Guillermo del Toro's love of Japanese culture seen in "Pacific Rim". “KAIJU” and robots with thorough attention to detail

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2019.06.17Hiroaki Saito

From 100 candidates, it took over a year to design every detail.

Other Jaegers that appear include Australia's Striker Eureka, China's Crimson Typhoon, and Russia's Cherno Alpha, but Guillermo confesses that it took quite a long time to complete them.

``We first designed about 100 robot silhouettes. From there, we narrowed down the candidates every week, similar to `` American Idol '' (laughs). About two months later, we narrowed down the candidates. As the designs were narrowed down, each Jaeger's character began to emerge, such as the elegant lines of the silhouette, which would be appropriate for Japan's Tacit Ronin.

The Day After we decide on the details of the design. Cherno Alpha incorporates Soviet-era T-series tanks and nuclear reactors, while Crimson Typhoon is modeled after medieval Chinese armor, with gold and crimson colors. By that time, the characteristics of each Jaeger had been determined, and Gypsy Danger, which uses power in a calm manner, was transferred to Striker Eureka, whose combat mode is at the forefront. Furthermore, detailed functions such as where to fill the fuel and how to charge the battery will be added, as well as Signs with words such as "danger" and "charging complete."

It took four to five months to decide on the design, and then another five to six months to distribute it to each country and decide on the functions, until all the designs were finalized.

According to Guillermo, the generic name "Jaeger" comes from the idea that the early technology was developed in Germany. Jaeger is a German word meaning fighter plane or tank.

Another thing that caught my eye in Guillermo's studio was the number of figurines placed on the table. These KAIJUs are about 1m in size. Of course, it was created as a CG model, but Guillermo says with a child-like, innocent smile, ``It's only true that I created it for a movie, but its original purpose was for my collection.''

A huge sea cucumber-like object is placed next to the figure, and according to Guillermo, ``This is KAIJU's secretory gland.'' He is a hardcore otaku, as he not only designed the intestines, heart, and brain, but also the parasites that crawl on KAIJU's skin. These details can be seen in the completed scene in which KAIJU's corpse is laid down.

Guillermo's favorite Japanese monster characters are ``the crazy feel of Alien Baltan and Pigmon, and the beautiful form of Baragon,'' but KAIJU from Pacific Rim tries to remove Japanese monsters from his mind as much as possible. It is said that I would also add that the name KAIJU was already written in a short story by Travis Beecham that served as the original idea.

By the way, Guillermo says that 250 feet (76.2 meters) was the appropriate "size" for Jaeger and KAIJU. After comparing it with airplanes, cars, ships, and the Golden Gate Bridge, which also appears in the movie, we settled on that size.

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