Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018) review

Jurassic Park is a film series that needs no introduction at this point. What started with director Steven Spielberg’s 1993 adaptation of author Michael Crichton’s 1990 novel of the same name has gone on to become one of the most famous franchises in pop culture history. The original Jurassic Park still stands as one of the most famous blockbusters of all-time, touted for its groundbreaking visual effects (both animatronic and CGI-based) that were used to bring the story’s dinosaur creatures to life. Because of this, it was the highest-grossing film of its time, earning over $914 million worldwide, a record that stood for four years until James Cameron’s Titanic became the first film to earn over $1 billion at the worldwide box-office (Jurassic Park would ultimately join the billion-dollar club itself when it was re-released in 3-D in 2013 for its 20^th anniversary). It was then followed by two immediate sequels, the Spielberg-directed The Lost World: Jurassic Park in 1997, which adapted Crichton’s 1995 sequel novelization that was made after the success of the first film, and the Joe Johnston-directed Jurassic Park III in 2001, the first film in the franchise that was not based on a Crichton novel. Both films did well at the box-office but neither of them was as well-received by critics and audiences compared to the first film. After that, a planned fourth film spent several years stuck in development hell due to numerous rewrites of the script, with writers like William Monahan, John Sayles, and Mark Protosevich being brought in to try and make it all work, ultimately to no avail.

It ultimately saw the light of day in 2015 with Jurassic World, directed by Colin Trevorrow, fresh off his 2012 indie hit Safety Not Guaranteed, who also co-wrote it with writing partner Derek Connolly. Serving more as a direct sequel to the original Jurassic Park (while still recognizing the previous two films as canon), the film was a monster hit at the box-office when it was released that summer. It earned over $208 million on its opening weekend in the United States and over $524 million worldwide, officially setting the record for the biggest opening weekend of all-time, a record that has since been outdone by Avengers: Infinity War both domestically and worldwide. And while critics and audiences seemed to be just as split on it as they were with the previous two films, it was still considered to be the best of the original film’s sequels. Cut to three years later and the series continues from its biggest financial hit to date with Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. This time, though, Colin Trevorrow isn’t in the director’s chair due to the commitment that he made to Star Wars: Episode IX before he ultimately left the project, though he and Connolly are still involved here as the film’s main writers. Instead, we have J.A. Bayona, who was previously considered to direct Jurassic World before he backed out due to fear of it being a rushed production, behind the camera. Like Trevorrow, Bayona’s been well-known for his work in the indie circuit with critically-acclaimed hits like 2007’s The Orphanage, 2012’s The Impossible, and 2016’s A Monster Calls. And for his first major blockbuster outing, he proceeds to give us yet another enjoyable dinosaur-centric adventure that does manage to carve out its own identity when compared to its four predecessors.

It has been three years since Jurassic World, the second major attempt at realizing industrialist John Hammond’s vision of a theme park featuring genetically-cloned dinosaurs was abandoned after the park was ravaged by its newest creation, a genetically-produced hybrid dinosaur known as the Indominus Rex. When it’s discovered that the island of Isla Nublar is about to be ravaged by an eruption from its previously dormant volcano, the U.S. Senate decides to not attempt to rescue the island’s dinosaurs to avoid any further dinosaur-related catastrophes. While this is going on, Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard), Jurassic World’s former operations manager who now runs an activist group seeking to rescue the dinosaurs, is approached by Sir Benjamin Lockwood (James Cromwell), who was Hammond’s primary business partner in his initial dinosaur-cloning experiments. Lockwood and his aide, Eli Mills (Rafe Spall), devise a plan to extract the dinosaurs from the island and have them moved to a safe location away from any human interference. Claire is selected to lead the rescue team and she also recruits her ‘ex’ Owen Grady (Chris Pratt), Jurassic World’s former Velociraptor trainer, who is ultimately convinced to go when it’s revealed that Blue, the last surviving member of both his raptor pack and her species in general, is one of Lockwood and Mills’ primary targets. Once on the island, however, Claire and Owen learn that Mills and his team have different plans for the dinosaurs. Instead of transporting them to safety, Mills plans to have the dinosaurs be sold off to buyers all over the world. And as for Blue, she’s needed to further the development of a new genetic hybrid that’s touted as being even more dangerous than the Indominus Rex, the Indoraptor.

Many have touted Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom as being more akin to a horror film, and it’s easy to see why. The way in which some of the film’s biggest sequences are filmed does give off a neat horror vibe, whether it’s a young girl being hunted by a vicious raptor in her own home or two characters being hunted by a Baryonyx in an abandoned facility that’s slowly being destroyed by lava. And overall, this does give a nice new spin to the traditional franchise concept of humans being hunted by dinosaurs. Still, even with that in mind, admittedly the story doesn’t always match the quality of some of this film’s most memorable sequences. This is especially the case when one big twist regarding a secret about one of the new characters is brought up but is never expanded upon after that reveal despite it being based around an intriguing new concept for this universe. Still, like the previous films, Fallen Kingdom doesn’t skimp on its dinosaur action, with a thrilling finale set not on the island of Isla Nublar but an old gothic mansion. On that note, Fallen Kingdom is quite arguably the best-looking film yet out of the Jurassic Park franchise. The cinematography from Bayona regular Oscar Faura produces some truly vibrant imagery, especially during the sequences where Isla Nublar is being ravaged by its volcano. And for those who were disappointed by the previous film only featuring one dinosaur animatronic in favor of CG-created dinosaurs (which weren’t even ‘bad’, even…), you’ll be pleased to know that Bayona goes for a greater balance between the two visual mediums in this film. Yes, there’s quite a lot of CG dinosaurs in this film, but there are also plenty of instances where the same great style of animatronics that was perfected by the legendary Stan Winston (which won him an Oscar for Best Visual Effects for his work on the original Jurassic Park) are on full display.

Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard are the only major cast members from Jurassic World to reprise their roles in this film, and the two of them are just as excellent here as they were in that film. Pratt’s great charisma is once again in top form here, and this film does give him some stronger character development to work with through the emotional bond that he shares with Blue. And while Bryce Dallas Howard doesn’t necessarily get to work with the same great transformative arc that Claire underwent in the first film, going from an uptight, work-focused businesswoman to a more emotionally-driven badass, she still gets to have just as plenty of badass moments as Pratt does. Plus, the two have excellent chemistry, better here than in the first film, even. As for the rest of the cast, while a lot of them do end up filling the franchise’s typical collection of characters who end up being ‘dino-chow’, all these actors and actresses do solid jobs in their respective roles. You’ve got your reliable screen veterans like James Cromwell as Sir Lockwood, Ted Levine as the imposing leader of Mills’ mercenary group, and Toby Jones as an auctioneer working in cahoots with Mills. And then you also have some solid newcomers as well, namely the other two members of Owen and Claire’s core group, Daniella Pineda as tenacious paleo-veterinarian Zia Rodriguez and Justice Smith as timid systems analyst Franklin Webb. But easily the most talked about member of this film’s cast is Jeff Goldblum making his heralded return to the Jurassic Park franchise as Dr. Ian Malcolm, who last appeared in 1997’s The Lost World: Jurassic Park. But as Goldblum himself noted in an interview, Malcolm does not factor that much into the film’s plot, as he only appears briefly at the beginning and end in sequences that do not have him interacting with any of the main characters. Still, for what it’s worth, Goldblum does make the most out of his brief appearance, delivering more of the stoic truths that he uttered in previous films that tie into the franchise’s biggest themes revolving around the ethical debate of resurrecting creatures who have been extinct for millions of years.

With a mediocre 50% rating on Rotten Tomatoes (at the time that I’m writing this), Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom continues the series’ trend of several folks feeling that the sequels don’t even remotely compare to the quality of the original film. But as someone who didn’t necessarily grow up with this franchise (outside of seeing Jurassic Park III when I was like six while over at a friend’s house), I’ve never held these heightened expectations against any of the sequels while still regarding the original film as one of the all-time greats. With that in mind, I enjoyed this film just as much as the other entries in the Jurassic Park franchise. To his credit, J.A. Bayona delivers what is easily the darkest installment of the series to date both thematically and visually. His horror genre roots do come in handy here, producing some effectively tense visuals that are bolstered further by Oscar Faura’s stunning cinematography. And while plot and character development are still not exactly this series’ strongest suit, it does deliver on everything else that fans of the franchise love about it when it comes to its wide array of dinosaur creatures and the chaos that is regularly caused by them. As such, this film ends on a truly fascinating note that paves the way for what will surely be an exciting conclusion to this new Jurassic World trilogy. This third installment will be hitting theaters in the summer of 2021 and will see Colin Trevorrow returning to the director’s chair and closing out the trilogy that he started a la J.J. Abrams returning to direct Star Wars: Episode IX (which, coincidentally, was originally set to be directed by Trevorrow). Until then, we have Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, another worthy follow-up to the iconic blockbuster that was the original Jurassic Park.

Rating: 4/5

Jurassic Park: The Story So Far

Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to the next installment of an ongoing series here on Rhode Island Movie Corner, ‘The Story So Far’. This is where I recap the past installments of a franchise in time for its latest release. In doing so, it allows you, the readers, an opportunity to catch up on a franchise if you find that you don’t have enough time to watch its previous installments and just want to know about its most important details before seeing the new film. And for today’s segment of ‘The Story So Far’, we’re looking at one of the most famous franchises in recent film history, Jurassic Park. Ever since director Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of author Michael Crichton’s best-selling novel of the same name hit theaters in 1993, it has gone on to become of the most beloved blockbusters of all-time, heralded for its groundbreaking visual effects. It then proceeded to get two follow-ups, 1997’s The Lost World: Jurassic Park, which Spielberg directed as well, and 2001’s Jurassic Park III, directed by Joe Johnston. Both films did well at the box-office though they weren’t as well-received by critics and audiences when compared to the first film. After that, a planned fourth film spent several years languishing in development hell until director Colin Trevorrow returned audiences to the island of Isla Nublar in 2015 with Jurassic World. Upon its release, the film set numerous box-office records amidst a critical reception that admittedly made it just as polarizing as the previous two films. But, of course, we’re back again with this cautionary tale of ‘man vs. nature’ with this year’s Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, directed by J.A. Bayona. But until then, let’s return to the early days of this crazy, little dinosaur experiment and embark on an adventure ’65 million years in the making’ as we recap the events of the Jurassic Park series.

