Pacific Rim |
- "...The acid factor of the Kaiju blood creates a toxic phenomenon known as Kaiju Blue."
- —TV Reporter[1]
"Kaiju Blue" is the designated Pan Pacific Defense Corps term for the toxic agent in the blood of the Kaiju.
Biology[]
Kaiju blood is phosphorescent in nature[2] and highly toxic to the Earth as well as humans.[note 1] It contaminates the environment where a Kaiju is either injured or killed. When the body of a Kaiju begins to decompose, its blood becomes a vapor (referred to as "bloodmist" by the K-Science division) that allows it to spread throughout the surrounding area.
The nature of Kaiju blood allows it to stain anything, particularly human skin. Although humans can use breathing masks as a way of protecting themselves, they can still be infected or poisoned by the bloodmist.[note 2] If Kaiju Blue is inhaled, the victim will begin to cough up a blue vapor and possibly even die from exposure.[3]
History[]
In the early stages of the war, HAZMAT teams were dispatched immediately after a Kaiju was eliminated to clean up the area and remove the toxic remains. But as the war progressed and more Kaiju began to attack, their bodies began to be left where they fell, and the Kaiju Blue was left to run.[1]
However, in many cases, black market dealers who specialized in Kaiju organs, such as Hannibal Chau, swooped in after a Kaiju had fallen and invented methods to neutralize the Kaiju Blue, allowing them to harvest a Kaiju's body parts without having to wear any kind of protective gear. A good example of this is the Kaiju Reckoner. After it was killed during its attack on Hong Kong in 2016, its carcass was left to rot and the toxic effects of its blood were neutralized through chemical means, allowing a small shanty town to eventually spring up around its bones.[1]
Development[]
In a effort to reduce blood and gore to appeal to a wide audience, Guillermo del Toro and the production designers for Pacific Rim decided that the blood of the Kaiju would be blue, particularly to create a color contrast in the Baby Kaiju set in Hong Kong and how it would spread in an environment "like an evil mold".[3]
Costume and Production designer, Kate Hawley and Andrew Neskormny referenced photography of an Asian fabric factory stained with indigo dye as means to explain how people were affected by breathing in Kaiju Blood in its vapor form.[3]
Trivia[]
- According to the novelization of Pacific Rim, the human body will go into shock after being exposed to or inhaling Kaiju Blue.[4][note 3]
Gallery[]
Screenshots[]
Notes[]
- ↑ Travis Beacham: "Kaiju blood is phosphorescent blue and is extremely toxic."
- ↑ "During pre-production Costume Designer Kate Hawley sent Production Deisnger Andrew Neskormny a photo of an Asian factory where indigo fabric was being dyed. "Everything gets stained," recalls Neskormny. "People's clothes, their fingers, their nails, just everything. I said 'Oh, yeah, that looks geat. We've got to do a bit of that.'" Hawley took the idea even further. "The idea is that that the blue blood had got into people's bodies," she says, "and you see bits of blue coming through their breathing masks, like a subtle little poison.""
- ↑ "Kaiju Blue was bad news, a kind of shock reaction the human body suffered when recently dead kaiju started to off-gas toxins in the hours after they died. It killed a lot of people when they went down in populated areas. Today it would only kill fish, and who knew if they got Kaiju Blue, anyway?"
References[]
|