thechaosgods

[thechaosgods]

Well, does running a PacRim DND campaign on the day the war ends count?

Oh, hey. Next January (2025) is when Pacific Rim canonically takes place. We should do something for that or something.

[thechaosgods]

so since the russians washed back on shore and stuff their robot is still destroyed so they’ll need to raise a new one from scratch

yea you fuckin heard me

[thechaosgods]

[thechaosgods]

The nice thing about disagreeing with people on the internet is that you can just block them and their shit opinions without ever having to interact with them!

[thechaosgods]

(Image Source: Tales From Year Zero)

#pacific rim #pacific rim lore

[thechaosgods]

"It's a movie about togetherness. It's a movie about connecting. It's a movie about trust, trusting each other, because we are all inside the same robot. ... The neural load of moving a machine that size is not something one person can handle. So these two pilots need to connect through memories and they will see the worst of each other and the best of each other. And they have to trust each other."

-Guillermo del Toro on the themes of Pacific Rim, Pacific Rim DVD commentary

[thechaosgods]

"Stop trying to cheer me up!" this is such a Newmann line omg

Thanks for the prompt! :) This time we’ll do this one with Hermann saying it! Here is sick!Hermann and Newt’s attempts at comforting. ( sorry if I’m spamming you all with these prompt fills today!)

“Do you want soup?”

Hermann sighed. “No.”

“How about some water?”

Another sigh. “No.”

“Okay, um…how about your meds, have you taken those? Or I could pick you up some flu medicine…”

One final sigh, but this time an exasperated, “Newton!” followed it. Hermann pinched the bridge of his nose and Newt felt guilty for stressing the guy out even more.

Keep reading

[thechaosgods]

Links to Pacific Rim creator Travis Beacham's own posts on drift compatibility and drifting

Drift compatibility is psychological, not genetic

The better you know someone, the more likely you are to be drift compatible

Drift compatibility is potential, not fate

Drift compatibility can be a choice

Friendship is the foundation of drift compatibility

The drift requires trust

Trust is fundamental; also drift compatibility can be determined with anything that tests how well you can anticipate each others' moves

That even includes multiplayer video games

Many cadets wash out during Pons training when secrets come out in the drift and shatter their relationships

A lot of pilots get messed up by flinching over sexual thoughts

Trying to avoid thoughts just makes them worse

Not everything you see in the drift is always real; also the way to deal with thoughts is just let them flow by

Pilots communicate through "headspace"

Illustration of a conversation in headspace

First drifts can be very confusing, because partners don't understand each others' minds very well yet

The drift exposes pilots to each others' raw, unfiltered thoughts

Raleigh knew what Yancy was going to say

The drift doesn't let you read your partner's mind like a database, and you may not necessarily understand what you see. Also when Pentecost says he carries nothing into the drift he means he's calm and stable.

Pentecost gained this calmness through meditation

Trying to block your partner from your mind will make you lose control of the Jaeger

Pilots who fall below 90% sync will be in trouble

General information plus info on RABITs

You can chase your partner's RABIT

Another post confirming you can chase your partner's RABIT

More RABIT info

More general information

Travis Beacham defines ghost drifting

Partners' personalities can rub off on each other

Neural overload doesn't hit you all at once; it accumulates

The time a pilot can go solo varies, and it's a steep curve from fine to dead

More info on solo piloting

Being high in the drift probably makes it harder to avoid chasing the RABIT

#pacific rim #pacific rim lore

[thechaosgods]

"I will concede that [Mako Mori] doesn't act like a decisive alpha male action hero. I don't much like that guy." - Travis Beacham, Twitter

"I don't like movies where we are only responding to WASP ideals of military superiority and ballistics superiority and we only win by the quality of our weapons. I don't like that, and I try to transmit in the film that we are going to win by all of us doing the best we can." - Guillermo del Toro, Pacific Rim DVD commentary

"I carefully avoided the car commercial aesthetics or the army recruitment video aesthetics. I avoided making a movie about an army with ranks. I avoided making any kind of message that says war is good. We have enough firepower in the world." - Guillermo del Toro, Pacific Rim’s Guillermo del Toro is a monster-loving pacifist

[thechaosgods]

Pacific Rim was great because they showed the government representatives for like two seconds and then the rest of the movie was about the common people becoming extraordinary in the face of extinction.

