Going to cut out this part of @lj-writes comment to my meta because I might be going off on a tangent and I hate derailing, even my own posts.
Also, I went back and listened to John’s narration as Jake, and noticed something weird in the opening sentences. So my first impression was that the narration was supposed to go like this:
You’re absolutely right, it changes the everything completely. And there’s something else interesting in this light.
Because the speech goes on: “And the war we thought was finished, is just beginning” and while Jake says this, we cut back to the scene with child!Amara where civilians and helicopters of unknown affiliation are being attacked by the Jaegers and we see a Jaeger fire a group of missiles that seems to hit a military looking person.
There’s obviously more than one war going on here. There was a war between the Kaiju and the humans, but that’s not the only war we see here.
And then there’s Jake speech to the Jaeger pilots a little later:
“It doesn’t matter where you come from. Who believed in you and who didn’t. This is our time, our chance, to make a difference. Now let’s get it done.”
Okay, again. It could be your average inspirational speech before going to fight the Kaiju, that’s entirely possible, but with above in mind and the fact that the group we so briefly see looks a bit like a group of misfits, I’m again wondering if we’re seeing a bunch of idealists going rogue with their Jaegers. And taking them not just against the Kaiju, but against those who would use them against humanity.
It is also worth nothing in this context that it is after this point that we see all but one of the Jaeger vs Jaeger fights.
And then there’s the Kaiju themselves. In the first movie we were pretty much told that they were mindless monsters, end of story. But this time we’re told that they’re more intelligent than first assumed. And one of the scientists from the first movie communicated with them.
Makes me again wonder, who is going to be the real bad guy in the movie. If they’re going to reverse expectations, or if we’re going to maybe see two?
Yup, from the sheer amount of Jaeger vs. Jaeger fighting in the trailer it’s clear that conflict between humans is a major part of the film. It would be boring tbh if the fighting were all against kaiju, since there was sort of an entire movie about that already.
And regarding the part of the narration you mentioned, what if the “war we thought was finished” ISN’T the kaiju war, at least at first? As you point out, we hear this narration as we watch fighting between humans. What if the war Jake refers to is a conflict between states that the world thought was over with when the existential threat to humanity intervened, but flared up again after the kaiju war ended–this time with giant robots?
Also, what if the new kaiju threat is related to this human war? It always bothered me that the kaiju simply showing up again years later seemed like an invalidation of Stacker’s sacrifice. What if one of the parties involved in the wars decided to open a rift to bring the kaiju BACK to attack/destroy an enemy? (It was a major plot point in PacRim 1 that humans found a way to get into kaiju heads, after all.) Or it could be a Watchmen kind of deal where another idealist, this one twisted and ruthless, sincerely believes a new kaiju threat is the only way to stop war between humans. This way the two plot threads of interhuman and interspecies conflict would cohere together and not be a random pile of events.
Ever since we got the teaser trailer for Pacific Rim Uprising and I got some “semi creepy propaganda” vibes of it and its promotion of the Jaeger program, I’ve been wondering what the Jaeger program turned into post the First Kaiju war. And with the trailer released I’m wondering even more.
Because the Jaegers and the Jaeger program aren’t phrased as a good here – they’re literally called “the monsters we created” and it’s Jake who’s talking here – but as a necessary evil to fight a greater and more destructive evil.
I’m wondering if the Jaegers were used to keep a fearful populace in check? If Jake saw where it all was headed even before the end of the first war and that that is why he left the program? If he had a falling out with his father and sister about it? And if that’s why he got caught up in the criminal underworld which might be the only “free” place left?
Of course, with the Kaiju back in force the Jaegers are once more a very necessary evil and Jake decides for his own reasons to join up again to help.
A few more thoughts after watching the trailer again.
This would go a way to explain Amara, that 15 yo Jaeger hacker that’s in the movie. Why would someone hack a Jaeger?
