In the run up to last summer's release of Pacific Rim, the film looked like it was going to be another lovable, big budget bomb that everyone was destined to wish for a sequel to. After all, the competition was pretty stiff, and the tracking numbers that the studio had at their disposal had the film pegged for a less than stellar opening against Grown Ups 2. Sure enough, the film opened in third place with a gross of $37.3 million, and it looked like Warner Bros. spent would be splitting even on the $190 million film. Then, something happened: international audiences flocked to the movie in its opening weekend, and it performed with solid top ten finishes for four weeks in the domestic market. Like Gypsy Danger itself, Pacific Rim rose to fight and won the day. So who's ready to go again? I'll tell you who is: Guillermo del Toro!
BuzzFeed spoke with the director at the Austin Television Festival, where he is promoting the premiere episode of The Strain. Naturally, the subject of a Pacific Rim 2 came up, as is bound to happen when talking with del Toro. After all, this and Hellboy 3 are always a hot topics to discuss with fans. It was then that good old Guillermo dropped some knowledge :
"I’m working very, very hard with Zak Penn. We’ve been working for a few months now in secret. We found a way to twist it around. Travis Beacham was involved in the storyline and now I’m writing with Zak because Travis has become a TV mogul."
For those of you who aren't groaning or sighing at the screen yet, Zak Penn is responsible for writing such films as Inspector Gadget ,Elektra, X-Men: The Last Stand, and The Incredible Hulk. I'll give you a minute to swear at your screen. That out of the way, I'm not too terribly worried about this news for two reasons: first, while Travis Beacham is working on Hieroglyph with the Fox network, he at the very least helped craft the direction of Pacific Rim 2's story. His work has also made sure that the film will be a direct sequel, and bring (at the very least) Raleigh and Mako back into the fold. I'm as disappointed as anyone that he's not immediately able to work on his baby, but his baby has grown into a kid. A kid who still has Uncle Guillermo to help it become an adult.
Second, this is a very early stage in Pacific Rim 2's writing process. Legendary Pictures isn't even committed at this point, so it's not like they're writing for a deadline. Guillermo del Toro even said himself, "I don’t have the money, but I’m proceeding like it is happening." So while this is exciting news just the same, there's still a chance that Legendary won't even want to make this happen, especially after Godzilla's huge success and so much focus going into that franchise. Or perhaps that success could be refocused into further building the Pacific Rim series. It's hard to say at this point.
In the meantime, Guillermo del Toro has The Strain premiering on FX July 13th, and is working on Crimson Peak, which is due out in theaters on October 16th, 2015.
