Sunday, December 30, 2012

Pacific Rim is a rip-off? Really?

On voit beaucoup de posts sur les forums disant "Pacific Rim est une copie", "Transformers vs Godzilla", "Robot Jox"...Pacific Rim étant un film de Robots Géants contre des Monstres Géants, il y a forcément plus ou moins de connexions. Mais Pacific Rim est un film original, un hommage pour sûr, mais très différent. Voyons pourquoi...

We see a lot of posts in forum saying "Pacific Rim is a rip-off", "Transformers Vs Godzilla", "Evangelion", "Robot Jox"...Well, for sure, Pacific Rim, being a Giant Robots vs Giant Monsters movie, have more or less connections with this anime/movies. But Pacific Rim is an original movie, an homage for sure, but very different. Let's explain why...



1) Evangelion

For all those who know Evangelion: for sure, the first time you heard about Pacific Rim, you thought "Evangelion". Mysterious giants monsters fought by giant robots with sync pilots...However, differences are huge!

a) Teenage heroes vs adult heroes. Evangelion is an adolescence metaphore. No teenagers in Pacific Rim
b) Giant robots-but-in-fact-no vs Giant Robots: Robots are not robots in Evangelion. That's one of the most important thing in the anime. In Pacific Rim, no trick: Robots are robots.
c) Pilot to Eva sync vs Pilot to pilot sync. Eva pilot needs to synchronize with his Eva in order to pilot it. In Pacific Rim, it's not a problem: Robots are machines, they don't any have state of mind. Pilots have to synchronize with their co-pilot only.

To be honest: I think that people who think only "Giant robots vs Giants monsters" thinking about Evangelion missed the point...Even if, at the first look, stories are similar, they are, in fact, totally different.


2) Robot Jox

Something in the design. Other way, this movie is basically robots vs robots, not robots vs kaijus...





3) Transformers

Transformers are ET with a robot look, copying Earth stuff. They have giant robot designs, but what are the other similarities?

Jaegers Transformer's style...




4) Mazinger, Goldorak, Voltron, all super robots anime...

Ok, giants robots in these anime. But it's absolutly not realistic, contrary to Del Toro's movie. Mazinger is the father of all geant robots, so the fact that we think "Mazinger" watching Pacific Rim can't be help. But it's only one pilot/mecha, and generally robots are not seen as rare but reproductible weapons (like jaeger), but as "unique" weapons, not reproductible.




5) Robotech, Gundamn...all real robots

I think these ones are closer. Close future. The big differences: the number of robots (in Pacific Rim: very rare, contrary to Macross), one pilot/mecha, the type of antagonists (Earth army, ET army...in Pacific Rim: just of few antagonists, but very powerful).







6) Power rangers, all sentaï...

Ok, there's a giant robot in sentaï saga, and a giant ennemy in each episode. But really, you want to compare 5 guys with different color costumes, fighting an foe who grows when he's beaten? Really?





7) Godzilla

Godzilla is the first kaiju, all Godzilla movies are Kaijus movies, Pacific Rim is an homage to Kaijus films...So I guess that maybe there is a link (of course there is!). But I don't think that we will have this WTF feeling that we have watching a Godzilla movie...(see here).





Pacific Rim is the first "big budget" movie involving giant mechas and kaijus, so it's normal to think about Mazinger, Evangelion, Godzilla...But inspiration doesn't mean copy! Pacific Rim is an original story!

If you fed up with posts and tweets "it's Evangelion", "it's Transformers vs Godzilla", "it's an other stupid robot movie", please share this post!

21 comments:

  1. Yes it is a blatant rip off like everything made in the west for the past 20 years.

    I guess Hunger Games "books" and crappy movie is not ripping off Battle Royale. It's an homage, a coincidence, or whatever the kids call it these days...

    Oh, and yes firefly was COMPLETELLY different from Cowboy Bebop. A bunch of space misfits and anti-heroes with tragic undertones is a pretty common theme

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    1. They were good anyway dude, if you go looking for similarities you'll find them, I felt just like you at first, but after enjoying Firefly and Hunger Games I realized there was enough of a difference between Firefly and Cowboy Bebop, and Hunger Games and Battle Royale. Common themes and motifs=/= plagiarism.

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  2. I can't tell if the commenter above me is a troll or not.

    If you are, it is possible to create something similar to and inspired by an older work without it been a "rip-off."

    If you're comment was a joke, then, you got. Very good :)

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  3. There are a few calculated differences from Evangelion, but using a tagline like, "To fight monsters, they built monsters" makes it seem like there was a DIRECT influence, and the writers, if not working WITH the creators of Evangelion, are borrowing EXTENSIVELY from the ideas put forth there. One can change theme and message, but the tapestry is still the same.

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    1. Wait... When he said "wecreated monsters" do you understand real monsters?
      You only see what you wanto to see. There's a big diference betwen the movie and the anime.
      It's a waste of time try to explain this, because the people close they eyes from the diferences, and stay talking, it's similar.

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  4. I agree that the influence of Evangelion is huge,and the screenplayer never hides this. But it's not a rip off, they change too much things that were the bases of Evangelion.
    About Hunger games and Battle Royal, I agree, it's quite the same story,in the first episode, but from what I know the other books are different.
    I've never seen Firefly, only the movie, Serenity, but I've never thought "Cowboy Bebop" watching it. Cowboy Bebop characters are too strong I think...I really can't compare them to Serenity characters.