Jurassic Park (RELEASED: 1993)

On the island of Isla Nublar, located off the coast of Costa Rica, industrialist John Hammond (Sir Richard Attenborough) and his company InGen have developed a way of cloning dinosaurs utilizing dinosaur DNA that has been extracted from fossilized mosquitoes. Hammond plans on showcasing his new discovery to the world via an immersive theme park called ‘Jurassic Park’. However, while transporting a Velociraptor to a new enclosure one night, one of the company’s dinosaur handlers is killed when the raptor tries to break free, resulting in a lawsuit from the employee’s family. Because of this, Hammond’s investors demand that he hires a team of experts to visit the park to ensure that it’s maintaining good safety standards. Thus, Hammond invites paleontologist Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neill), paleobotanist Dr. Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), and mathematician/chaos theorist Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) to the island. Along the way, they’re joined by lawyer Donald Gennaro (Martin Ferraro), who represents Hammond’s investors, and once they arrive on the island, they meet Hammond’s grandchildren, tech-savvy Lex Murphy (Ariana Richards) and her younger brother, dinosaur enthusiast Tim (Joseph Mazzello). This proves to be a bit of an issue for Grant who, as evident from an earlier scene where he discusses raptors with a kid at a dig site, isn’t that big a fan of children. But the tour goes on as planned, with the group being told that the dinosaurs on the island are unable to breed because they are all female, something that Malcolm questions as he claims that this attempt of theirs to control nature is doomed to fail. As for the tour itself, it ultimately ends up being incredibly underwhelming as most of the dinosaurs that the group is meant to come across don’t show up. The only dinosaur that they do come across is a sick Triceratops that they find once they temporarily leave their tour vehicles. Ellie decides to stay and study the Triceratops while Grant, Malcolm, Tim, Lex, and Gennaro return to the tour vehicles right as a tropical storm begins to make landfall on the island, which forces the tour to be put on hold.  

Meanwhile, Jurassic Park’s disgruntled main computer programmer, Dennis Nedry (Wayne Knight), initiates a plan to steal some of InGen’s fertilized embryos for a rival company. To do so, Nedry temporarily shuts down the park’s security system, which also ends up shutting off all the power in the park. To make matters worse for Grant and company, this ends up occurring right when they’re stationed near the Tyrannosaurus Rex paddock. Sure enough, the T-Rex breaks loose, eating Gennaro (while he’s hiding on the toilet in a nearby restroom) and injuring Malcolm while Grant and the kids barely manage to escape. Nedry’s own efforts to leave the island with the embryos in tow ends up being disastrous as well when he gets lost on the way to the docks and is killed by a venom-spitting Dilophosaurus (disclaimer: Dilophosaurus did not spit venom in real-life; this was something that Michael Crichton invented for the novel). When Ellie and the park’s warden, Robert Muldoon (Bob Peck), head out to try and find Grant and the kids, they rescue Malcolm and barely manage to escape from the T-Rex when it chases after them. Once back at the park’s visitor center, Hammond and his chief engineer, Ray Arnold (Samuel L. Jackson), decide to reboot the park’s entire system when they find that they’re unable to figure out a way around Nedry’s hacks. When Arnold fails to return from turning the power back on, Ellie and Muldoon head out to investigate. Muldoon ends up getting killed by a pair of Velociraptors while Ellie manages to reach the primary maintenance shed and gets the power back up and running again, coming across Arnold’s severed arm in the process.

As Grant and the kids begin their journey back to the visitor center, they come across a bunch of broken egg shells, with Grant realizing that Malcolm was right and that the dinosaurs can breed after all due to the parts of their DNA that were taken from frogs who can change their sex in a single-sex environment. After enduring everything from a Gallimimus stampede (and subsequent T-Rex attack) to Tim nearly dying when they try to climb over an electric fence right when the power is turned back on, the trio manages to return to the visitor center and reunite with Ellie. Unfortunately, they are then pursued by the raptors, who first chase Tim and Lex through the kitchen before cornering the lot of them in the control room. The group manages to temporarily keep them at bay when Lex manages to use the park’s UNIX computer system to restore power to the entire park, fixing both the phones and the electric door locks. As Hammond calls for a helicopter to evacuate, the group are forced to flee once again when the raptors break through the windows of the control room. They eventually end up in the visitor center’s foyer, where they get cornered by the raptors. Luckily for them, the T-Rex pops up by surprise and kills the raptors, giving them ample time to escape. After reuniting with Hammond and Malcolm, the group finally escapes the island via helicopter, with Grant having gained a newfound appreciation for children thanks to the time that he has spent with Tim and Lex.

