BEATING A DEAD DINOSAUR TO DEATH

_{Dr. Loomis (Jonathan Bailey) and Zora (Scarlett Johanson) in Jurassic Park: Rebirth (2025) (Jasin Boland / Universal Pictures)}

(Spoiler Warning: I am going to comment on Michael Crichton’s original Jurassic Park novel. If you haven’t read it and are planning to do so, do not read the first and third paragraph)

At the end of the Jurassic Park novel (but not the film inspired by it), the protagonists destroy the island with explosives. That is a logical move to make and is much more realistic than the way any of the 7 Jurassic films in the series ended. But then again, if any of the movie characters did that, we wouldn’t have a series, would we?

Jurassic Park was a successful novel, but it became a bigger deal when Steven Spielberg adapted it for the big screen in 1993. Spielberg worked his magic with his usual trademarks of big budgets, terrific special effects, and good action sequences. As a result, what might have been just a dinosaur movie became a blockbuster that earned $914 million worldwide and was the highest grossing movie of all time until Titanic arrived in 1997.

With that success, Spielberg and Crichton were bound to deliver a follow up. In the original Jurassic Park novel, Jeff Goldblum’s character Dr. Ian Malcolm died. However, in the sequel The Lost World, Crichton brought back Malcolm as the protagonist. There was no explanation for why he is alive again, but Malcolm had been the most memorable human in the original Jurassic Park film, so this seemed a logical choice for Spielberg’s adaption as well. Although both the novel and the film made money, The Lost World is not remembered as fondly as the original Jurassic Park. Even Spielberg expressed disappointment with the film, confessing that midway through making it, he became disenchanted with it.

Although Spielberg wouldn’t direct another Jurassic film and Crichton no longer wrote any novels about Jurassic Park, Jurassic Park III came out in 2001. Despite making $366.8 million worldwide with a $93 million budget, it is to date the lowest grossing installment of the series. At the time, it seemed that the Jurassic series came to an end.

However, in 2015, they decided to reboot the whole series with Jurassic World. In this story, Jurassic World is a dinosaur-themed park open to the public. One would wonder why this would happen after the events of the preceding three films, but it made no difference in the end as Jurassic World was by far the most entertaining Jurassic film since the original. It made $1.671 billion worldwide, of which $653 million in North America and $1.018 billion in other countries. It is the third highest grossing film of all time.

Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard, the protagonists of Jurassic World, would return for Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018) and Jurassic World Dominion (2022), which also featured Jeff Goldblum. But just like before, the audience was disappointed with the sequels, as reflected in the diminishing box office returns, $1.3 billion for Fallen Kingdom and 1 billion for Dominion.

Once again, the series producers responded with a reboot, this time in the form of Jurassic World: Rebirth. This film was directed by Gareth Edwards, who had directed Godzilla (2014), and starred Scarlett Johansson and two-time Oscar winner Mahershala Ali. Even the screenwriter of the original Jurassic Park film, David Koepp, returned. Does this reboot the Jurassic series? In a word, no.

In this movie, dinosaurs live on a tropical island that cannot be legally accessed. As noted before, Crichton’s ending of Jurassic Park would still be the more logical, but would preclude any further movies.

Pharmaceutical executive Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend) has realized that a new drug to treat heart failure could be produced with DNA from three dinosaurs. Since access to the island is prohibited, he decides to recruit two ex-military covert operatives Zora (Johansson) and Duncan (Ali) for the mission.

They bring with them paleontologist Dr. Henry Loomis (Jonathan Bailey) to extract samples from the dinosaurs. As soon as he is introduced, we immediately know that he will be the most moral character of the film. Loomis likes the idea of making the drug but he wants it to be free for everyone, whereas Krebs is more concerned with making a profit than helping people. Zora and Duncan agree to his proposal, as they need money to settle some debts. Although they appreciate that Loomis’ idea is morally right, helping him realize it wouldn’t get them out of their financial peril. Yet, pretty much any viewer can guess what Zora and Duncan will choose.

However, while all these characters’ motivation for going to the island is clear, we can’t understand why Reuben Delgado (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) would choose to go sailing in its vicinity with his two daughters Teresa (Luna Blaise) and Isabella (Audrina Miranda) and Teresa’s boyfriend Xavier (David Iacono). When Reuben’s ship becomes shipwrecked by a seawater dinosaur, I imagine that audiences are not surprised, as this would add to the plot. Still, watching the scene, I kept wanting to yell at Reuben, “This wouldn’t have happened if you hadn’t decided to sail there.” The filmmakers wanted to make Krebs the most immoral character in the film but to me Reuben isn’t any better.

Anyway, the ship containing Krebs, Zora, and Duncan finds Reuben’s family and rescues them. However, they too are attacked by sea dinosaurs. To prevent Teresa from calling for help and jeopardize his secret mission, Krebs throws her overboard. The Delgaldos and Xavier jump into water to rescue Teresa, thus separating themselves from the expedition team. 

Eventually, the team’s ship crashes and lands on the island. The Delgaldos also come to the island but are separated from the team until the climax. Zora informs the team that she has called up a rescue helicopter to circle the island in 24 hours, giving them enough time to complete the mission.

As the movie progresses, we learn there used to be a laboratory on the island where dinosaurs were cross-bread to make more species for Jurassic World, the theme park. Of course, there were mutations as well. At the film’s climax, we meet one of the mutated dinosaurs, but the filmmakers didn’t bring much imagination into this creation. Basically, it seems like the designers watched Alien (1979) one night and thought it would be a good idea to put the alien’s face on a T-Rex and stopped there. Also, this dinosaur seems to be rather discerning in his taste, as he predictably may chase the good guys around but doesn’t eat most of them (at least anyone who is a major good guy is spared), whereas he does eat all the bad guys in this movie. The dinosaur is also careful not to destroy any of the vials containing the dinosaur DNA needed to make the drug for heart disease.

Critics have not been kind to Jurassic World: Rebirth, but neither have audiences. They have given it a B grade on CinemaScore, which is the second lowest grade in the series next to Jurassic Park III’s B-. Still, it is doing reasonably well at the box office, and has so far taken $529.5 million worldwide. While that would be impressive for most movies, it is nothing compared to some of the series entries that earned over a billion dollars. In its first week, it grossed $312 million worldwide but only took $217.5 million in the second week, suggesting that this downward trajectory will continue.

At this point, the Jurassic series has exhausted itself and should go the same way as the real-life dinosaurs: extinct.