Thursday, July 18, 2013

Bathroom Monologue: Rescuing Pacific Rim



Dear Stacker Pentecost,

I notice that you are devoting your life to fighting the giant enemies of civilization. As a mechanical being that has not only spent its entire existence in this service, but was actually built for it, I am deeply sympathetic to your cause and wish your organization the best of luck.

I actually wish you more than luck for, as someone built to help in this struggle, it's often been an issue that I was not built larger. Like my creators, you seem to have constructed robot armors at approximately the same height and mass as the monsters you face. Unlike my creators, though, you seem to have at least four times the resources, given that you have four machines, where there is only one of me. I know, also, that you have several outdated machines of similar dimensions, and all of these are also similar to the titanic crabs, pterodactyls and whatever the glowing squidy thing was.

Have you ever considered taking all the material for several machines and making one that was much bigger than the giant monsters you face? Given that your plan of attack is always fisticuffs (my favorite professional approach, as well), punching the things to death would be considerably easier if they were much smaller than you. Many have been the days on which I wished I hadn't been built to the specifications, down to the meter, of the monster I had to pursue. If only I was as much bigger than him as he was than my creators, then the fight would have been over very quickly, perhaps leaving you time to get that nice Asian lady some psychotherapy.

Best,
Mechagodzilla

12 comments:

  1. Replies
    1. Just to clarify - this is all just a gag. I love Pacific Rim the way it is. It was just fun to poke it from the point of view of a rival construct.

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  2. Mechgodzilla and MechaKong should've both been bigger. But they do speak from experience.

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    1. At least in the case of MechaKong, it was clearly built by wacky semi-competent weirdos. Mechagodzilla has had so many iterations that it probably got frustrating for it eventually.

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  3. I have not seen the movie - just the trailers - but this is SO true!

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    1. The movie is very fun! It speaks to the kaiju tradition so well.

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  4. This is entirely too logical an argument for those movies, I can only assume Mechagodzilla has gained a heck of a lot of wisdom in his years of experience.

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  5. Stacker should not allow writers and scriptwriters to write the requirements specs. They're always going to do this kind of thing to "make the storyline more interesting."

    Go go (Mecha)Godzilla!

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  6. Not sure who this Stacker person is, but the advice here is sound.

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  7. Seriously! It's so dang obvious. The need for this letter shouldn't even be out there. It's about time someone said something. *claps*

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  8. Okay, but from an engineering standpoint you have to take into account load stress, manoeuverability, stability... It may well be the robots are already at the far end of their maximum size limit using the materials available on Earth. If the battle could be taken to Earth orbit that would be a different discussion of course... wait, what do you mean "overthinking it"?

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    Replies
    1. I would love to see what screenwriting conceit they invented for the ocean-based monsters to suddenly be confronted in space. I'm entirely on board.

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