The Lost World: Jurassic Park (RELEASED: 1997)

After the success of the film adaptation of Jurassic Park, Crichton published a sequel, The Lost World, in 1995, which was subsequently adapted to the big-screen by Spielberg two years later. Set four years after the events of the original film, it opens with InGen once again finding itself in hot water when a young girl named Cathy Bowman (Camilla Belle) is attacked by a swarm of Compsognathus while on vacation with her family. As it turns out, the family had landed on another Costa Rican island, Isla Sorna, which is revealed to be the site where the company had created the dinosaurs before they were moved over to Isla Nublar. The site was ultimately abandoned when a hurricane ravaged the area, leaving the dinosaurs on their own without any sort of measures in place to restrain them. InGen, now headed by John Hammond’s nephew Peter Ludlow (Arliss Howard), plans on using the island to fix their financial troubles caused by the incident on Isla Nublar. While this is going on, John Hammond approaches Ian Malcolm and asks for his help in ensuring the dinosaurs’ survival by having him travel to Isla Sorna with a team to document them to prove that they’re perfectly fine in their natural habitat. While Malcolm is hesitant to return to the area, he is ultimately convinced to go when he learns that one of the members of Hammond’s team is his girlfriend, paleontologist Sarah Harding (Julianne Moore), who’s already on the island. Now intent on getting her out before something happens to her, Malcolm meets up with the other two members of their team, engineer/field equipment expert Eddie Carr (Richard Schiff) and video documentarian Nick Van Owen (Vince Vaughn). Before they head off, Malcolm is also forced to deal with the increasingly strained relationship that he has with his daughter Kelly (Vanessa Lee Chester).

Once the group lands on Isla Sorna, they reunite with Sarah while also discovering that Kelly had stowed away with them in their mobile base. Soon after, a team of mercenaries and hunters led by Ludlow and big-game hunter Roland Tembo (Pete Postlethwaite) arrive on the island to enact InGen’s plans by capturing multiple dinosaurs and having them sent to a theme park that’s planned to be built in San Diego. They also capture an infant T-Rex that Tembo plans on using as bait to lure its parent, which he’s primarily looking to capture. Clearly aware of why this is, as Malcolm later puts it, ‘the worst idea in the history of bad ideas’, Nick and Sarah break the dinosaurs out of their cages, allowing them to wreak havoc upon the InGen team’s camp. They also take the infant T-Rex back to the mobile base to fix its broken leg. This, of course, causes its parents to arrive on the scene, knocking the base off a cliff while Malcolm, Sarah, and Nick are still inside and eating Eddie when he tries to pull it back up. The trio ultimately gets rescued by the InGen team and, because of the loss of both teams’ communications equipment, are forced to form an uneasy ‘alliance’ with them to reach the island’s abandoned radio station and call for rescue. The group ends up getting chased by the adult T-Rexes and a bunch of velociraptors, with numerous casualties along the way. Malcolm’s group manages to reach the radio station, fend off the raptors, and call for a helicopter while the InGen team successfully manages to capture the male T-Rex, who’s then transported to the site of the new theme park in San Diego.

Back on the mainland, the ship transporting the T-Rex ends up crashing into InGen’s docks when it arrives earlier than expected without responding to any calls from the harbormaster. After it’s discovered that the ship’s crew has been killed, the T-Rex is accidentally released from the cargo hold, allowing it to rampage through the city where it menaces suburbia, eats ‘unlucky bastards’ who happen to be played by the film’s screenwriters (no joke, that’s what the character played via cameo by screenwriter David Koepp is listed as), etc. To get it back on the ship, Malcolm and Sarah collect the infant T-Rex from the new park’s facilities and transport it back by car, luring the adult T-Rex back with them just like when they first took the infant back to their mobile base on the island. When Ludlow tries to intervene, he gets trapped in the cargo hold by the adult T-Rex and is devoured by the infant while Malcolm and Sarah manage to tranquilize the former and trap them both in there so that they can be sent back to Isla Sorna. The next day, Malcolm, Sarah, and Kelly watch a news report on the infant and adult T-Rexes being transported back. An interview with John Hammond reveals that plans have been made with the Costa Rican Department of Biological Preserves to turn Isla Sorna into a nature preserve, allowing the dinosaurs to live in peace without any sort of interference from humans. Thus, as the film ends with a shot of the family of T-Rexes reunited on the island, Hammond quotes the line that Malcolm famously stated in the previous film, affirming that ‘life will find a way’.

Jurassic Park III (RELEASED: 2001)

Four years after the events of the previous film, Jurassic Park III opens with 12-year-old Eric Kirby (Trevor Morgan) parasailing near the island of Isla Sorna with family friend Ben Hildebrand (Mark Harelik). To their horror, the other passengers on their boat are killed by something that is unseen due to fog and the two end up having to detach themselves from the boat before it crashes into a bunch of rocks, resulting in them being directed right towards Isla Sorna. Meanwhile, back on the mainland, Dr. Alan Grant finds himself struggling to find funding for his team’s research while Ellie Sattler has since gotten married to U.S. State Department worker Mark (Taylor Nichols), whom she has had two kids with. One day, Grant is approached by Paul (William H. Macy) and Amanda (Tea Leoni) Kirby, who offer him funding for his research in exchange for an aerial tour of Isla Sorna. Despite his initial dismissal about returning to the area (to the point where he responds to a question about it at a university lecture by stating that ‘no force on earth or heaven will get him on that island’), Grant agrees to their offer. He is joined by his assistant, Billy Brennan (Alessandro Nivola), on the trip along with a bunch of mercenaries who are ‘financed’ by the Kirbys, Udesky (Michael Jeter), Cooper (John Diehl), and Nash (Bruce A. Young). Once they arrive at Isla Sorna, however, Grant discovers that the group plans on landing there. Despite his objections, they do land and, soon enough, they end up stranded when they crash into a Spinosaurus that had been chasing Cooper, who is subsequently eaten by it along with Nash. After escaping both the Spinosaurus and a T-Rex, who gets killed by the former, Grant learns that the Kirbys had lied to him. Instead of being a rich couple, they are recently-divorced parents who own a hardware store and have come to Isla Sorna in search of their son Eric and Amanda’s boyfriend Ben, who have been missing for the past eight weeks.

