del Toro talks Pacific Rim’s different endings, no director’s cut on DVD, and what might appear in sequel

Last Updated on August 2, 2021

After a strong marketing campaign Guillermo del Toro's PACIFIC RIM opened this past weekend to a disappointing third place finish at the box office, pulling in only $38 million domestically and losing the top spot to DESPICABLE ME 2's minions and Adam Sandler's fart jokes in GROWN UPS 2. Though the film did brisk business overseas, it still has a way to go before it earns back its $190 million budget and a sequel can move forward, turning into the franchise we all hope it can be. The next few weeks can determine that (and let's pray to the movie gods that it is so) but until then del Toro is already sharing what may appear in part two, what we can expect on the DVD, and the three different endings he shot.

del Toro has teased some of his ideas for a possible sequel, sharing an idea rooted in one particular, crucial plot-point from the first film. It's a bit spoilerish if you haven't seen PACIFIC RIM yet, so be warned. Speaking to Bleeding Cool on the potential sequel, del Toro states…

There was a line that I deleted from the movie that will come back if I do a second movie. Newt explained that the Kaiju are not carbon based organisms like humans, they are silicon based. The only part I left of his explanation is that they have a hive mentality, meaning that if you “drift” with a Kaiju brain, you are drifting with every Kaiju alive.

Depending on the duration of the drift the information might be complete or incomplete, but the Kaiju know everything the human drifts with them knows. That’s as much as I can tell you without spoiling the sequel. Well, that’s providing there is a sequel – if there isn’t one, I promise, I’ll spill the beans.

Looking ahead to the films DVD/Blu-Ray release later this year, del Toro shared what we can expect, as well as a bit about what we shouldn't expect, when PACIFIC RIM hits shelves on disc. And while del Toro has admitted that his friend and filmmaker Alejandro Gonzalez Iñárritu helped him cut ten minutes out of the movie, don't expect a longer version on the eventual DVD.

This is my director’s cut. There will not be an extended cut right now, we’re not planning on it, but there will be deleted scenes and they were deleted for a reason.

We’re going to record the commentary in the next few weeks. I prepare my commentaries very carefully. As you’ll know if you have listened to any of the commentaries on my other DVDs and Blu-rays, I run a very open ship. I try to tell people what was difficult, what went wrong, what they should watch out for. I think that for a new generation of filmmakers, commentaries can be film school.

The video [documentary] content will be quite complete, though sadly the home video, DVD and Blu-ray market is shrinking so we can’t be as extravagant as we were with other discs in the past, but my philosophy of this is very simple: if you buy one of my movies, a toy, or a collectable from one of my movies, I try to give people a piece of merchandising or memorabilia that I would be happy to pay that price for.

If you buy a Sideshow maquette or you buy a DVD or a Blu-ray, I can guarantee you I put many personal hours of effort into it. I didn’t delegate it, I supervised every piece of merchandising that is significant. I don’t supervise T-shirts or bandanas or cup holders, but everything that is one way significant, I supervise myself.

Now the question is whether or not the extras on the PACIFIC RIM discs will contain the alternate closing scenes that del Toro shot. In speaking with Badass Digest, del Toro spilled on three different endings that were filmed, explaining…

When I was working on the movie we had three or four different versions of the relationship between Charlie and Rinko because I wanted to see if I could make a story about two people liking each other without having to end in a kiss. So when I shot the ending we shot three versions. I’ve never done this before, but instinctively I thought we should do three versions. We did one version where they kiss and it almost felt weird. They’re good friends, they’re pals, good colleagues.

So del Toro shot an ending with a kiss, an ending with no kiss, and the third ending he shot was…

Basically just a huge exhale like ‘We made it.’ But the thing that stayed in the movie is the hint that there may be a love story one day, but it’s not there yet.

Maybe in the sequel, if it gets made.

PACIFIC RIM is currently in theaters. Charlie Hunnam, Charlie Day, Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi, Robert Kazinsky, Ron Perlman, Max Martini, Clifton Collins, Jr., Burn Gorman, Larry Joe Campbell, Diego Klattenhoff and Brad William Henke all star.