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  5. No, It's a TDKR rips off, because there are ruined cities in both movies...

    Seriously, this is how ALL OF YOU sound like.

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  6. It'll ba-bomb horribly at the box office, nailgun at the ready folks.

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  7. Your major differences are just BS...of course you have to change a few things so it's not exactly the same....but come on bro....sell that sh@t somewhere else.

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  8. I like how you think, still it is the biggest homage to NGE i've ever seen.
    The robots are underground while the kaijus rise from water. There is a fight scene on a boat.
    Del Toro is a big anime fanatic and you can see that just by looking at his face.
    This really is not Evangelion but it feels almost as a cry to make it.

    Evangelion is more of a psychological observation than a robot franchise, while this seems like the action packed blockbuster.

    www.livestreamforum.info

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  9. NO SEAN BOBOS . GRASIAS A ESTE DIRECTOR QUE SE ATREVE A REALIZAR PELICULAS DE MECHAS, APROVECHANDO LA GRAN TECNOLOGIA QUE POSEEMOS EN ESTOS TIEMPO. DANDOLE UN TOQUE MUY REAL, E INSPIRADO EN PALICULAS DE ANIME . POR QUE QUERAMOS O NO EL DIRECTOR EN MAS DE ALGUNA OPORTUNIDAD TUVO QUE AGARRAR UN MANGA DE EVANGELION O VERSE UNA PELICULA DE ROBOTECH. Y POWER RANGER Y EL WON CREO ESTA PELICULA, QUE LO QUE NOSOTROS DEBEMOS HACER ES APOYARLA AL 100 %. POR QUE GRASIAS A ESE EXITO MAS DIRECTORES VERAN EN ESTA AREA UN ATRACTIVO Y POR FIN DE UNA VES POR TODAS VER QUISAS UNA PELICULA DE EVANGELION O DE ROBOTECH EN LA PANTALLA GRANDE. (OVIAMENTE POR DIRECTORES DESENTES Y NO COMO EL DIRECTOR DE DRAGON BALL)


    SALUDOS.
    DIESEL.

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  10. what do you do? you take NGE and robotic, you mash it up and add some differences and what do you get? PACIFIC RIM!!!!! the movie still looks awesome, and another difference: in NGE the mecha can hold guns, but in PR from the trailers it looks like the robot/mecha cant. movie still looks great though, filled with guns, army stuff, and giant robots! something any girl friend would roll her eyes about (trolololol)

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  11. say what you want, I saw the trailer for this for the first time today -- in fact was the first time I heard of it -- and yes, I was all pumped up because I thought NGE had finally made it. I was VERY surprised -- even stunned -- when the title "Pacific Rim" popped up.
    Yes, there are some substantial differences, but visually at least it is incredibly similar, even to the point that some of the sequences in the trailer are virtually identical to bits of NGE: the clamps around the feet for the launch sequence, the giant hand stretching out into the camera, the dramatic shot of 01 striding through the street, etc -- and that's all just from the first couple eps of NGE! Even the "synching" concept is similar, just taken a step further with the two pilots having to synch together first, then with the robot. Yes, I know, these are really robots, not organic, but of course that's something that only develops over the course of the series, along with all the other secrets of the EVA, and I doubt any movie has the time to do that or explore the philosophical and psychological depths that NGE does.

    I'll probably o see it, and take my kids who are into it, but I'll get a black jacket and go as Gendo (who also seems to appear in PR!)

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    1. "the clamps around the feet" that's from Gundam
      "the giant hand stretching out into the camera, the dramatic shot of 01 striding through the street, etc" that's from pretty much every giant robot anime ever.
      "Even the "synching" concept is similar," Again, the first time this concept showed up was in one the very first popular mecha, Getter Robo, whose pilots needed to synch in order to combine and fight as one.
      I'm not hating on all you people, but the fact that the first thing you think about is NGE is simply because you haven't seen anything else from that genre. Which is huge. Even more so than the kaiju movies.

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  12. Wow OK, well for one, yes it is waaaay to similar to evangelion for it to be original. Two: um, most of your differences between pacific rim and evangelion either didn't make sense or were irrelevant. "Robots aren't robots in evangelion" then what the hell were they? And yeah the pilots obviously have to sync with the Eva or the thing wouldn't move, you're gonna have to do better than that.

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    1. The Evas were cyborgs, as in half biological, half mechanical. The Jagers are simple, non-living robots used as weapons.

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  13. A rip-off does not mean you have to copy everything tiny aspects from the original, yeah, adult vs. adolescent pilots, who cares? "Robot" made by flesh vs. robot, monsters (but in fact angels) vs. monster, these only make Eva more sophisticated than the rip-off. It is not only a rip-off but a westerners-try-to-mimic-asian-concept-but-not-so-successful rip-off.

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    1. Somebody gets it... too bad most of my brothers and sisters don't seem to like sophisticated movies :(

      the things that this new movie is borrowing from eva (and other mech's, games) aren't really the things that made eva epic to begin with.. I suppose that is why im upset, I really wanted to see a live action mecha with a little real Japanese substance to it.

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  14. Buy any DVD or Bly Ray

    Get free PECIFIC RIM Movie Passes at Aido.com

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