Guillermo del Toro‘s more-anime-than-live-action blockbuster Pacific Rim is getting an animated sequel series which will expand the franchise beyond the two feature films.
The Netflix-funded series will have two seasons and is being created by eminent animation studio Polygon Pictures Inc. alongside Legendary Entertainment who produced the films.
Speaking at Project Anime, an industry event proceeding Los Angeles’ massive Anime Expo, Legendary Entertainment‘s executive vice president of brand development and consumer products, Elie Dekel made the announcement:
“[This is] one of the biggest budget anime series I’ve had the pleasure of working on, and I think that speaks to the commitment of Netflix and Legendary [to anime]”
The sequel series will reportedly tell the story of two siblings who come across a massive, abandoned Jager mech in the search for their lost parents.
It’s unknown at this time if Del Toro will reprise his producer role as he did in 2018’s Steven S. DeKnight sequel, Pacific Rim: Uprising.
The Pacific Rim series is reportedly one of five animated series which Netflix is currently producing as original content for their streaming service; others include an animated continuation of the dark sci fi series Altered Carbon as well as an animated adaptation of the Cagaster of an Insect Cage manga series and a Jurassic Park series titled Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous.
To me this seems like a natural and worthwhile evolution for the franchise; the dedication to anime tropes were actually a little bit offputting in the original film, in my opinion, but continuing this style across a more familiar medium would probably right that nitpick. Plus with shows like Love, Death, Robots raising awareness of the amazing potential of modern animation, we’ll really have to wait for a trailer before we can even decide exactly what is in store here.
That said, I do think that while moving Altered Carbon to animation will no doubt be a more cost-effective means to keep that franchise going, it seems at this point a little bit more like a step down no matter how grandiose the planned vision for the future. Good sci fi is precious and Altered Carbon, for its occasional flaws, was damned good in live action.
What do you guys think of Netflix ramping up their original animated content and leading with a Pacific Rim series?
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