2. The Interface Fixes The Old Problems
The Jaegers operate on the unique drift system sure, but that’s only because a single pilot experiences brain damage from piloting the colossus alone, a mecha-trope that has always been poorly reflected/explained; its best examples probably being Hiro’s heavy breathing in Gundam Wing, or the leagues of tears shed in Evangelion.
For some reason, piloting a machine in these works, especially Gundam Wing, is extremely strenuous to the mind, which makes no sense as these mecha are controlled by pedals and levers, user interfaces that ultimately make no sense when you consider the intricate controls that go into a mecha. Do you have to flip a switch for each individual finger, or do you have a “flip the bird” macro assigned to the big red F**k-you-fire-rockets button?
The point is, these machines are “too much to handle” in order to point out in your plot when you have a legendary wunderkind pilot who can handle the mental strain of pushing buttons on a thing made on an assembly line. It’s like saying that you can only drive a Lamborghini if you can resist the sexual advances of the cigarette lighter.
Pacific Rim’s interface does away with all of this vague nonsense, assigning a big Gazelle-home-fitness-center like foot pedal system to sense leg movements, and the neural uplink pons system that allows pilot to bond to machine to pilot. Now a specific explanation for how this uplink works isn’t actually given, but you can’t hold the movie accountable for such an omission. It’s the same idea behind the dream machine in Inception or the tablet device in your hand — you may use it everyday, but that doesn’t mean you know how it works.
By initiating a neural uplink, it suddenly makes sense why pilots start going crazy whenever they sit in particular mech suits, as the large size is simply too much for one brain to handle, resulting in a seizure of the motor cortex, or death from a sudden 100-foot drop after you lose connectivity with the mech. It’s a small detail to include, but it just acknowledges one of the biggest pet peeves I’ve had in pop culture since the Darth Vader “Nooooooo” George Lucas mixed into the force lightning scene in the blu-ray edition of Return of The Jedi.Â
