REVIEW: Pacific Rim Uprising brings back the robots for one more tired rumble in Tokyo

REVIEW: In Pacific Rim: Uprising, there is a lot missing from a drab, lethargic sequel to the original rock-’em-sock-’em robots-versus-monsters hit from 2013.

PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING (M)

Rating: one and a half stars (1.5 out of 5)

Director: Steven S. DeKnight (feature debut)

Starring: John Boyega, Scott Eastwood, Cailee Spaeny, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day.

Nothing to do but lurch and destroy

There is a lot missing from this drab, lethargic sequel to the 2013, rock-’em-sock-’em robots-versus-monsters hit Pacific Rim.

scene from Pacific Rim Uprising.

The most telling absence is that of the first movie’s director Guillermo del Toro, last seen clearing room in his trophy cabinet after winning multiple Oscars for The Shape of Water.

The Mexican master’s crafty artfulness is nowhere to be found in this gloomily booming follow-up, which exhibits no real filmmaking flair whatsoever.

Replacement director Steven S. DeKnight is a veteran of episodic television making his filmmaking debut, and his work here is more about corners cut than minds expanding or jaws dropping.

The loss of not one, but two quality leading men in Idris Elba and Charlie Hunnam isn’t helping here either.

John Boyega (as Jake) and Scott Eastwood (as Nate) in a scene from film Pacific Rim Uprising.

The one marquee name in play this time is a current Star Wars team member, John Boyega, and he does push hard to get this big fat boulder of apocalyptic bombast moving somehow.

Sadly, it is a waste of energy on his part, and a waste of time on ours.

The plot fast-forwards the calamitous CGI clashes of the Jaegers (big robots) and the Kaiju (big monsters) a decade down the line from the original, where Tokyo is set to host an obligatory third-act trashing and trampling.

Jaegers in a scene from film Pacific Rim Uprising

While we wait for that (admittedly awesome) spectacle to arrive, our conflicted young hero Jake Pentecost (Boyega) - Elba played his dad in the first movie, in case you were wondering - helps train some cadets in the dual mystic arts of Jaeger wrangling and Kaiju mangling.

scene from Pacific Rim Uprising.