If you’re a 90’s kid, it’s safe to assume that Jurassic Park has got its own place in your childhood classics. From John William’s awe-inspiring theme for the 1993 movie to the feeling of pure wonder when the park visitors (and the audience) spot a dinosaur for the first time– Jurassic Park is hard to forget. And the classic trilogy (loosely based on the works of Michael Crichton) has been the source of creature horror and dino-mania in pop culture for decades.
So when the franchise gets rebooted as Jurassic World, and the 2nd trilogy too comes to an end with the final chapter of the legacy, expectations were naturally high. But if you went into theatres seeking to relieve that childhood sense of awe, dread, and adventure that the original Jurassic Park instilled, you’d be disappointed with Jurassic World Dominion.
With a long list of colossal monsters and prehistoric horrors now rampaging in front of the modern audience, it’s not easy to spark that sense of surprise with dinosaurs anymore. But the ones who went to watch Jurassic World: Dominion, went looking for dinosaurs specifically.
Yet it is evident that even today it’s hard to measure up to that Spielberg magic from 1993.
What Jurassic World: Dominion fails to deliver on is the Jurassic aspect of itself.
Except for some quick montages to attest to the movie’s oversold concept of “coexistence between humans and dinosaurs”, the first half of the movie has a lot, almost everything else, going on, except for the dinosaurs bit. There are gigantic locusts, and capitalist conspiracies to abuse genetic power, there’s even the classic bike chase through overcrowded streets and narrow alleys. Therefore, albeit unintentionally, the movie ends up becoming more of James Bond and Mission Impossible, than anything Jurassic. Even after the interval, while you finally see actions involving dinosaurs, certain scenes involving Dr. Alan in a cave with a torch and a hat might allude to Indiana Jones as well.
The surprises in this movie are few; bad decisions are the order of the day, and the safety of the protagonists is absolutely guaranteed (even when explosive plane crashes into frozen lakes). But if taken just as big-screen creature entertainment, rather than the “epic conclusion” it was marketed as, Jurassic World: Dominion still has a few things going for it.
Firstly, besides the human-dino coexistence, this time we also get to see the stars of the original Park trilogy and the reboot installments coexist- all reunited to survive the dinosaurs and to save the world. For fans of the original trilogy, it’s a treat getting to witness the ever-exasperated Alan, always enthusiastic Ellie, and perpetually spaced-out Ian teaming up again after nearly 30 years.
Secondly, one might argue the change in setting in Jurassic World: Dominion is a good change from the overused tropical islands filled with dinosaurs.
Jurassic World: Dominion is the first of the reboot trilogy to set itself apart with changing landscapes– from icy mountains to swampy forests and Mediterranean alleys.
But that’s not all the movie has going in its favor. One of the film’s family-friendly plus sides is that, while some of the dino attacks in the originals were a bit heavy on the gore, Dominion is never so horrifying as to be unsuitable for younger audiences.
To wrap things up, while the original trilogy were nail-biters with very real stakes, the first two installments of Jurassic World felt more like a theme-park ride. And the last one, Jurassic World: Dominion, feels like a movie that’s unsure of what other movie it’s trying to be like.
Despite the overly human-centric plot line, Jurassic World Dominion is still a thrilling, over-the-top (albeit predictable) ride filled with big-budget animatronics and CGI entertainment.
Honestly, if you are someone who just loves dinosaurs and doesn’t care about the film’s ratings or critical analysis, or you are just mindlessly seeking something to watch with the family (or are just curious to see how the once-beloved Jurassic franchise ends), Dominion is still worth a watch.