This article discusses 10 movies like Pacific Rim you must watch. Add these well-recommended and highly-rated films to your watch list.
In 2013, Guillermo del Toro was known for Pan’s Labyrinth and Hellboy, which is interesting because they are two very different films. However, del Toro knows how to make fantastical creatures feel human and he added that to Pacific Rim.
The film is about a war between humankind and a monstrous sea creature. A former pilot and a trainee are paired up to drive a seemingly obsolete special weapon in a desperate effort to save the world from the apocalypse, as per the synopsis on IMDb.
The films listed below all involve some form of robots, cyborgs, or large creatures facing off with humans getting in the way. These films have a perfect balance of both and the human storyline can be hard to sit through in most films, but not the ones on this list. They are fun, the films are heartfelt, and most importantly, the action is on another level.
10 movies like Pacific Rim
Transformers (2007)
In 2007 Shia LaBeouf was hot off Even Stevens and Holes. He then signed on with Michael Bay to become the ultimate action star. If you grew up in the 90s the animated Transformers series was part of your Saturday morning line-up. People did question how the characters would look in live-action and they did not disappoint.
In this film, Sam Witwicky (LaBeouf) connects with an old Camaro, an Autobot from a Cybertronian race. The Autobots and Decepticons have been trying to blend into the environment on Earth only for them to have the ultimate standoff because one teenager knows how to get them home.
Terminator 2: Judgement Day (1991)
Many say that the sequel to Terminator is better than the first one and even director James Cameron might agree. In this film, a cyborg, identical to the one who failed to kill Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton), must now protect her ten-year-old son John from an even more advanced and powerful cyborg.
Cameron has always pushed the envelope for technology in film and this became one of the biggest films in history to present this story and make the cyborg look authentic.
Real Steel (2011)
If you have gone to an arcade, you’ve seen those large robots that you can control and battle someone else with using the joysticks attached. Real Steel took that concept and made it into a heartfelt story with Hugh Jackman playing a struggling ex-boxer. In the near future, robot boxing is a top sport and this ex-boxer feels like he found a champion from a discarded robot. It’s always the concepts that could very well happen in the future that could make people appreciate the story being told.
Battleship (2012)
Director Peter Berg knows how to make a great action flick and Battleship was an underappreciated sci-fi film. A fleet of ships is forced to do battle with an armada of unknown origins in order to discover their destructive goals. This is loosely based on the board game of the same name and it was a bit over-the-top. But it was still a fun action movie that brought the board game to life. Not many people expected this to be made, but it’s interesting to see how they integrated the concept of the game.
RoboCop (1987)
In a dystopic and crime-ridden Detroit, a terminally wounded cop returns to the force as a powerful cyborg haunted by submerged memories. Even though the special effects weren’t the greatest back in ’87, RoboCop was still fun to watch. It was hot off the heels of the first Terminator so naturally it was time to pump out as many cyborg movies as they could to capitalize on the success of one movie. However, RoboCop was always in the shadows of Terminator and became lost in the mix instead of gaining any recognition.
Edge of Tomorrow (2014)
This film is also known as Live Die Repeat just in case anyone finds it difficult to find. Tom Cruise and Emily Blunt star in this sci-fi time-loop film which is one of the most underappreciated films of the 2010s. A soldier fighting aliens gets to relive the same day over and over again, the day restarting every time he dies. It plays out like a video game but the way the story is pieced together with new information each day is incredible.
Rampage (2018)
When three different animals become infected with a dangerous pathogen, a primatologist and a geneticist team up to stop them from destroying Chicago. Surprisingly, this Dwayne Johnson film did well at the box office and people rather enjoyed the different spin on interacting with primates.
Godzilla vs. Kong (2021)
Those who have been fans of both monster movies are in for a treat when these two big guns come together to have one epic battle. This is the epic next chapter in the cinematic Monsterverse that pits two of the greatest icons in motion picture history against each other — the fearsome Godzilla and the mighty Kong — with humanity caught in the balance. Debates were had on whether Godzilla could actually take on Kong and vice versa.
Oblivion (2013)
Director Joseph Kosinski and Tom Cruise had worked together before the successful Top Gun: Maverick. This film was a sci-fi adventure that had a veteran assigned to extract Earth’s remaining resources as he begins to question what he knows about his mission and himself. This is an interesting take on space exploration and what could possibly happen in the future. This is marked rather high on IMDb and is one of the better sci-fi films to come out in the 2010s.
Alita: Battle Angel (2019)
James Cameron returned to the writer’s room with Laeta Kalogridis and Yukito Kishiro to create a wicked cyborg story with new technology. It’s true Cameron pushes the boundaries with storytelling but because he was in the midst of working on Avatar: The Way of Water, director Robert Rodriguez was behind the camera for this film. And what an incredible collaboration this was. A deactivated cyborg’s revived, but can’t remember anything of her past and goes on a quest to find out who she is.
Do you have any other recommendations for movies like Pacific Rim? Let us know!
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