#Pacific Rim: The Black
Text
So I rewatched Pacific Rim: The Black to refresh myself on how bad it was, and once again I am just kind of in awe at how god-awful it is.
The Black very literally takes the magic out of Pacific Rim. You know how "drift hangover" refers to a persistent psychic connection between pilot and jaeger? Welp, here "drift hangover" is used to refer to a headache after drifting. Ghost drifting (you know, when pilots get psychic with each other) is turned into ghost piloting, which is when a pilot drifts with the memory of another pilot. Like, it's understandable if most people don't clock the mysticism and animism underpinning Guillermo del Toro's vision of Pacific Rim, but this is a very deliberate effort to erase where humans can just have funky psychic shit happen to them sometimes.
The Black doesn't really seem to understand how drifting works. Two characters have a heated argument without falling out of alignment. Another character functionally has a mind-reading ray. There's no real comprehension of what drift compatibility is and how it works.
The child soldiers are younger than ever. Taylor looks like he was maybe twelve at most when he was taking his pilot's test. Like. Actual twelve year olds are getting certified as jaeger pilots in this world. And this is framed as a good and desirable thing. Literally what the fuck.
The Black calls Horizon Brave "Horizon Bravo," and claims it's a Mark IV jaeger. If you have literally any access to any information about Horizon Brave at all, you know it's a Mark I jaeger.
The jaeger piloted by the children (Atlas Destroyer) is claimed to be a Mark III jaeger, yet uses the type of fuel cells introduced in Uprising. Like it was a whole fucking plot point that Lady Danger was a nuclear jaeger. Literally all they would've had to do was make Atlas Destroyer a Mark VI. It would have been fine.
Atlas Destroyer has a bunch of features Mark IIIs definitely didn't have. Remember how Raleigh and Yancy needed a crew to help them into their drivesuits? Atlas Destroyer just automatically tosses 'em on itself. Remember how Lady Danger's AI mostly just gave status updates? Atlas Destroyer's AI holds entire conversations. Again, you could've just made it a Mark VI, show.
And speaking of Atlas Destroyer's AI, for some goddamn reason the PPDC gave her an emotion chip. Because it's not hard enough to be a pilot already, now your jaeger gets to have anxiety.
The Black claims that Trespasser "smashed the Australian wall in the first attack." This is wrong on every conceivable level. Trespasser attacked San Francisco in the first attack, in 2013. The first kaiju to attack Sydney was Scissure, in 2014. The kaiju what smashed the wall was Mutavore, in 2025.
There is one queer-coded character. He is murdered in gory fashion.
There is one Indigenous-coded character who studies kaiju and their biology. He is depicted being into New Agey woo and wrongly believing that the kaiju he raised can love him. He dies when one of his kaiju eats him.
A major antagonist is depicted as a ruthless man who will kidnap, mindwipe, exploit, and even murder children. Then the show attempts to give him a redemption arc and we're supposed to actually care.
The PPDC refused to let the children's father retrieve them and the other survivors left behind in "the Black." (Read: Australia after the PPDC literally bombed it from space after a bunch of breaches started opening all over it.) Yeah, the PPDC can bomb an entire continent from space, but they can't spare a goddamn rescue helicopter.
Despite all of this and the aforementioned child soldiers, the PPDC is framed as the good guys and the only respite from the horrors of the Black; getting to the Sydney shatterdome is an unambiguously happy ending.
Early on we're lead to think that the PPDC might be getting its hands dirty with kaiju genetic experiments/bioweapon development. Later on we learn that it's the local kaiju cultists doing it. Now come on, which suspect actually makes sense here; the PPDC who can afford to build a killsat, or the kaiju cultists who apparently can't even afford a sterile room to perform a blood transfusion in?
The kaiju cultists are pretty obviously inspired by far right conspiracy theories about evil cults, rather than the actual behaviors of actual cults.
The kaiju sisters recruit by kidnapping women, turning them into kaiju hybrids, and forcing them into their hivemind. For some reason they kill all men. Despite this they are really obsessed with the idea that the half-kaiju smol, who for all appearances is a boy, is going to be their kaiju messiah. It really doesn't make sense, but then again, what can we expect from a slapdash job of far right conspiracy theories?
