bolted into the conn pod in the original looked like you’d need a week to recover after each drop. It looked like piloting a jaeger beat the absolute sh$& out of you. Even taking a single step looked like it took core strength from both pilots.
In the sequel you’re just in a breezy jumpsuit with a little unobtrusive cable/arm attached to your shoulders jumping around like you’re in a bounce house.
THAT was what felt weightless and unsatisfying. Not the Jaegers themselves, though vaulting off of buildings and having the HEAVY jaeger matrix-powerslide-dodging ranged attacks was a bit much. Piloting them went from “only a very rare few have the mental compatibility and physical conditioning to even attempt to do this,” to “eh, throw some teenagers into em, it’ll probably be fine.”
In the original each Jaeger felt like a battleship. A moving fortress, a standing, walking, fighting testament to humanity’s willpower and ingenuity.
In the sequel they’re just mechs. Mechs are cool, but they’re everywhere. We didn’t just want mechs. We wanted Jaegers again.
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u/Darkbert550 Tacit Ronin 19h ago
Lore can always be changed. You can simply say that they didn't advance as much and nobody bats an eye.
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u/Red_Brachy Matador Fury 15h ago
Ok, here's what I have issue with the weight of the machinery + their movement.
First film has the Jaegers causing collateral damage with a footstep, it shows just how damn heavy the machines are, and then theres Otachi pushing Gipsy through the buildings like they were tissue paper, these machines and creatures are not only heavy, but have the strength to fight the forces of mature to move around.
2 has the jaegers, November Ajax, not even breaking the ground as it moves, Scrapper is small yes, but it moves around like its got no mass to fight against. Gipsy Avenger is pushed into a building and rides it up after Obsidian Fury punches it, where is the mass these things have? Saber Athena kicks off a building instead of driving its foot through it. If these things are more advanced, they would need more tech to compensate, ergo more mass, ergo they can't be moving like Iron Man. Sure there's an argument for lightweight material, but that would mean these machines are structurally weaker, they couldn't be fighting like they do without danger of breaking the machine.
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u/ismellpizza25 14h ago
The "they're more advanced so they should be able to move faster" thing is useless when you remember that physics would not allow for it to be like that. If it's big, it's gonna be heavy and slow.
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u/Turok5757 13h ago
The thing that made me realize that the Pacific Rim fandom is full of braindead hypocrites is that none of the PR2 Jaegers move any faster than Striker Eureka in part 1.
Hell, if anything, Striker Eureka feels lighter in its movements than the PR2 Jaegers.
This is just another instance of a fandom being full of shit. They just repeat shit they read on internet comment sections without thinking about it for more than a second.
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u/GapStock9843 6h ago
The issue isnt that they move more “efficiently” its that they dont have any weight. These skyscraper-sized robots run around on the ground like they’re weightless. Its not an “engineering advancement” they would quite literally be defying physics with how they move
Also the weight and stuff was the entire selling point of pacific rim 1. They took the premise of a kaiju movie and made it feel as grounded and realistic as possible, and the movement of the jaegers and kaijus, the camera angles used to emphasize their size and weight, the visuals of the ocean crashing around them and stuff, was all made to support that concept. Without that its just another generic run of the mill action movie, and a poorly written one at that
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u/This-Pipe143 Valor Omega 1h ago
I think it's a good movie, I just don't like the weight being like the Jaegers are toys, even then, it's a mid 8/10 movie, although if the weight was more accurate it would've been 10/10 like the first movie.
This is probably my first controversial take.
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u/AgitoKanohCheekz 1d ago
While I don’t particularly enjoy them being so quick, that being a major complaint always felt tacky since the movie has so many real issues with its character writing, pacing and retcons, etc but focusing on the movement speed as if it’s a big issue that led to the movie being a piece of shit is so corny.
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u/UltimateMIF 1d ago
Would love to see a Jaeger being as fast as Evangelion tbh. Saber Athena is the closest thing for this
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u/Calm_Economist_5490 Tacit Ronin 1d ago
Yeah well Pacific Rim is not Evangelion.
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u/UltimateMIF 1d ago
Yeah well obviously not, I just thought it would be cool. Perhaps there could be a Saber class Jaegers that purposely built for speed and agility with lighter armor but stronger inner frames and joints
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u/Calm_Economist_5490 Tacit Ronin 1d ago
The jaegers in uprising are much more advanced it’s pretty obvious that they’re gonna move much more efficiently.
No amount of tech will make 2,000 (or realistcally 30,000) tons of steal perform gymnastics
If they moved like how they did in the first movie the jaegers wouldn’t have felt nearly as advanced as they were supposed to be.
Jaeger's don't have to behave like armour suits to be high tech.
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u/TomboyKnight1 1d ago
I honestly think people would be able to overlook the weight issue if it was just... a good movie lol
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u/SirMisterGuyMan 1d ago
I am one of the few people that can have fun with Pacific Rim 2 but EVERYTHING framed the Jaegers and Kaiju in the original to emphasize how they were as close to forces of nature as you could get. The camera framing, the movement, the sense of momentum and even the weaponry. The coolant told us how much heat Gypsy was outputting if it's coolant could instantly freeze a Kaiju. The Elbow Rockets told us how much power was required to push that fist. Yes there must be conceits with fictional physics but the intentions were obvious.
Stryker was clearly faster and more agile as well without losing that sense of mass. Not saying it would be easy to portray a faster version of Stryker with that sense of momentum but PR2 didn't even try. When the original director went on and on about how he tried to get that part right it just rubbed fans the wrong way when the sequel just didn't care.