Charlie Hunnam in Pacific Rim
Charlie Hunnam is an actor who is well and truly on the rise and is back on the big screen this week with Pacific Rim.
The movie sees the British actor team up with director Guillermo Del Toro for the very first time in what is the biggest movie role of his career to date.
Hunnam kicked off his acting career in TV back in 1998 when he appeared in Byker Grove and Microsoap for single episodes.
The role that really boosted his status in the UK came a year later when he played Nathan Maloney in Queer as Folk.
The Channel 4 drama was created by Russell T Davies and followed the lives of three gay men living in Manchester.
Hunnam went on Young Americana and Undeclared; while the latter was met with critical acclaim it was cancelled after one season.
But Hunnam was starting to make his move into film with Whatever Happened to Harold Smith, Abandon and Nicholas Nickleby; he took on the title role in the Charles Dickens adaptation.
The movie roles kept coming throughout the mid noughties as he appeared in the likes of Cold Mountain, Green Street Hooligans and Children of Men.
But it was back on TV that he really did make his breakthrough, landing the role of Jackson 'Jax' Teller in Sons of Anarchy.
He took on the role for the first time back in 2008 and has appeared in seventy episode through to 2013.
Sons of Anarchy has been a hit with both audiences and critics and Hunnam has found himself in the awards mix; he has received nominations at the Emmy's and Critics' Choice Television Awards for his work.
We have already seen him on the big screen this year in Deadfall and now he is back with Pacific Rim.
The sci-fi blockbuster is the biggest movie and biggest role of his career as he takes on the role of Raleigh Becket in the film.
Pacific Rim follows the war between mankind and an alien race as humans fight back against the invasion.
To combat the giant Kaiju, a special type of weapon was devised: massive robots, called Jaegers, which are controlled simultaneously by two pilots whose minds are locked in a neural bridge.
But even the Jaegers are proving nearly defenseless in the face of the relentless Kaiju. On the verge of defeat, the forces defending mankind have no choice but to turn to two unlikely heroes, a washed up former pilot (Hunnam) and an untested trainee (Kikuchi), who are teamed to drive a legendary but seemingly obsolete Jaeger from the past. Together, they stand as mankind’s last hope against the mounting apocalypse.
The movie sees Del Toro in the director's chair for the first time since 2008 while Idris Elba, Rinko Kikuchi, Charlie Day and Ron Perlman are all also on the cast list.
And Hunnam will be reuniting with Del Toro for his next film project Crimson Peak. The horror film is set to hit the big screen in 2015 and will also star Benedict Cumberbatch and Jessica Chastain.
Charlie Hunnam really is someone to watch out for over the next few years as a collaboration with Del Toro could be very successful for him
Pacific Rim is released 12th July
Tagged in Charlie Hunnam