By the way, this is the PPDC banner literally hanging from the PPDC training center, in the show that is very firm in insisting that THE PPDC IS THE GOOD GUYS WHO PROTECT YOU:
24 notes
·
View notes
Text
Tuesday Typings
I came back from the North American Science Fiction Convention with so many books. Notes on costume stuff, one giant costume todo list, and recent reads/watches as well.
Books acquired recently
The Archive Undying, Emma Mieko Candon, 2023, bought
This is How You Lose the Time War, Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone, 2020, bought — finished and enjoyed
The Sng of Achilles, Madeline Miller, 2012, bought
Translation State,, Ann Leckie, 2023, bought
Francis: The People's Pope, Ted Rall, allegedly autographed, 2018, bought
The Stars Like Dust, Isaac Asimov, 1996 paperback printing, gifted
The Courier, Gerald Brandt, 2016, free pile
Alliance Rising, C. J. Cherryh and Jane S. Fancher, 2019, free pile
Foundryside, Robert Jackson Bennett, 2019 Broadway promo printing, free pile
Mica, fille de Transyl, Michèle Laframboise, 2012, free pile — I do not read the French; this is going on a gift pile for a Francophone friend
To Climb a Flat Mountain, G. David Nordley, 2009?, bought after the author gave me an answer to a worldbuilding problem
Burning Days, Glenn Grant, 2011, free
This Virtual Night, C.S. Friedman, 2021, free
To Each This World, Julie Czerneda, 2022, free and signed
The Complete Smoke Trilogy, Tanya Huff, 2019, free
She Who Became The Sun, Shelley Parker-Chan, 2021, free
All of the free books are from Pemmi-Con; half are from DAW Publishers who were really, really generous.
Recent Reading and Watching
This is How You Lose the Time War surprised me with the identity of the Seeker; mid-book I thought there might be another operative tailing them, or a Purple child, or a third side to this war. That last prediction was quite close!
Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn - Bande Dessinee Episode: 0 wasn't particularly thrilling, but I value it because it fills out the characters of Full Frontal and Angelo Sauper, and how the Zeonist public sees things before the initiation of the Third Neo Zeon War, aka The Laplace Incident.
Star Wars: The Clone Wars has been good through season 7; I ned to track down season 8 to see if they later appearance of Ashoka in Star Wars Rebels makes any sense.
Legend of Galactic Heroes: I have finally finished this. RIP to a legend, but we all knew that the death flag for the last person to die was waved at the end of the third season. Rubinsky's end was also fitting: reflecting of how he was no longer part of the plot, he was also no longer part of politics. His last gasp felt irrelevant, and really was.
Pacific Rim: The Black is a 3dcg film that's reminiscent of RWBY and Dragon Prince in style, but with the same Ramin Djiwadi soundtrack, and some neat twists that really delve into the fridge horror of the setting. But this is a kids' show, so there's little blood, the decapitations happen out of frame, and the heads don't roll too far. Episode 7 has a nice "it's dangerous to go alone; take this" moment.
Computing
A 2.1A powerbank is not enough to stably power a Pi 1 B+ with a 4.0" square Hyperpixel Touch display and a wireless keyboard. Big Sad. Next question is if a PiSugar 3 battery controller will work with a Pi 1 B+ or if I should splurge $75 on a Pi 4 for this device.
I'd like to have a mobile compute terminal that's smaller than a 13" laptop, but still has USB ports. Scrollwheel and a button to toggle the OSK would also be nice.
Primary nonwork laptop's keyboard continues to degrade; It's becoming a desk item. Its degradation is the primary driver of the new palmtop development.
Actually, wait, I have a spare CM4 from a StereoPi 2 device. I could use that, with a compatible breakout board maybe. Or I could test the Hyperpixel screen on the Stereopi board directly. Then I'd have a 4" touchscreen mated to a … 5" wide board? Well, it'll at least let me test some things, like whether the CM4 works for this use case. Bonus dual cameras is a questionable bonus.
Crafting
KInda burnt out on crafting, tbh. Last two weeks were full of crunch before Pemmi-Con/NASFiC, which netted me a "Judge's Choice in Novice Class" award and "Best Use of Modern Tech" in the Masquerade competition.
Next up, over @glowingskull, I plan to post rundowns of the stuff I made, and maybe some shapefiles, but there's a lot of work left in this costume and I plan to redo large parts of the headgear.
Because, let's be honest, the post-con todo list for that costume is basically:
Better photographs?
