Jurassic World: Rebirth Review

Spoiler Alert: This review reveals certain elements of the movie’s plot, as well as minor spoilers and plot sequences. If you prefer no spoilers at all, please read after seeing the movie.

The movie begins five years after the events of Jurassic World: Dominion (JW3), and it is stated that this is 32 years after dinosaurs returned. It’s a bit difficult to tell if this means 32 years after the original Jurassic Park (hereafter JP1) or after Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (hereafter JW, and in this case JW2 when referencing the movies). But since JW3 followed closely in time after JW2, it is most likely referring to JP1.

The movie opens on one of InGen’s research station islands, a brand-new location on Ile Saint-Hubert (also referred to as Site C). Like most other JP and JW movies, something that seems inconsequential sets off a bad domino effect. In this movie, a research scientist is eating a candy bar, and the wrapper gets sucked into some type of vent, and this causes the security system to short out for the pen of the Distortus rex (a six limbed, small-mouthed, alien looking T. rex). D. rex kills the man who was trapped inside the pen with him, and then the scene shifts to a few years in the future.

Several important events happen in the intervening years. First, InGen has gone bankrupt, and their research has been bought up by a new company, a pharmaceutical giant, ParkerGenix. Second, the research station on Ile Saint-Hubert is abandoned. Third, dinosaurs all over the world have been dying off due to “climate change.” This seems odd because the only place the dinosaurs currently live and thrive is on equatorial islands (apparently not much for global warming going on). The movie attempts a half-hearted solution, mainly that the vegetation the herbivores feed on only grows in tropical areas, and these rainforest environments have a higher oxygen content that the dinos need to survive.

We are introduced to Martin Krebs who hires covert ops expert Zora Bennett, paleontologist Dr. Henry Loomis, and (later in the movie) mission leader Duncan Kincaid to extract DNA from the largest surviving dinosaur, marine reptile, and pterosaur across land, sea, and air, which supposedly holds the key to a lifesaving heart disease drug . Kincaid also has several more mercenary types whom he enlists on the mission.

Dr. Loomis works in a museum as a biologist/historian/bioengineer, and just as he is meeting with Krebs, the “dinosaurs ruled the earth” banner is being taken down because the museum will be closing (a nice homage to the banner falling in the original JP). Dr. Loomis explains that nobody cares about dinosaurs anymore. People are bored with them now.

Screenshot from Universal Pictures trailer.

Mosasaurs, Spinosaurs, and Titanosaurs (oh my!)

Next, we meet the Delgado family—father Reuben, oldest daughter Teresa, and youngest daughter Isabella, plus Teresa’s “lazy stoner” boyfriend—who are all shipwrecked by a massive mosasaur capsizing their boat. They are rescued by Kincaid, meaning that these four civilians are also now on the same mission. But the research/mercenary team is now hunting the same mosasaur that capsized the Delgado’s boat in order to get a DNA sample, which they successfully retrieve. However, as they get closer to Site C, their boat is attacked by the mosasaur as well as several spinosaurs, who apparently have learned to hunt together cooperatively. This is one of the weaker points in the movie as the explanation for this is never given but is assumed it’s just part of “evolution” (more on this below).

Once on the island, after surviving their second shipwreck, the Delgados are separated from the mercenary/research group and must fend for themselves. The mercenaries have lost two members to mosasaurs and spinosaurs, and they hurry to find cover inland, looking for the titanosaurs that have tracking devices on them. They find a large herd of them and are able to get a DNA sample.

Meanwhile, the Delgado family evades several dinosaur and pterosaur encounters but do pick up a small juvenile dinosaur (Aquilops) that is friendly to the youngest daughter. While on a raft, they are attacked by a T. rex that chases them for a while but eventually gives up when they enter a restricted river passage. At the same time, the mercenary team has successfully gotten its last DNA sample from a pterosaur—Quetzalcoatlus—but they lose another team member.

Mutant Mayhem

Later, the Delgados reunite with the research/mercenary team at what used to be the Site C research compound, where much of the power is still working thanks to geothermal generators, fed by pipes all over the island. But this seems to be cold comfort as they are quickly hunted by a Mutadon, which is some type of winged mutant hybrid combining Velociraptor and pterosaur DNA. The Mutadon chases everyone into some access tunnels under the research station, except for Krebs who escapes in a large SUV and drives away. Like all JW villains, Krebs is killed by a dinosaur as he tries to escape, this time in a grisly, partial dismemberment before being eaten by D. rex.

The helicopter rescue team that was supposed to pick them up meets its end at the jaws of D. rex, which is now also hunting the remaining humans. Kincaid successfully distracts it with flares so that the rest of the party can escape on a zodiac-style motor-powered raft. But somehow, he survives, and the party returns to pick him up. The four members of the Delgado family and the three surviving members of the mercenary party make it out, and they decide that they will not turn over the DNA to ParkerGenix but open-source the material so that anyone can afford to use any drugs synthesized from their DNA samples.

Image ©Universal Pictures.