The group finds Ben and Eric’s parasail, with Ben’s skeletal remains still attached to it and no sign of Eric, meaning that he’s potentially still alive. After being chased by a group of Velociraptors, who kill Udesky, Grant is separated from the group and is rescued from the raptors by Eric, who’s managed to survive on his own for the past eight weeks. When the duo manages to reunite with the others, Grant learns that the reason why the raptors have been chasing them is because Billy had taken a pair of raptor eggs to provide their dig site the funding that they obviously won’t be getting from the Kirbys. Grant, furious at this decision, takes the eggs to ensure that the group will survive, remarking that Billy ‘is no better than the people who built this place’. When the group enters an aviary full of Pteranodons, Billy saves Eric from being taken by them but is seemingly killed in the process. Eventually, the group begins to make their way downriver by boat, barely managing to ward off the Spinosaurus with fire while Grant phones Ellie for help. When the group gets cornered by the Velociraptors once again, Grant manages to ward them off by surrendering the stolen eggs to them and using Billy’s 3-D printed replica of a Velociraptor larynx to confuse them. Once they reach the coast, they end up getting rescued by the U.S. Marine Corps and the U.S. Navy, who were called there by Ellie. Billy is revealed to be alive and the group leaves the island while noticing a bunch of Pteranodons departing as well. As Grant remarks, they’re ‘looking for new nesting grounds’.

Jurassic World (RELEASED: 2015)

Generally ignoring the events of the previous two films (which still recognizing them as canon), Jurassic World takes place 22 years after the events of the original film. In the years since, John Hammond’s idea of a dinosaur theme park has been revitalized by the Masrani Corporation, with ‘Jurassic World’ operating on the exact same site on Isla Nublar. Bickering brothers Zach (Nick Robinson) and Gray (Ty Simpkins) Mitchell travel to the park to visit their aunt Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard), who serves as the park’s operations manager. As soon as they arrive, though, she immediately brushes them off to deal with the pressure coming from her boss, ‘pilot’ Simon Masrani (Irrfan Khan), to develop a new attraction that would help boost their attendance numbers. Under the direction of Hammond’s former lead scientist Dr. Henry Wu (B.D. Wong), a new dinosaur known as the Indominus Rex is created from the combined DNA samples of various dinosaurs, including the T-Rex, and other creatures. Claire is then forced to ask for the assistance of the park’s velociraptor trainer Owen Grady (Chris Pratt), whom she had one ‘bad’ date with, to ensure that the Indominus’ enclosure is properly secured. Once there, however, they find that the Indominus has seemingly managed to escape. As it turns out, the Indominus managed to fool them with its camouflaging ability (taken from cuttlefish DNA) and escapes for real once Owen and a few other workers go in to inspect the site. Masrani attempts to subdue it by sending in the park’s Asset Containment Unit, but most of the team ends up getting killed by it, resulting in Claire ordering a complete evacuation of the northern half of the island.

Unfortunately for Claire, a new problem emerges when Zach and Gray end up wandering into a restricted area via the park’s gryosphere attraction. The two brothers end up getting attacked by the Indominus and barely manage to escape from it by jumping off a waterfall. While Claire and Owen head out to try and rescue them, they end up coming across the old Jurassic Park Visitor Center and begin heading back to the resort in one of the old park’s jeeps, which they manage to repair. Meanwhile, Masrani pilots an attack helicopter to hunt the Indominus. This ends up being a complete disaster, however, as the helicopter crashes into the resort’s aviary, resulting in a swarm of Pterosaurs attacking the resort’s guests. Owen and Claire manage to find Zach and Gray while park security manages to subdue the attacking Pterosaurs. Soon after, Vic Hoskins (Vincent D’Onofrio), head of InGen’s security team, assumes command of the situation. Hoskins and Owen had come into conflict earlier over the former’s suggestion of using the latter’s quartet of trained raptors (Charlie, Echo, Delta, and Blue) for military use. Despite Owen’s objections, he agrees to partake in Hoskins’ plan to use the raptors to hunt down the Indominus. Unfortunately, once Owen and the raptors come across the Indominus, Owen realizes one of the biggest secrets surrounding the creature’s creation… it’s part raptor. This allows the Indominus to become the Raptors’ new ‘alpha’, resulting in the pack beginning to hunt InGen’s troops.

