When Jurassic Park released in 1993, it was the highest grossing film worldwide, brining in a whopping $978 million. For context, the second highest grossing film was Mrs. Doubtfire with $219 million.  

In the 32 years since Jurassic Park shook up theaters, audiences have been fed five sequels ranging from good to forgettable. What all the sequels have in common is a plot that creates some contrived way to get humans to an island full of murderous dinosaurs or get the murderous dinosaurs to humans.  

The newest installment, Jurassic World: Rebirth, is a story about humans going to an island full of dangerous dinosaurs. 

The movie takes place sometime after the events of Jurassic World: Dominion. Earth’s environment proved to be too harsh for dinosaurs – except a small part of the world close to the equator. All of the world’s governments have decided nobody should travel there. However, a pharmaceutical company believes dinosaurs contain the key to a drug that’s capable of curing heart disease and saving millions of lives (while also making them insanely wealthy). The only catch is they have to get the samples from living dinosaurs, and not just any. They need the biggest prehistoric creatures from the land, sea, and air.

This covert mission requires the help of operation expert Zora (Scarlett Johansson), a paleontologist named Henry (Jonathan Bailey), and Duncan (Mahershala Ali) who is someone that can smuggle them in and out of dangerous territories. Also, along for the trip is Greedy Businessman aka Martin (Rupert Friend). 

One of the best things about the film is how quickly they get to the action. Shortly after audience introduced to the major players, the team is on its way to the island to capture the three samples. Duncan hears a distress call, and they go to rescue a shipwrecked family.  

After getting their first sample from the sea dinosaur, the dinosaurs start doing dinosaur things. The group barley escapes, and find them trapped on an island full of dangerous mutated dinosaurs. Zora leads the team on a search for the other two dinosaurs before her extraction team picks them up in 24 hours. 

To be clear, this is an enjoyable film that requires you to do one thing: Turn your brain off. Completely off. If you don’t, you’ll ask questions like – Why didn’t the world governments bomb these islands? Why does nobody hear an 8-ton dinosaur walking up behind them? Are dinosaurs secretly taking ballet lessons? Why was the team so unprepared for the threat of dinosaurs? How much therapy will the survivors need?

The film is truly a mix bag of good and bad. Let’s start with the good…all the dinosaur action was very entertaining. From the opening scene to the final showdown, the film does an excellent job creating real tension and fear by showing just how unequipped humans are to live amongst dinosaurs. They also did a great job making the dinosaurs look terrifying. The D-Rex that shows up in the third act isn’t even explained. It has multiple arms and a head bigger than Jason Kidd’s son with some crazy looking teeth. 

The cast was surprisingly fun. Despite the script not being the strongest, each actor did their part well. It was nice to see Mahershala on the big screen again. He has one of the best, “Oh shit!” faces in Hollywood. Scarlett Johansson is fantastic as the lead. Her dry humor and comedic timing is perfect for this character. The film attempts to give these characters a background during a scene earlier in the movie. Zora and Duncan are trauma bonding on the boat, while the scene is pretty unnecessary, it’s an attempt to make these characters feel real and give them other motivations other than money.

The bad…so much dumb stuff happens in this film. I know some of the choices are plot devices to movie the story along, but others are just unexplainably stupid. There was no need to add the family. Zero reason. Aside from a few funny moments and the T-Rex sequence, they were mostly dead weight. The dinosaurs in this film, as menacing as they are, they suddenly become the slowest and stupidest animals on the planet when a character needs to escape. It’s unforgivable how many times this happens over the course of 2 hours.  

The biggest gripe, this film is trying so hard to be Aliens (1986). A group shows up at remote scientific station after an event cost the lives many people. They’re lead by a badass woman. They lose almost all of their firepower immediately. The guy working for the evil corporation prioritizes money over the safety of the group. There’s a cute kid and a cat (a small dino). They survive by traveling through tunnels underneath the facility. There’s a much bigger threat than the group realizes. If you’re playing sci-fi movie bingo, you’re screaming “bingo” at the 45 minute mark. It’s not that these moments are bad; they’re recycled tropes from other movies that executed them better.

For most general audiences, people will enjoy how fast paced and fun this movie can be at times. They’ll enjoy the dinosaurs, the humor, the many escapes from death, and all the callbacks to previous Jurassic films. Audiences have to remember not to think too hard about what’s happening. This movie has its moments of exhilarating fun when someone is being chased or the dread of a dinosaur stalking someone in the jungle.

Jurassic World: Rebirth feels more like and unnecessary sequel than an installment that’s breathing new life into the franchise. There are moments that take audiences back to that feeling people had in 1993. Unfortunately, there are more moments that make you scream, “WTF are we doing?” I’m not sure if this rebirth of the franchise or if the franchise will ever galvanize the world again, but it is one of the better sequels in the franchise’s history.

Grade: B-