9. Pacific Rim - Idris Elba's Flashback Fight
In this year's Pacific Rim, Idris Elba plays a man named Stacker Pentecost who fought the Kaiju as a single Jaeger pilot before he becomes the commander of the Jaeger forces. In other words, he used to punch large alien monsters in the face using a big robot suit. The scene in question takes place years before the action of the main story, during Mako's flashback/breakdown during her Jaeger test. Mako, played by Rinko Kikuchi, remembers when a Kaiju attacked her city and she ran away in the growing wreckage. Right as the Kaiju seems to be gunning for the little girl, a Jaeger piloted by Elba's character distracts it and beats it to death offscreen as the camera focuses on Mako. This could have been for budget reasons as the digital effects necessary to believably render each battle must have been costly, but due to the large budget of the movie it was more likely a story decision. First of all, it makes sense to focus on Mako because this particular moment in the film specifically comes from her memory (and the audience/Raleigh sees it through the neural link from the Jaeger,
see this comic for more details if you're confused). Also, due to the sixteen other robot vs. monster alien fights in the movie and the dramatic nature of this scene it made more sense for it to be about something other than behemoths fighting one another. But seriously, who wouldn't want to see another beatdown courtesy of Idris Elba?