Owen, Claire, Zach, and Gray barely manage to escape and return to the Jurassic World Visitor Center. Once there, they discover that Hoskins has been working in conjunction with Dr. Wu on new hybrid dinosaurs to further his plan of having them be used for military purposes. While Hoskins ends up getting killed by Delta, Owen manages to regain the trust of his raptor pack right as the Indominus returns. After Echo and Delta are killed by it (Charlie was killed earlier during the Indominus hunt by a missile), Gray remarks that they need something with ‘more teeth’ to stop it. Thus, Claire orders one of the park’s control room operators, Lowery Cruthers (Jake Johnson), to open the gates to the T-Rex paddock as she manages to lure the T-Rex into a fight with the Indominus… and yes, she does all of this while wearing heels. With assistance from Blue, the last surviving member of Owen’s raptor pack, the T-Rex manages to corner the Indominus at the edge of the resort’s lagoon. Before the Indominus can attack again, it is swiftly grabbed by a Mosasaurus and dragged underwater. Blue and the T-Rex depart, though the former shares one last moment with Owen beforehand. As Isla Nublar ends up being abandoned once more, Zach and Gray reunite with their parents, Karen (Judy Greer) and Scott (Andy Buckley), at an off-site shelter in Costa Rica while Owen and Claire prepare for whatever comes next by deciding to stick together ‘for survival’. The film ends with the T-Rex perched above the abandoned Jurassic World site, once again in control of its home environment. But as it’s established in the trailers for the upcoming Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, the future of said home is put into jeopardy by way of the island’s previously dormant volcano.

And that is the ‘Story So Far’ when it comes to the Jurassic Park series. Thanks for following along and you can expect a review of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom sometime in the next few days. While I am aware that the overall reception towards this franchise’s sequels tend to vary amongst critics and audiences, I’ve personally enjoyed all the films in this franchise (yes, even Jurassic Park III despite the 2.5/5 rating that I gave it a few years back in the retrospective that I did on the original trilogy prior to the release of Jurassic World). Thus, I am eagerly looking forward to this new film, which I hear will provide an interesting set-up for the new trilogy’s finale that’s set to come out in 2021 and will see Colin Trevorrow return as director.

Star Wars Episode IX - Colin Trevorrow Out, J.J. Abrams Back In

Well, we’ve got yet another directorial shake-up on our hands in the Star Wars universe. Just a few months after Phil Lord and Christopher Miller were booted from the Han Solo spin-off film and replaced by Ron Howard, the same has now happened with the ninth installment of the main series, Episode IX. Originally, the film was set to be directed by Colin Trevorrow, who was fresh off 2015’s worldwide smash hit Jurassic World… and this year’s critically derided Book of Henry (more on that in a bit). However, like Lord and Miller, it was recently announced that Trevorrow had backed out of directing the film due to, what else, creative differences with Lucasfilm. But, once again, the search for a new director did not last long, and in this case, it was an old familiar face who stepped in to finish the job. Yes, folks, J.J. Abrams, the man, myth, and legend who kick-started the new Star Wars trilogy on the right note with The Force Awakens is coming back to write and direct Episode IX. Given the critical/commercial success of TFA, it seems like this would be a well-received decision, right? Well, not exactly… Yes, folks, the Star Wars franchise has been in quite a state of flux as of late due to several of the recent developments surrounding its upcoming films. This is the second time in a row now that a Star Wars director has been ‘fired’ from the job due to creative differences with the studio and producer Kathleen Kennedy (three if you count the time when Josh Trank stepped down from helming a spin-off film presumably due to his behavior during the disastrous production of the 2015 reboot of Fantastic Four). This has, unfortunately, put Kennedy in a tough situation as she’s been subjected to tons of flak that, dare I say, verges a bit on sexism. I’ve gone over this before when I discussed the Han Solo incident so I won’t repeat myself too much here other than the fact that, given her prestigious career in the industry, Ms. Kennedy doesn’t deserve all this criticism over something that could happen to any film producer.

I mean, I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; film productions don’t always go perfectly. There will be times where a film will be affected by problems that may often require something along the lines of reshoots, script rewrites, and so on and so forth. However, just because a film has a troubled production doesn’t automatically mean that it’s doomed to failure. Seriously, it’s because of incidents like this that I’m extremely happy that social media wasn’t around in the time of films like Jaws and the original Star Wars; good lord, we would’ve never heard the end of those films’ production woes had that been the case. And in terms of what’s going on right now with Episode IX, at least this wasn’t like what happened with the Han Solo film where the director switcheroo occurred more than halfway through filming. Episode IX, on the other hand, hasn’t even started production yet. In fact, not long after J.J.’s hiring was confirmed, it was also announced that the film had been pushed back to the franchise’s preferred release month of December 2019, which effectively gives J.J. more time to prepare for it instead of rushing through it so that it’d be out by its original May 2019 release date. Now, granted, I am aware that these recent bits of production turmoil have been somewhat of a common occurrence as of late with the Disney-owned era Star Wars films. Aside from these recent directorial hiccups, there was also, of course, the dilemma that Rogue One faced when it had to go through reshoots, namely to rework its third act. Ultimately, though, all the hubbub surrounding these events is just a consequence of an age where we can practically know anything about a film’s production.

