It’s actually unfair of us to compare Jurassic World: Dominion (and the other parts of the dinosaur franchise revival) to what Steven Spielberg did back in 1993. It’s not that the director utilized a special effects frenzy to guarantee success. He actually made sure we believed dinosaurs were back. And then he terrified us when he made sure we believed they had been let loose. That’s a sense of wonder few films today have the ability to convey.
Does that mean everything that would come after didn’t stand a chance? Up to a point, yes. He even experienced it himself with the The Lost World: Jurassic Park, but at least he wasn’t trying to make a better film. He understood the tier the film could be set in and went from there.
What the Jurassic World franchise has tried several times is very clear. The only goal for Universal at this point is to exploit the JP logo as many times as possible. The first one wasn’t as bad as critics said it was and it was a fancy return to a concept we cheered for. Raptor taming was a huge stretch, and motorcycle races looked awful, but we accepted for the sake of being back. Part two was memorable for a single scene evoking an ecological commentary, and not much else. Part three was a risk everyone accepted.
Jurassic World: Dominion was a terrible experience at revisiting the world where dinosaurs have returned. There’s no reason why this version of a franchise entry should exist, and today it only feels like a big paycheck. We get a reencounter with past characters that appear to be uncomfortable in the roles that made them what they are. The special effects are impressively bad. And the plot is a terrible excuse for gathering them all in the same place for a couple of big sequences. With Jurassic Park we stared in awe at man playing with unlimited power. In Dominion we stare at the results of a film director misfiring in all directions.
I won’t dig much on the plot. Jurassic World: Dominion has dinosaurs sort of living among us in reservations and parks. Yes, even the dangerous ones. Owen and Claire return as a couple living off the grid while taking care of a child a big corporation is looking for.
This big corporation is called a Biosyn and they’re responsible for manipulations of huge insects that are threatening crops. This is where doctors Ellie Sattler, Sam Grant and Ian Malcolm enter the picture. They feel it’s their responsibility to reveal the mischievous nature of the company.
All of this in a dinosaur film that also takes place in Malta and Italy (how the film progresses and doesn’t address the geography aspect in its chronology is mind-bending) and justifies 7 characters at peril at all times. The plot in Jurassic World: Dominion is complex enough to drive the film to the end, but it isn’t compelling nor engaging. It’s just a lame patch for an ugly third act.
Even the big reveal isn’t as important as it should be. A cloning story should elevate some characters into relevance and sadly we’re stuck with a complete lack of direction for them. Even in genre films, we’re supposed to care for what’s happening to people on the screen. In Jurassic World: Dominion we just want things to end. Only the Kayla Watts character was compelling enough to make us root for her all the way. Characterization was so poor in Jurassic World: Dominion that we cared deeply for a character whose ethics are questionable but she’s cool in an adventure setting.
G-S-T RULING:
Easily the worst film in the series, Jurassic World: Dominion was a commercial success because there isn’t a chance we don’t go in droves to see huge dinosaurs on the big screen. We know the film we will see and we’re OK with that. As forgiving and shallow as that sounds, there’s a limit to how films treat their audiences. This one served horrible special effects, Owen Grady being the same idiot with the hand thing, and a revisit to characters we didn’t need. This needs to end and it’s time for dinosaurs to move to another franchise.