Selfish rich people build walls to keep the world out, but the ones with the courage to go out there to fight, reclaim and perish for their lands are the orphans who lost everything to war, the fathers that want their children to have a future, the kids that want their parents to get old, the soldiers that won't abandon the people and would disobey any orders demanding them to do so, the lovers who would rather die fighting beside each other, the siblings who won't dishonor their home, the weirdos, the outcasts, the has-beens, the broken, the obsessed. The ones who know that the planet and its people are worth dying for and are not afraid to lose all they have to keep humanity safe.

Pacific Rim completely erases the ones in power in favor of bowing to the courage of the people in the streets...

[thechaosgods]

JAEGERCON INTERVIEWS - GUILLERMO DEL TORO.

ONE LAST SURPRISE FOR YOU ALL, THE MAN HIMSELF!

1. If you were a Jaeger pilot, which Jaeger would you choose and who would you want as your co-pilot? - Question By Gabriëlle

Del Toro: CHERNO ALPHA and I would want my wife or Ron Perlman as co-pilot.  They both know all my weaknesses and flaws.

2. Did you keep anything as a souvenir from the shoot or if you didn’t, what would you want to keep? - Question By Libertinem

Del Toro: I kept several things:  concept models, concept paintings, drawings, props- like Mako’s red shoe, one of Hannibal’s shoes, the “spine” connective hardware, a Russian helmet etc

  3. What, for you, was the best or most memorable off-screen moment while you were working on the film? - Question By Star

Del Toro: The WHOLE shoot was like that. This is the film I have enjoyed the most. I was full of joy and working hard!

4. So many reviews and commentaries have pointed out how Pacific Rim sparks a Saturday morning cartoon-flavored glee. Do any of you have favorite childhood shows, stories, or movies that this experience reminded you of? - Question By ThisNewDevilry

Del Toro: Of course! That was the WHOLE point of the film-  to be a time machine for those that want to go back to that time- I did- and to go back to my Tetsujin-28-Go days or my Ultra days (Ultraman or Ultraseven) or Space Giants or many many others!  I am grateful for the adults that jumped in and were able to go back in time with it but I am even happier about the kids that saw it.  This film and the Hellboy films are meant for new generations of monster / mecha fans and not meant to be nostalgia exercises.

  5. What do you think it is about Pacific Rim that made it gain such a dedicated fanbase in such a short amount of time, instead of simply fading away like so many other blockbusters do after their initial release? - Question By nerdy-newton

Del Toro: The repeat viewing factor has been insane. I have never- and I mean, never- received so many emails and notes and phone calls from people just saying how much they loved it and how they had seen it up to 6 times the first weekend. Outside of the USA is the same thing- people that connect with it go over and over again.

6. Is there anything that just didn’t make it into the movie that you really wish had been there? Any little bit of backstory or piece of dialogue or visual or anything like that?

Del Toro: I removed about 45 minutes of story / plot. I wanted to keep the film under 2 hours if possible. As it is, it sits at roughly 2:02 plus credits. But everything we removed was because I wanted it gone or because it slowed down the film. Some scenes will make it as deleted scenes in the disc but not many.

7. Was there one scene that, when you watch the movie, makes you especially happy? A scene that you were thrilled to see make it to the big screen?

Del Toro: The entire first reel, the entire battle for Hong Kong and Mako’s drift back to her childhood.

8. I don’t know if you want to play favorites, but I am sure the fandom would like to know! Do you have a favorite Jaeger, and a favorite Kaiju?

Del Toro: Cherno and Leatherback- both are clumsy and heavy and adorable.

9. Pacific Rim is an incredible homage to the Kaiju movies that have come before it. Was there one scene in particular that was a tribute to those films?

Del Toro: Obliquely, the opening scene evokes my memory of seeing War of the Gargantuans. BUt I try to honor Tsuburaya, Honda, Narita, Nakajima, Go Nagai- without quoting them. Just evoking the spirit of fun and faith they had in their craft.

10. This is not a question so much as it is a thank you, from all of the fans of Pacific Rim, for giving us something new and original to immerse ourselves in. It means so much to this younger generation of movie-goers to have something not only original, but characters and a world that we can see ourselves in. Thank you again!

Del Toro: It was entirely my pleasure. In a world of complex, neurotic hatred I wanted to create something sincere and simple with a technically complex film.  I wanted to tell a tale of heroism and hope and trust that kids could see and dream of.  Adventure films were always inspirational for me growing up.  I love Pacific Rim with all my heart and I thank you all for loving it back.

