Guillermo Del Toro Addresses ‘Pacific Rim 2’ Delay: “As Far As I’m Concerned, It’s Not Gone”
If Universal really is canceling the apocalypse, someone forgot to tell directorGuillermo del Toro. Earlier this week we got the very discouraging news thatPacific Rim 2had been"halted indefinitely,“and quite possibly scrapped altogether. But del Toro insists it’s still on. “As far as I’m concerned, it’s not gone,” he said. Read the Guillermo del ToroPacific Rim 2comments after the jump.
Del Toro responded to thePacific Rim 2delay news in a chat withEW. “We are still turning in a screenplay and a budget in three weeks,” he said. “As far as I’m concerned, it’s not gone. We’re still on it.” According to him, it’s just a delay. “It moved further,” he said. “I may do another movie in the middle.”
According toTHR’s earlier story, Universal was getting cold feet aboutPacific Rim 2, as the original was “one of those films that grosses a lot ($411 million worldwide) while being so costly that a follow-up isn’t a sure thing.” Indeed, it made just over $101 million domestically on a $190 million production budget. But it did well overseas, particularly in that all-important Chinese market, which is the only reason a sequel was considered even a remote possibility.
Del Toro had started making plans forPacific Rim 2(working title:Maelstrom) before the first one even hit theaters. Several characters from the first film are expected back, including those played byCharlie Hunnam,Rinko Kikuchi,Charlie Day, andBurn Gorman, but it’s said to be a"very different"type of movie.
Fans of del Toro know this is far from the first time that one of his passion projects has been shoved aside. But del Toro being del Toro, he has a pretty good sense of humor about it. “I can tell you this, if I was a billionaire, I would definitely doHellboy 3,Pacific Rim 2, andAt the Mountains of Madness.” He continued, laughing: “And I would quickly become a millionaire.”
