Jurassic World: Rebirth
review by Bobby Blakey
The original Jurassic Park unleashed a new type of cinema on audiences when it hit theaters in 1993. After its success of making us believe dinosaurs returned it spawned two sequels with The Lost World and Jurassic Park III. In 2015 the franchise returned for a new chapter with Jurassic World that once again spawned two sequels in Fallen Kingdom and Dominion. Now we are returning to the franchise with Jurassic World Rebirth starring Scarlett Johansson, Jonathan Bailey, Mahershala Ali, Rupert Friend, Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, David Iacono, Audrina Miranda, Philippine Velge, Ed Skrein, and Béchir Sylvain with Godzilla and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story director Gareth Edwards at the helm.
Jurassic World Rebirth follows five years after the events of Jurassic World Dominion and the planet’s ecology has proven largely inhospitable to dinosaurs. Those remaining exist in isolated equatorial environments with climates resembling the one in which they once thrived. The three most colossal creatures within that tropical biosphere hold the key to a drug that will bring miraculous life-saving benefits to humankind.
I love all things Jurassic Park/World. I am fully aware that not all of the stories have been that great, but the joy of getting to see dinosaurs wreak havoc on terrified humans is always a great time. Heading into any film in this franchise I expect plenty of dinos, action adventure and over the top and often silly storylines to get us there. Anyone expecting anything else is reaching since pretty much every film since the beginning has be ridiculous if you think about it and I love them all.
Heading into this next chapter I was eager to meet this new cast and see what
new sites and dinos they had for us and how they would be expanding this story. They kept it simple in reasoning to get them to the island that works even if it brings in the usual betrayal and some cliched character ideas to the mix. It is interesting as they have an entire other group of people introduced into the mix that opens things up for essentially two separate adventures to keep things fun even if not necessary.
As with all the Jurassic World films, they keep offering up a bigger variety of dinosaurs to interact and fight with. They delve deeper into the mutations and mixed variations that they have been teasing us with in the previous films and go all in here. I think the mutated variations which I thought were awesome might lose some and lose that element of old school dinosaurs that they love. Make no mistake, there are plenty of them here just not how you might expect. This also is the first time around that raptors aren’t prominently featured, and I am kind of happy about it. We also got to spend some time in the water in some sequences that almost felt like JAWS that set the tone of what’s to come.
This latest entry isn’t perfect and feels a little strange without any familiar faces or direct connection to the previous films, but for me a welcome new direction should it move forward. It can also serve as a more one-off in the way the story is told and how it ends so works either way. It checked off the boxes of what I want in a Jurassic film, and I hope this isn’t the final outing into this world as I am always ready for more.
In addition to the film this release offers bonus content including an alternate opening, deleted scenes, gag reel, commentaries, featurettes and so much more. Return to the island and grab your copy of Jurassic World: Rebirth available now on digital and then on 4K, Blu-ray and DVD on September 9th from Universal Home Entertainment.