Empire Australasia — December 2017

WORDS IAN FREER

John Boyega takes centre stage

as the 600-foot monsters return

ALIEN

UPRISING

ON-SET

EXCLUSIVE

PACIFIC RIM:

UPRISING

OUT 22 MARCH 2018

Former Jaeger pilot
cadets and rivals
Jake Pentecost
(John Boyega)
and Nate Lambert
(Scott Eastwood)
join forces.
Below: Watch out Kaijus,
the Jaegers are on the
war path.

ONE OF THE most colourful aspects of

Pacifi c Rim, along with the fearsome creatures,

was the spectacular monicker of Idris Elba’s

apocalypse canceller: Stacker Pentecost. The

sequel features John Boyega as his son, so what

do we get this time? Boring old Jake.

“I felt the same way,” laughs Boyega on set

at Fox Studios in Australia. “Jake? I wonder

if Stacker is a nickname that stuck.”

Set a decade after the fi rst fi lm, in Pacifi c Rim:

Uprising the alien monsters, known as Kaiju, have

returned. And although he knows his way around

a Jaeger — the giant mech suits used to fi ght them

—Boyega’s Jake is no hero.

“At the start of the fi lm, he is an absolute

crook,” says Boyega. “There are rogue Jaegers

where people have collected spare parts and

made their own machines. Jake is stealing from

people and selling Jaeger parts.”

If Jake is the prodigal son, then the scene

Empire witnesses is a homecoming. Jake is

brought to the Shatterdome, Pan Pacifi c Defense

Corps’ HQ in China, after being arrested. Jake will

encounter both his estranged sister Mako (Rinko

Kikuchi) and his former cadet partner Lambert

(Scott Eastwood), now a successful ranger.

“It’s like seeing a friend after they graduate

from college and your

life is not as successful,”

says Boyega. “It’s that

moment of reckoning.”

If Uprising

is upping the character

dynamics, then it isn’t

at the expense of the

action. “This was hard

work,” says Boyega

(also a producer on

the fi lm). “I had to

slide down a Jaeger

arm from top to

bottom. I dropped

down 20 feet straight.

That was messed up.”

Spoken like a true

Pentecost.