Okay I know it’s common human nature for some to try and break into stuff where they shouldn’t be, not out of malice but just to see if they can. But on the other hand, it might indicate that some humans anyway seems to need/want protection from the Jaegers.
And then there’s the opening scene where we see said hacker standing in the middle of what looks like a Jaeger attack, but there seems to be no Kaiju around. It looks more like the Jaegers attacking ordinary humans. Then a bit later we see Jake get off something (a helicopter carrier?) along with the 15 yo girl. So she’s with him, and by extension probably part of that criminal underworld mentioned in the synopsis.
Holy shit, I think you’re on to something! You’re right that we don’t see kaiju in the opening of the trailer. In fact, look at what a Jaeger is doing in the background here:
It’s smashing an aircraft, not fighting Kaiju. This is either Jaegers being used in warfare or in some kind of civilian repression, and I’m guessing the latter because this is clearly an urban area and not a battlefield.
Also, I went back and listened to John’s narration as Jake, and noticed something weird in the opening sentences. So my first impression was that the narration was supposed to go like this:
“We were born into a world at war between the monsters that destroyed our cities and the monsters we created to stop them. We thought we had sacrificed enough.”
Which would be straightforward, right? There was a war between the Kaiju and Jaegers, a war that caused untold loss.
But that reading is strange on a couple of levels. For one thing, the war wasn’t between Kaiju and Jaegers, it was between the Kaiju and humans. It would be like saying World War 2 was between Japan and nuclear bombs, it doesn’t fit. For another, that first sentence, “We were born into a world at war” sounds like a complete sentence and the next part, “between the monsters…” reads like the beginning of a new sentence.
So what if the narration actually reads like this?
“We were born into a world at war. Between the monsters that destroyed our cities and the monsters we created to stop them, we thought we had sacrificed enough.”
Completely changes the meaning, doesn’t it? It gets rid of the awkwardness of putting Jaegers, which are weapons of war, in the position of a party to the war. It also sounds closer to my ears to how John is reading the words.
Most significantly, this reading presents the Jaegers as an evil or at the very least a tremendous drain that demanded sacrifices–of expenses and resources, for a start, but what if there was more? Civil liberties? Human lives?
There’s more evidence that Jaegers are being used in conflicts between human groups. There’s the scene of missiles flying in from behind Jaegers to hit some kind of command center, and since when do Kaiju shoot missiles? Those are clearly of human make.
And of course, since those in power make the rules, the “criminal underworld” may simply be people trying to live away from the police state’s control and outlawed for that reason. This possibility helps me feel a lot better about the whole criminal angle, because I really was not looking forward to the prospect of Jake being some unruly delinquent that Mako has to talk into doing the right thing.
If the Jaeger program did go bad, it’s likely to be after 2025 when the events of Pacific Rim took place, since the program was being shut down in the early to mid 2020s and wasn’t in a position of power. Since Stacker died in 2025 before the Jaeger program was diverted Jake’s fallout is unlikely to have been with him, at least over this particular issue.
The period after 2025 and Stacker Pentecost’s death would be a perfect time for the rot to set in. There would be the enormous political capital from the awe toward Jaegers and pilots, the surplus military hardware available at a time of peace (from the Kaiju, anyway), and the militaristic mindset of preparing for the next war through “unity” which would really be thinly-veiled code for obedience and suppression of dissent. All this would set the stage for the countries in the Pan Pacific Defense Corps to turn against each other and/or their own populations.
Assuming Jake had moral objections to the direction the Jaeger program was taking he’d have all the more reason to get off the grid into the underground. Much like Mako, he’s a child of Stacker Pentecost and a perfect pawn for propaganda. If he wants no part in that he’d have to go into hiding because repressive police states are not known for taking kindly to rejection.
Not every villain, not every time, and certainly not to everyone at once, but there should be moments. We should, occasionally, be able to see ourselves in the bad guys, be able to understand how they got there.
Because it reminds us not to fucking go there.