With that said, though, let me make something clear; unless proven otherwise, I’m 100% confident that Trevorrow wasn’t kicked off Episode IX because of the negative reception towards The Book of Henry. I’ve talked before about how the internet over-reacted quite a bit when the film came out to the point where several articles posed the same exact question; ‘Is Episode IX in trouble?’… even though the film wasn’t even in production yet. Heck, even the polarizing reaction to Jurassic World played a factor into the hesitation surrounding Trevorrow’s hiring. It got to the point where, apparently, some people were ‘happy’ when the news broke of his departure. This ties into something that I’ve always questioned about the online film fan community and that is its tendency to focus more on films that they dislike rather than those that they did like. I mean, seriously, if Trevorrow had truly gotten canned just because of Book of Henry, then J.J. Abrams could’ve been denied from directing The Force Awakens just because of the blowback that he got over Star Trek Into Darkness’ use of elements from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Heck, imagine if this mentality was implemented with the Marvel Cinematic Universe films; I guarantee you that NONE of the MCU directors would’ve even been hired if judged solely for their misfires. I mean, after all, the director of the Guardians of the Galaxy films did write the live-action Scooby-Doo films. Or remember when the directors of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Captain America: Civil War, and the upcoming Avengers: Infinity War directed You, Me, and Dupree? Bottom line, the validity of a director’s qualifications for a certain project shouldn’t be judged solely because of one bad film that they made. Case in point, even though Trevorrow attracted a lot of flak for Jurassic World and Book of Henry, he did also direct 2012’s indie hit Safety Not Guaranteed.  

Thus, prior to these recent turn of events, I was optimistic about Trevorrow’s hiring and confident in his ability to make an entertaining Star Wars film. But, of course, that isn’t happening anymore so now we get to look forward to another J.J. Abrams-directed Star Wars film. Hurrah! However, as noted in the intro, the news of J.J.’s return hasn’t really gone over well with everybody and the main reason why is that some feel that he’s too ‘safe’ of a choice to direct the film. That might have something to do with the one thing that I’m sure many of you have already guessed about when I said the word ‘safe’. Yep, it’s the common criticism of The Force Awakens’ shared similarities with Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope. Really, there’s not much more that I can bring to this discussion other than my belief that the internet’s just beating a dead horse at this point. Heck, even Ron Howard’s hiring for the Han Solo film was deemed as a ‘safe’ pick to replace Phil Lord and Chris Miller. All this just goes to show the increasing pressure that the franchise has been under recently from fans who have been demanding that they enlist more ‘auteur’ directors who can bring something ‘new’ to the franchise. And while I’m not against that, for the record, from what I can gather, the main reason why Lord, Miller, and even Trevorrow were let go was that their directorial personalities clashed with Lucasfilm’s vision for the franchise. And as controversial as it will undoubtedly sound to some of you, I think that this was ultimately for the best. Again, I’m all for new takes on the Star Wars franchise. However, the amount of creative clout that a director is given on a film can sometimes end up having a severely negative effect on it (e.g. Batman Returns, Sucker Punch). Heck, this has even happened before with this franchise; just look at when the prequels came out.

And it’s a shame, really, that these recent ‘studio vs. director’ controversies have had a negative impact on J.J. Abrams’ return to the franchise. Given the ever-present ‘it’s just a rehash of A New Hope’ argument, it feels like the internet’s collective opinion of The Force Awakens has changed quite drastically since it came out. It’s legitimately at the point now where I’m beginning to wonder if it and Rogue One were truly the critical/commercial hits that they were. Oh sure, they both did well with critics and have collectively grossed over $3 billion at the box-office, a total which will surely increase by another $1-2 billion once The Last Jedi comes out. But in an age where shows like Honest Trailers and Cinemasins are becoming more and more prominent, it’s becoming a lot harder for films to maintain the positive reputation that they had upon their initial release. It also just goes to show how Star Wars is easily the most scrutinized film franchise of all-time, as the expectations for it are bigger than the Marvel and DC Cinematic Universes, Harry Potter, and Lord of the Rings franchises combined. Even when it’s doing well, there are always plenty of naysayers out there who will try and bring it down. And given these recent turn of events, it feels like this is all just putting more overt pressure on Rian Johnson to truly deliver with The Last Jedi. However, despite all the behind-the-scenes drama that’s been going on as of late, I’m still looking forward to these next few Star Wars films. Because if they do turn out great, then all the pre-judgmental backlash directed against them will have just been utterly pointless. And while I know that I’m undoubtedly biased because he’s one of my favorite directors working today, the announcement of J.J. Abrams’ return for Episode IX just makes me even more excited for it because of how much I loved The Force Awakens. In other words, to quote the classic hashtag created by popular Star Wars Youtuber HelloGreedo, #InJJWeTrust.

And, just for the hell of it, it’s time for the return of a classic meme that I created prior to the release of The Force Awakens. Feel free to use it as you see fit.

Jurassic World (2015) review

In 1993, Steven Spielberg brought Michael Crichton’s best-selling sci-fi novel/cautionary tale ‘Jurassic Park’ to the big screen and of course we all know how it turned out. It ended up becoming one of the most revered films of its time while also setting major landmarks in the use of CGI for the film’s dinosaur creatures. It was followed by two sequels that were both commercially successful, although neither film was as beloved amongst critics and audiences as much as the first film. Now, 14 years after ‘Jurassic Park III’ was released in 2001, and after a considerably long period of what can only be described as ‘development hell’, primarily due to script re-writes, director Colin Trevorrow, fresh off of his 2012 indie hit ‘Safety Not Guaranteed’, returns us to the world of ‘Jurassic Park’, both figuratively and literally due to the fact that it takes place on the same island that the first film took place on, with ‘Jurassic World’. And boy is it one hell of an experience. Now let me just make things clear for a second. At the end of the day, I can’t say that this is an absolutely ‘perfect’ film, nor can I say that it’s technically ‘as good’ as the first film. For the record, I’m not holding this against ‘Jurassic World’. It’s just that, obviously, the first film is such a hard act to follow. But not only does ‘Jurassic World’ pay loving respect to the original film that it’s following up on but it also delivers on exactly what we came to see; awesome dinosaur-related action. And in that regard, the film doesn’t disappoint in the slightest.  