Write up the project
Print off a holder for these parts, because I'm retiring them to mount on the wall
Redesign snout, again, to remove grilles and double-thicken all the parts
Resculpt temples and ears of skull
Put a visor in the eye holes
Eye-lights in visor?
Enclose head: back of skull, ventilation, neck sock
Redo the flame staff's camera monopod mount attachment point for durability (may require welding?)
Sculpt a model for the chestpiece, so it's plastic instead of foam
Sculpt a model for arm bracers
And then on top of that I also want to:
Document the Servicer outfit
Sew on a Masonic patch for the Servicer outfit
Build some DIY NVGs for use in costume projects like this one
Write up the Baba Yaga's Hut costume which won Best In Show
I think my next costume goal, after the revised Turaga Vakama, will be an Earth Federation Space Forces officer uniform, so I can give the planned "WTF is Zeon" lectures in character.
The next head goal will be a Deinonychus head with articulated jaw, which requires advancements in augmented reality. Need to get the StereoPi working, or ditch/sell it and switch to paired NVG monocles.
Music
I think it's time for Pacific Rim soundtracks. Pacific Rim: The Black sounds somewhere between the Pacific Rim movies' soundtracks and the tense violin work from the 2009 Sherlock Holmes movie with RDJ and Jude Law, soundtrack by Hans Zimmer. Not particularly Australian, unfortunately.
Lego Stuff
Gotta merge the two submarine kits, and build the Emperor's Throne Room that I won at pinball at Pemmi-Con.
#this is how you lose the time war#spoilers#pemmi con#nasfic#pacific rim: the black#legend of galactic heroes#the tuesday again no problem expanded universe and spinoffs
14 notes
·
View notes
Photo
Drawing I've made for ford1114 of their OC with Ayase from Guilty Crown and Hayley from Pacific Rim: The Black from their fanfic (linked here)
Commission Prices/Info Here
14 notes
·
View notes
Text
Girlfriends
#Pacific Rim The Black#pacific rim#pacific rim: the black#hayley travis#pacific rim mei#prtb#pr:tb#pr#pr mei#pacific rim the black mei#pacific rim: the black mei#meiley
5 notes
·
View notes
Text
Watched Pacific Rim The Black and, I liked it. It was enjoyable and fun and introduced some cool concepts.
But at the same time it rams those cool concepts into 14 episodes and doesn't have time to really dig into any of them. This show should have been 4+ seasons to really do what it clearly wanted to.
A Kaiju cult that is waiting for the Kaiju Messiah, hybrid Kaiju-between both Jaeger and human-kaiju seeming to evolve while on earth (as implied by the kaiju obsessed guy in the dessert and the kaiju testicle) the MCs mom kidnapped into the Kaiju cult and brainwashed with kaiju blood? All cool as shit and all barely touched.
Apex is this awesome Jaeger drone/Kaiju hybrids, that's EATS kaiju amd is basically a fucking feral Eva (biomech with the organic bits being from the invading enemy monster) that's all built up as super badass but with this special connection with the Obligatory Anime Magic Orphan and then we see him like 3 times and the show kills him off.
The whole story around Magic Anime Orphan and where he came from and why he looks like a human could easily power 4 seasons.
Meis memory storyline/backstory is basically not explored at all.
Also, even when it's done well with top of the line tech(like Trigun Stampede) , cgi anime models still look real off and awkward to me. At least the human characters, the Kaiju and Jeagers didn't look bad or awkward, really just the people.
And the way drifting was depicted wasa bit different than how we see it set up in the first film, but that doesn't bother me terribly.
Either way, pretty good show, but way more Unexplored Potential than actually fully executed ideas. Definitely needed more than a measly 14 episodes.
19 notes
·
View notes
Text
i know its kinda minor but after Pacific Rim The Black I really am so irked that Haley always claims to love Boy so much but never insists that he should have a better name than the super lazy title her brother uses because he just callously and actively refused to give him any regular name, even in spite of verbally voicing acknowledgment that the option was clearly there but that he just won't because it's "dumb" or something.
Anyway In my mind and a hypothetical rewrite I'm calling him Nova all the time now as like a reference to how he's "new" and they've never seen anyone like him before, and also as a reference to how he has massive amounts of power within him.
Also, it just sounds cool.