Our eternal thanks to director Guillermo Del Toro for not only answering our questions, but for sharing this incredible film with us. Happy Jaegercon 2013, everyone!

[thechaosgods]

Hermann after Newts first drift.

#pacific rim lore

[thechaosgods]

Pacific Rim (2013) Deleted Scene

#pacific rim #pacific rim lore

[thechaosgods]

Recently noticed that K-Sci and LOCCENT have the same flooring, up to and including stripes on the edges of some of the grates:

So yeah, that's a thing.

#pacific rim #pacific rim lore

[thechaosgods]

You know what, there's no way some of Hermann's many letters to HR didn't include complains about Newt Jamming Too Hard. Just look at all the instruments he's got on his side of the lab:

I'm spotting:

Three electronic keyboards

An electronic drum set

A guitar

A piano

Two microphones

A trumpet

A set of bongos

A stomp box

One can only imagine how many times Hermann had to listen to Newt making a ruckus. Can you imagine Newt taking a shine to play the trumpet or practice the drums while Hermann's trying to crunch numbers at two AM?

(Picture from movie-screencaps.com!)

#pacific rim #pacific rim lore

[thechaosgods]

Lore

Things I noticed on my Pacific Rim rewatch:

1. Raleigh had his left arm ripped off while he was piloting the left hemisphere, then had his right arm and leg shredded while he was piloting the right hemisphere. Holy fuck he has been through it. His resilience and battle focus is enough to be recognized by Pentecost, whose solo Tokyo battle was three hours long.

2. Implied that Hercules Hansen was one of the OGs, like Cherno Alpha. Wonder what happened to his copilot before he began drifting with his son. Wonder what happened to the Jaeger he piloted before Striker Eureka.

3. Pentecost says he carries nothing into the drift, but that just means he knows how to match with anyone, right? Wonder what that final drift was like in Chuck Hansen's head.

4. Tendo Choi is in command of the bridge when neither Pentecost nor Herc Hansen is present. I forgot that he reverts to Cantonese in stress situations, love these details.

5. I enjoy the bilinguals of this film. Also really interesting choice to focus on the western rim of the Pacific Ocean: Australians, Japanese, Chinese, Russians, and a badass Marshal who strikes deals with the black market and literally anyone else who will fund the Jaeger program. We get to have industrial apocalypse, alien thriller, and cyberpunk in one film. (Side question: are the Americas' coastlines devastated?)

6. Mako's expressions are so. Agh. Her face shows what she's feeling with unshielded honesty (she feels so much, like Raleigh) but she carries herself like Pentecost: deliberate, controlled. Very much his student (daughter).

7. Newt and Hermann are obsessed with their scientific theories being right, even if it means the possible doom of humankind. Iconic Academics. Also they must be important enough to have helicopters on call, since they run out of one to get to the bridge in time for the final fight.

8. Final goodbyes between Stacker Pentecost and Mako Mori.

9. Mako and Raleigh are two of many orphans who had no intention of surviving the war that took their families. Raleigh's last sacrifice was simultaneously the most selfless and selfish thing to do. Good for him to have survived, Mako would've found it hard to forgive him.

10. "Stop the clock."

#pacific rim #pacific rim lore

[thechaosgods]

Jaegers of Pacific Rim: What do we know about them?

There's actually a fair amount of lore about Pacific Rim's jaegers, though most of it isn't actually in the movie itself. A lot of it has been scattered in places like Pacific Rim: Man, Machines, & Monsters, Tales From Year Zero, Travis Beacham's blog, and the Pacific Rim novelization.

Note that I will not be including information from either Pacific Rim: Uprising or Pacific Rim: The Black. Uprising didn't really add anything, and The Black's take on jaegers can easily be summed up as "simplified the concept to make a cartoon for children."

So what is there to know about jaegers, besides the fact that they're piloted by two people with their brains connected via computer?

Here's a fun fact: underneath the hull (which may or may not be pure iron), jaegers have "muscle strands" and liquid data transfer technology. Tendo Choi refers to them in the film when describing Lady Danger's repairs and upgrades:

Solid iron hull, no alloys. Forty engine blocks per muscle strand. Hyper-torque driver for every limb and a new fluid synapse system.

The novelization by Alex Irvine makes frequent references to this liquid data transfer tech. For example:

The Jaeger’s joints squealed and began to freeze up from loss of lubricant through the holes Knifehead had torn in it. Its liquid-circuit neural architecture was misfiring like crazy. (Page 29.)