22 years after the original incident on the Costa Rican island of Isla Nublar regarding John Hammond’s genetically-cloned dinosaur theme park Jurassic Park, a new fully-functioning dinosaur theme park now named Jurassic World, run by operations manager Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard) and owned by Simon Masrani (Irrfan Khan) of the Masrani Corporation, has been built, embodying Hammond’s original vision for Jurassic Park. When general interest in the park begins to drop due to the apparently decreasing ‘wow factor’ of the dinosaur exhibits, the park’s scientists create a new genetically modified dinosaur, referred to as an ‘Indominus Rex’, out of a hybrid of various bits of animal DNA (e.g. cuttlefish, T-Rex, etc.) as a way to attract more guests to the park. However, a few weeks before the new exhibit is set to open, the new dinosaur ends up breaking out of its enclosure and starts rampaging across the island, resulting in Claire, her two nephews Zach (Nick Robinson) and Gray (Ty Simpkins), who are visiting the park, and Velociraptor trainer Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) getting caught right in the middle of the situation as they and the rest of the ‘Jurassic World’ staff try to stop this new menace before it ends up terrorizing the park visitors.

I’m just going to put it bluntly; this is not one of those films that is going to get any major attention come award season for its writing. After all, this is a sci-fi film about genetically-engineered dinosaurs that run amok… and that’s basically it. It’s definitely not the ‘smartest’ sci-fi film ever written but then again, neither were the other films for that matter. Ultimately, these films are just meant to be entertaining popcorn flicks and ‘Jurassic World’ definitely succeeds in that regard thanks to Trevorrow’s solid direction. There are numerous awesome dinosaur-related action sequences throughout this film. I mean for crying out loud this is a film where Chris Pratt’s character leads a pack of trained velociraptors into combat on a motorcycle, plus plenty more awesome moments that I won’t spoil here for anyone who hasn’t seen the film yet. All in all, ‘Jurassic World’ definitely feels like a true sequel to the original film (‘The Lost World’ and ‘Jurassic Park III’ were mostly ignored here). Trevorrow subtly pays homage to ‘Jurassic Park’ from time to time while also managing to still make this film feel new and not just a re-hash of the original film. And the effects are still as solid as they’ve ever been, even if at this point they’re mostly CGI with only about one major use of animatronic effects, the latter of which has been a major trademark of the franchise.  

On that note, a common criticism of the series has been that while the effects have always been superb, the same can’t be said for character development. And like every other film in the series (yes, even the first film in some cases), that’s definitely true in regards to some of the characters in the film, like Vincent D’Onofrio’s character Vic Hoskins, the head of security for InGen who apparently was meant to be the human antagonist but ends up being one of those ‘villains’ that doesn’t actually do anything ‘villainous’, which is rather disappointing given D’Onofrio’s excellent turn recently as the main antagonist Wilson Fisk in ‘Daredevil’. But despite that, and some other throwaway characters, the film’s four main leads all do excellent jobs. Chris Pratt, after the hot year that he had in 2014 thanks to ‘The LEGO Movie’ and ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’, continues to prove himself to be a Grade-A leading man in the role of Owen, who let me remind you commands a whole pack of raptors. The role is generally more serious compared to Pratt’s usual comedic roles but he still manages to maintain his natural charisma. Bryce Dallas Howard is also a major standout as well as Claire who at first may seem like nothing more than, to paraphrase a tweet by Joss Whedon in regards to the film’s first official clip, a workaholic ‘stiff’ but then turns out to be quite a badass in her own right by the end. Nick Robinson and Ty Simpkins both do excellent jobs as well as brothers Zach and Gray and there are actually some really sweet bonding moments between the two in the latter half of the film amidst all of the chaos going on.

While ‘Jurassic World’ was easily one of the most anticipated films of 2015 for many people, at the same time I found that many other people online were questioning about various aspects of the film, including the whole plot of a genetically-engineered hybrid dinosaur and the aforementioned trained Velociraptor pack, among other things. So going into this film, I ignored all of the noise from the internet and by the end of the film, came out fully satisfied by what I had saw. Simply put, ‘Jurassic World’ is hella fun. No, it may not be the most well-written/smartest sci-fi film ever made but really what do you expect from a series that is based around dinosaurs brought back to life by genetics? But even with that in mind, ‘Jurassic World’, like the original ‘Jurassic Park’, and hell I’ll even argue ‘The Lost World’, succeeds by just being incredibly entertaining with awesome action sequences involving dinosaurs, solid visuals, and a solid cast headlined by standout performances by leads Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Ty Simpkins, and Nick Robinson, even if most of the other characters are generally underdeveloped and are really nothing more than just ‘dino chow’. And most importantly, ‘Jurassic World’ feels like a true sequel to ‘Jurassic Park’. It may not be as ‘ground-breaking’ as the original film but it definitely stands as the best of the sequels to date and one of the most enjoyable summer blockbusters of 2015 so far.

Rating: 4/5