Pacific Rim Uprising

Actors: John Boyega, Scott Eastwood, Cailee Spaeny, Jing Tian, Adria Arjona, Zhang Jin, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day, Burn Gorman

Rating: 8 out of 10, Any blockbuster sequel has a hard row to hoe but this succeeds because it trusts the actors and they deliver, especially John Boyega. He continues to prove he is so much more than a reformed storm trooper and delivers the right combination of humor, panache, and charisma as the son of the last movie’s hero. Thankfully Charlie Hunam was jettisoned for a younger, more appealing crew of jaeger pilots. Jing Tian steals every scene she’s in, just as she did in The Wall. The kaiju are back menacing a rebuilding earth and Boyega along with Clint Eastwood’s kid are responsible for saving humanity. This movie puts to bed the notion that kaiju only fight in the rain and the CGI work was impressive as poor Tokyo is once again leveled by marauding mega-monsters. My only issue is with the climactic battle where the kaiju are so formidable that the jaegers are basically useless. Still it was pure popcorn driven fun with hardly a thespian utterance heard.

MVP: Boyega, spreading his wings as a lead