Moviebob, we need to talk.
I like you; I trust you as a critic; I'm not one of those people who watches you primarily to hate on everything you say or do. But you are wrong about Pacific Rim.
I urge you, I beg you to go back and watch it with less clouded eyes. As you say in your baggage episode any number of things can cloud a critics vision with regard to this film, in this case you imply in other episodes that a lot of large blockbusters (Man of Steel; star trek into darkness) were duds this year, and I worry pacific Rim looks better by comparison. You also freely admit that you wanted to like it because it was doing something new.
But seriously rewatch it. Rewatch the tired comic-relief-scientist cliches. Rewatch the deus-ex-machina filled fight sequences(oh we have a sword). Rewatch the tired romances. The convoluted hard to follow fight scenes.
I couldn't believe my eyes when the showing of this I went to was in X-wide; Maybe Scope or iMax versions are available, but for fight scenes designed to have this epic sense of scale I found myself bored and unable to tell what was going on.
Not to mention the strange problems with the logistics of this future world; which makes it inherently harder to care about it. "Oh the Kaigu attack but we still had the time money and resources to put together super-hologram computer systems whilst also building giant mecha's and the ridiculous brain technology they work on." Or the entire world forgetting that a seawall is a REALLY REALLY dumb idea.
The monsters are all indistinguishable, we're told they are different 'levels' but are never given any context for this. At one point one of them pulls an EMP out of it's butt which is then immediately forgotten about.
But what I hate most about this film is how humanity win; I don't want to route for the guys who magically manage to drop a nuke behind their opponents and scamper away; that is not an epic victory. That is a sly backstabbing victory that just feels awkward and wrong. Now don't get me wrong some underhand tactics are all very interesting but that doesn't feel like the ending to a massive blockbuster. I would rather have had an awkward sequel hook in which the main plot was just setting up a return of the Jaigas over the seawall, than this drab idea for an ending.
Okay rant over. I'm not asking you to change your list as it's only your opinion at one time, but please go back and rewatch this film on another day to see if it hold up. I personally don't think it will.
Thanks for taking the time to read this,
k