The sheer scope of the popular reception for Jurassic Park in 1993 is hard to overstate. Both commercially and critically, it qualifies as a classic of the action-adventure genre. Now, two sequels and an entire reboot trilogy later, the Jurassic franchise comes to a conclusion (for now) with Jurassic World: Dominion.
[kofi]
It brings together characters from both trilogies. It features all the impressive dinosaur effects fans have come to expect. But it also relies too heavily on the formulaic. Given all the elements in place, audiences could’ve reasonably expected something better than what they get in Jurassic World: Dominion.
“Why do they always have to go bigger?”
When Jurassic World hit theaters in 2015, it had been 14 years since the last Jurassic Park film. And it wasn’t enough that a greedy corporation would hijack scientific progress anymore. Now, the premise had to be bigger.
So, the dinosaur theme park does more than just provide thrills for the public. The scientists behind the park also take creation into their hands by crafting new genetic species. For profit, of course. First, it was the Indominus Rex, then it was the Indoraptor. Obviously, both situations go badly.
But Dominion goes a different route. Now that dinosaurs are out in the wild alongside humans, a new biotech company takes the place of InGen from the earlier films. BioSyn (get it? Bio SIN?) doesn’t want to create new dinosaurs anymore. They have other goals, concerning controlling the world’s food supply.
The possibilities of this are barely taken advantage of by the script here, however. Instead, the typical arrogant genius CEO character trope is trotted out, and there is no substantially interesting narrative theme to make up for it.
The film relies too hard on the nostalgia factor of seeing Dr. Alan Grant (Sam Neill), Dr. Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), and Dr. Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) again. But then, they don’t meet up with the characters from Jurassic World until the final act.
Plus, the filmmakers STILL fall into the “bigger is better” trap. Because this sequel features the first appearance of the Giganotosaurus, the largest land animal that has ever existed.
“I always come back.”
The heart of the Jurassic World films has been the relationship between animal behaviorist Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) and velociraptor Blue. Owen trained Blue since her birth, and the two have faced many life-threatening situations together. This time around, Blue has reproduced on her own, and her baby is stolen by BioSyn.
Throughout this trilogy, many things about Owen have a touch of the ludicrous about them. In Dominion, he actually lassos a dinosaur. Yep, you read that right: HE LASSOS A DINOSAUR. There is a bit of genuine emotion to be had in his interactions with Blue. But Owen rushes off to save Blue’s baby, so Blue is off-screen for much of this film. And you feel this absence as you watch.
All this is not to say there is nothing of value here. Neill, Dern, and Goldblum are too engaging for watching them to be a waste of time. Director Colin Trevorrow seems to be enthused by new staging for action sequences. Snow and ice, anyone? And composer Michael Giacchino can always be trusted with the music. He knows exactly when to kick in the strains of John Williams’ classic score from the 1993 original for maximum effect.
But with the legacy characters back, it’s hard not to wonder how much stronger this film could have been. Jurassic World: Dominion easily supplies the scares we all expect, but a little more attention to the substance behind them would have been more successful.
3 stars out of 5