He had enough fiber-optic and fluid-core cabling to get the bandwidth he needed. (Page 94.)

Newt soldered together a series of leads using the copper contact pins and short fluid-core cables. (Page 96.)

Unfortunately I haven't found anything more about the "muscle strands" and what they might be made of, but I do find it interesting that jaegers apparently have some sort of artificial muscle system going on, especially considering Newt's personnel dossier in the novel mentioned him pioneering research in artificial tissue replication at MIT.

The novelization also mentions that the pilots' drivesuits have a kind of recording device for their experiences while drifting:

This armored outer layer included a Drift recorder that automatically preserved sensory impressions. (Page 16.)

It was connected through a silver half-torus that looked like a travel pillow but was in fact a four-dimensional quantum recorder that would provide a full record of the Drift. (Page 96.)

This is certainly... quite the concept. Perhaps the PPDC has legitimate reasons for looking through the memories and feelings of their pilots, but let's not pretend this doesn't enable horrific levels of privacy invasion.

I must note, though, I haven't seen mention of a recording system anywhere outside of the novel. Travis Beacham doesn't mention it on his blog, and it never comes up in either Tales From Year Zero or Tales From The Drift, both written by him. Whether there just wasn't any occasion to mention it or whether this piece of worldbuilding fell by the wayside in Beacham's mind is currently impossible to determine.

Speaking of the drivesuits, let's talk about those more. The novelization includes a few paragraphs outlining how the pilots' drivesuits work. It's a two-layer deal:

The first layer, the circuity suit, was like a wetsuit threaded with a mesh of synaptic processors. The pattern of processor relays looked like circuitry on the outside of the suit, gleaming gold against its smooth black polymer material. These artificial synapses transmitted commands to the Jaeger’s motor systems as fast as the pilot’s brain could generate them, with lag times close to zero. The synaptic processor array also transmitted pain signals to the pilots when their Jaeger was damaged.

...

The second layer was a sealed polycarbonate shell with full life support and magnetic interfaces at spine, feet, and all major limb joints. It relayed neural signals both incoming and outgoing. This armored outer layer included a Drift recorder that automatically preserved sensory impressions.

...

The outer armored layer of the drivesuit also kept pilots locked into the Conn-Pod’s Pilot Motion Rig, a command platform with geared locks for the Rangers’ boots, cabled extensors that attached to each suit gauntlet, and a full-spectrum neural transference plate, called the feedback cradle, that locked from the Motion Rig to the spine of each Ranger’s suit. At the front of the motion rig stood a command console, but most of a Ranger’s commands were issued either by voice or through interaction with the holographic heads-up display projected into the space in front of the pilots’ faces. (Page 16.)

Now let's talk about the pons system. According to the novelization:

The basics of the Pons were simple. You needed an interface on each end, so neuro signals from the two brains could reach the central bridge. You needed a processor capable of organizing and merging the two sets of signals. You needed an output so the data generated by the Drift could be recorded, monitored, and analyzed. That was it. (Page 96.)

This is pretty consistent with other depictions of the drift, recording device aside. (Again, the 4D quantum recorder never comes up anywhere outside of the novel.)

The development of the pons system as we know it is depicted in Tales From Year Zero, which goes into further detail on what happened after Trespasser's attack on San Francisco. In this comic, a jaeger can be difficult to move if improbably calibrated. Stacker Pentecost testing out a single arm describes the experience as feeling like his hand is stuck in wet concrete; Doctor Caitlin Lightcap explains that it's resistance from the datastream because the interface isn't calibrated to Pentecost's neural profile. (I'm guessing that this is the kind of calibration the film refers to when Tendo Choi calls out Lady Danger's left and right hemispheres being calibrated.)

According to Travis Beacham's blog, solo piloting a jaeger for a short time is possible, though highly risky. While it won't cause lasting damage if the pilot survives the encounter, the neural overload that accumulates the longer a pilot goes on can be deadly. In this post he says:

It won't kill you right away. May take five minutes. May take twenty. No telling. But it gets more difficult the longer you try. And at some point it catches up with you. You won't last a whole fight start-to-finish. Stacker and Raleigh managed to get it done and unplug before hitting that wall.

In this post he says:

It starts off fine, but it's a steep curve from fine to dead. Most people can last five minutes. Far fewer can last thirty. Nobody can last a whole fight.