Antis who get upset about villains having relatable qualities (often couched as being “romanticized” or “woobified”) are people who cannot bear to ever think of themselves as having the capability of being wrong.
Every human alive is capable of being a horrible person. Relatable villains remind us to keep an eye on that shit.
Yes, this, all of it.
OP is confusing the terms relatable and understandable. Relatable means establishing a SYMPATHETIC connection to the character and frankly I don’t think anyone wants that to mass murderers and committers of genocide.
It doesn’t seem like that to me! I think that “relatable” is meant to imply sharing certain recognizable traits with the villain, obvs not the murder if you’re meant to learn from this, jesus, but having these characteristics be able to let you see that this is a person that went wrong in a way that could be possible for you, rather than just a monster that there’s no way of becoming with bad choices and reactions. Understanding that you need to work to not be a bad person is important,, and instilled through relating to bad people’s flaws or nature while not becoming one.
Since fandom just loves using dictionary definitions, let me participate in that. From Merriam-Webster
especially :able to be shown or established to have a causal or logical connection to something
Some of these linguistic simplifications are directly relatable to the loss of certain language functions …
—William A. Foley
2) US :able to be related to: like, or have sympathy for because of similarities to oneself or one’s own experiences
a movie featuring strong but relatable characters
(Emphasis mine)
What you’re describing is understandable characters, so you’re as confused as OP.
If you want to relate to killers and genocide committer be my guest, but kindly fuck off from my blog and my presence forever. I do not want you near me.
Oh ew. Wtf is wrong with people that they think we should like and have sympathy for murderers and genocidaires? And it doesn’t stop at fiction, either–witness the dedicated fandoms surrounding actual serial killers and nazis. I just.
reylos remain the creatively and narratively most boring, uncreative group of people I have had the misfortune to know of. they have so little clue about how to make a character conflict in anyone who isn’t a straight, white man, I constantly suffer massive second hand embarrassment just from having to see those so called metas
Saaaame. As a fellow writer of obsessive long-ass fannish essays I feel positively insulted by what canon Reylos churn out. No that is not how you logic- that screenshot doesn’t support what you just- HAVE YOU SEEN THIS MOVIE?
That’s not even going into their issues with racism and antisemitism. It haunts me that the massively antisemitic reylo meta on Reddit that completely ignores Finn’ s existence and assumes Kylo Ren is the hero went pretty much unchallenged.
Oh dear, if it was only their analytical abilities that was a mess. I’ve seen enough bad analysis in academia through my life that I’ve build up a certain tolerance for it. I’d still snark about it though.
Nah, it’s their complete inabilities to build, or see the possibility in building, a character progression for anyone that doesn’t center around Kylo. Like someone wrote a 1k+ of… idek what the term for this is because meta barely applies, of why ReySky would mean that Rey’s character would have to remain static throughout TLJ.
Of course, ReySky almost certainly means that Rey’s feelings for Kylo remains more or less static, or takes a negative turn in TLJ and that’s all that really matters to this crowd. So I’m not surprised at all.
I’m more amused that they think Rey has any chance of developing romantic feelings for Kyle if they’re not related. What kind of toxic heteronormative bullshit…
reylos remain the creatively and narratively most boring, uncreative group of people I have had the misfortune to know of. they have so little clue about how to make a character conflict in anyone who isn’t a straight, white man, I constantly suffer massive second hand embarrassment just from having to see those so called metas
Saaaame. As a fellow writer of obsessive long-ass fannish essays I feel positively insulted by what canon Reylos churn out. No that is not how you logic- that screenshot doesn’t support what you just- HAVE YOU SEEN THIS MOVIE?
That’s not even going into their issues with racism and antisemitism. It haunts me that the massively antisemitic reylo meta on Reddit that completely ignores Finn’ s existence and assumes Kylo Ren is the hero went pretty much unchallenged.
L.J.'s Obsessions 