18 notes
·
View notes
Text
I was NOT expecting to cry my eyes out in pac rim black
2 notes
·
View notes
Text
wait what? alternate version? what...what happens in it
#anyway probably still not gonna watch The Black#just...not interested ¯\_(ツ)_/¯#Pacific Rim: the Black#Pacific Rim
3 notes
·
View notes
Text
PACIFIC RIM: THE BLACK
category: tv show
robot positivity: 80%
premise: a spinoff of the movie pacific rim (2013) and its sequel. giant robots called jaegers are created to fight kaiju (giant monsters). dystopian anime set in australia.
review: honestly, it's not brilliant - but it has a good soundtrack, it's fun, it's not romance-heavy, and it has an AI character. the AI is depicted positively and is given agency (mostly), but is not really a main character. if you like pacific rim or mech/kaiju stuff in general, i'd recommend at least giving it a shot.
warnings: there is robot and mech injury and death, unfortunately. some of it is pretty hard to watch (for me, at least). other warnings include psychological manipulation, brainwashing, animal death, and general violence.
#recs#otherkin#machinekin#television#anime#mecha anime#kaiju#pacific rim#pacific rim: the black#robotkin
2 notes
·
View notes
Text
Me look at Netflix's Explosive tag on Pacific Rim: The Black post episode 5 Escaping Bogan
👁️👄👁️
1 note
·
View note
Text
sometimes, it's not so much about the romance as it is about the devotion. the adoration.
#pacific rim#black sails#the x-files#the bear#game of thrones#raleigh x mako#jack x anne#msr#sydcarmy#theonsa#i could go on forever i think#for me personally it is also about the romance and i do think they should all kiss and be in love but thats not THE POINT-#*adam scott meme* its about the vulnerability and unconditional care one has with someone else#how many different ways can i make this same post lets count
5K notes
·
View notes
Text
So this is on Netflix. For anyone interested.
0 notes
Text
John Boyega in Mens Health
#john boyega#mens health#fitness#melanin poppin#black king#black actors#british actors#nigerian actors#fine black man#gym body#gym motivation#they cloned tyrone#the woman king#star wars#pacific rim#tyrone x reader#fontaine x reader#king ghezo x reader#king ghezo#talented
1K notes
·
View notes
Text
Hayley and Mei are lesbians and in love fuck you
#pacific rim#pacific rim the black#pacific rim: the black#prtb#pr#hayley travis#pacific rim mei#pacific rim the black mei#pacific rim: the black mei
3 notes
·
View notes
Text
Pacific Rim: The Black
Pacific Rim: The Black
Sipnosis
Después de que Kaiju devasta Australia, dos hermanos buscan a sus padres y encuentran nuevas criaturas, personajes y aliados.
Opinión personal
Si eres fan de las películas, te animo a pasar una tarde(o varias) pegada al Netflix para disfrutar de una serie buena de principio a fin. Buena animación, profundidad de los personajes y un argumento muy interesante e intenso.
View On WordPress
1 note
·
View note
Text
watched pacific rim: the black and now it's time for: getting unreasonably upset over how you genuinely thought the concept of it being difficult but possible to be able to come to an understanding with Kaiju was the singular thing with the most potential in the whole show
but they decide to ditch it for the most boring and predictable alternative answer. just for the sake of being edgy and making sure the main characters are constantly plagued with misfortune, always fighting and accidentally get people hurt and killed everywhere they go.
it really is a big case of "i know i SHOULDN'T be so annoyed because I get what you were going for. but also even though i GET it i don't particularly like it." like yeah, it does "make sense" that monsters purpose-built for destruction can't love. but that's exactly it. It makes so much sense and is such a surface level conclusion to reach that when you pull the rug out from under me and prove the easy answer right all along, I'm more just disappointed and annoyed and not actually shocked.
Like I really think the alternative would raise much more interesting questions, and be a much better subversion of expectations. In the long run, I think it actually would be really good and interesting for a gritty setting to force you to grapple with the fact that the beings you're killing are genuinely capable of affection and respect, but while retaining the fascinating nuance of how this is still hard-won and risky, and you still have to accommodate for how they don't think or feel the way you do, but have valid emotions regardless.
1 note
·
View note
Last Seen Blogs
cosplayuniversalsociety-blog
Cosplay Universal Society
oncelerswifesblog
kiki
techieblogxx
kmbrly
kidshut
Kids Hut
hanterxdong
Untitled