Next, let's talk about the size and weight of jaegers. Pacific Rim: Man, Machines, & Monsters lists off the sizes and weights of various jaegers. The heights of the jaegers it lists (which, to be clear, are not all of them) range from 224 feet to 280 feet. Their weights range from 1850 tons to 7890 tons. Worth noting, the heaviest jaegers (Romeo Blue and Horizon Brave) were among the Mark-1s, and it seems that these heavy builds didn't last long given that another Mark-1, Coyote Tango, weighed 2312 tons.

And on the topic of jaeger specs, each jaeger in Pacific Rim: Man, Machines, & Monsters is listed with a (fictional) power core and operating system. For example, Crimson Typhoon is powered by the Midnight Orb 9 power core, and runs on the Tri-Sun Plasma Gate OS.

Where the novelization's combat asset dossiers covers the same jaegers, this information lines up - with the exception of Lady Danger. PR:MMM says that Lady Danger's OS is Blue Spark 4.1; the novelization's dossier says it's BLPK 4.1.

PR:MMM also seems to have an incomplete list of the jaegers' armaments; for example, it lists the I-22 Plasmacaster under Weaponry, and "jet kick" under Power Moves. Meanwhile, the novelization presents its armaments thus:

I-22 Plasmacaster Twin Fist gripping claws, left arm only Enhanced balance systems and leg-integral Thrust Kickers Enhanced combat-strike armature on all limbs

The novel's dossiers list between 2-4 features in the jaegers' armaments sections.

Now let's move on to jaeger power cores. As many of you probably already know, Mark-1-3 jaegers were outfitted with nuclear power cores. However, this posed a risk of cancer for pilots, especially during the early days. To combat this, pilots were given the (fictional) anti-radiation drug, Metharocin. (We see Stacker Pentecost take Metharocin in the film.)

The Mark-4s and beyond were fitted with alternative fuel sources, although their exact nature isn't always clear. Striker Eureka's XIG supercell chamber implies some sort of giant cell batteries, but it's a little harder to guess what Crimson Typhoon's Midnight Orb 9 might be, aside from round.

Back on the topic of nuclear cores, though, the novelization contains a little paragraph about the inventor of Lady Danger's power core, which I found entertaining:

The old nuclear vortex turbine lifted away from the reactor housing. The reactor itself was a proprietary design, brainchild of an engineer who left Westinghouse when they wouldn’t let him use his lab to explore portable nuclear miniaturization tech. He’d landed with one of the contractors the PPDC brought in at its founding, and his small reactors powered many of the first three generations of Jaegers. (Page 182.)

Like... I have literally just met this character, and I love him. I want him to meet Newt Geiszler, you know? >:3

Apparently, escape pods were a new feature to Mark-3 jaegers. Text in the novelization says, "New to the Mark III is an automated escape-pod system capable of ejecting each Ranger individually." (Page 240.)

Finally, jaegers were always meant to be more than just machines. Their designs and movements were meant to convey personality and character. Pacific Rim: Man, Machines, & Monsters says:

Del Toro insisted the Jaegers be characters in and of themselves, not simply giant versions of their pilots. Del Toro told his designers, "It should be as painful for you to see a Jaeger get injured as it is for you to see the pilot [get hurt.]" (Page 56.)

Their weathered skins are inspired by combat-worn vehicles from the Iraq War and World War II battleships and bombers. They look believable and their design echoes human anatomy, but only to a point. "At the end of the day, what you want is for them to look cool," says Francisco Ruiz Velasco. "It's a summer movie, so you want to see some eye candy." Del Toro replies, "I, however, believe in 'eye protein,' which is high-end design with a high narrative content." (Page 57.)

THE JAEGER FROM DOWN UNDER is the only Mark 5, the most modern and best all-around athlete of the Jaegers. He's also the most brutal of the Jaeger force. Del Toro calls him "sort of brawler, like a bar fighter." (Page 64.)

And that is about all the info I could scrounge up and summarize in a post. I think there's a lot of interesting stuff here - like, I feel that the liquid circuit and muscle tissue stuff gives jaegers an eerily organic quality that could be played for some pretty interesting angles. And I also find it interesting that jaegers were meant to embody their own sort of character and personality, rather than just being simple combat machines or extensions of their pilots - it's a great example of a piece of media choosing thematic correctness over technical correctness, which when you get right down to it, is sort of what Pacific Rim is really all about.

#pacific rim lore