Creature Compendium

Brachiosaurus and Titanosaurus

One of the first actual dinosaurs we see is an aging Brachiosaurus. Far from majestic, it has wandered into a highly populated area and collapsed, blocking traffic. In contrast, on the island, they find a herd of Titanosaurus. These animals are presented as enormous and majestic creatures. They’re shown with surprisingly long, thin tails with a frill on their back and neck that they use to make show during a seeming courtship ritual. These frills aren’t found on the actual fossils, and they may be a nod to the fictional “Titanosaurus” from the Godzilla universe. The actual genus Titanosaurus is only known from a few bits and pieces including some tail bones, a possible femur, and some other fragments from India and several other locations. In 2003, some paleontologists claimed that it’s a nomen dubium (“dubious name”) because the original specimens can’t be differentiated from related sauropods.

Mosasaurus and Spinosaurus

The biggest animal in the movie, however, is the Mosasaurus. The actual fossils show that it was a huge animal, close to 40 feet long. However, the movie exaggerates its size greatly, making it seemingly larger than a blue whale. At one point, while being hunted by the Mosasaurus and four Spinosaurus together, Dr. Henry Loomis gets very excited and calls their behavior “interspecies symbiosis.” This may be inspired by living examples like whales and dolphins hunting the same school of fish “together.” But this example seems very unlikely. Mosasaurus was likely a deep-water creature, and it’s debated how aquatic Spinosaurus actually was. The most recent reconstructions of Spinosaurus show it having very short hind limbs, only slightly longer than its forelimbs. In the movie, their hind limbs seem somewhere between those reconstructions and the Jurassic Park III Spinosaurus, which was built more like a T. rex with long hind limbs.

Quetzalcoatlus

Quetzalcoatlus is another primary animal that gets quite a bit of screen time. It is the largest known pterosaur (not true dinosaur) with a wingspan up to 36 feet. In the movie, it nests inside a strange templelike structure carved into the side of a cliff. Fossils of Quetzalcoatlus indicate that it had a crest on its head. But the movie version has no head crest and, instead, has a crest on the front of its beak for some reason. The latest research indicates that these animals likely walked upright with their wings tucked behind their backs. But the movie version definitely moved in more of a bat-like fashion and even managed to climb up the side of a cliff at one point. In one rather violent scene, it swallows a man whole, which seems unlikely but may have been possible. They are considered opportunistic hunters, and they didn’t have teeth to grind their food, so they likely swallowed it whole.

T. rex

Of course, any Jurassic movie must include Tyrannosaurus rex (it’s in the logo). It appears a little larger and more “beefy” than previous movie versions, which is accurate to the latest scientific speculation. It spends quite a bit of screen time in a river chasing people in a raft. This scene is likely an homage to a similar scene in the original Jurassic Park book by Michael Crichton. This scene didn’t make the cut in the original Jurassic Park movie because of special effects limitations at the time. Most animals are capable of swimming, and a large animal like this could likely wade in deep water or perhaps even walk along the bottom like elephants and hippos sometimes do today. Prehistoric Planet recently featured a T. rex swimming as well, so this idea is not original. It’s unclear why the T. rex spent so much energy chasing some tiny humans when it had a Parasaurolophus carcass on hand, but it’s a movie, so it’s fine.

Aquilops

Aquilops gets quite a bit of screen time as the “emotional support dinosaur” for the young girl, Isabella. Aquilops is a small ceratopsian that looks somewhat similar to Psittacosaurus. It is known from a three inch long, partially complete skull found in Montana. It’s presented as a cute herbivore, which may be accurate, but not much is known about it.

Raptors and More

Raptors get a surprisingly small amount of screen time given how much attention they’ve gotten in other Jurassic movies. They also do not have any feathers, consistent with the rest of the franchise (see our video on raptors). Other extinct animals that get some screen time are Gallimimus (dead on a lab table), Ankylosaurus, Dilophosaurus (complete with its Jurassic Park frill), Dunkleosteus (extinct armored fish, seen dead on a fishing boat), a Megalodon skull, and some small pterosaurs (perhaps Dimorphodon?). An unnamed half-fish, half-amphibian also makes two subtle appearances. It’s presented as the typical evolutionary trope, a missing link between fish and amphibians. Perhaps it’s their evolutionary version of Ichthyostega (learn about supposed tetrapod evolution)?

The Mutants

Mutations have no ability to add information to the genome and are usually destructive to the organism.

Perhaps the scariest animals in the movie are the “mutant hybrids” that were genetically engineered on this island but were too ugly to be displayed to the public (ironic considering the Titanosaurus was featured so elegantly). There were two mutants featured—D. rex (Distortus rex), a large monster with two pairs of forelimbs, and Mutadon, a smaller creature that looked like a mix between a raptor and a pterosaur. They never explained how hybrid genetic engineering also involved mutations; they just used these buzzwords in a nonscientific way. Mutations have no ability to add information to the genome and are usually destructive to the organism (see more on mutations).

Image ©Universal Pictures.

Worldview Content

This movie is scary and violent at times, which earns the PG-13 rating, and also takes God’s name in vain multiple times. Millions of years is explicitly mentioned twice, and evolutionary ideas are alluded to several other times, including Loomis saying he wants to be buried by silt in an inland sea to be fossilized (learn about how fossils are formed).

There seemed to be a conflicted theme in the film about life and death.

There seemed to be a conflicted theme in the film about life and death. While watching multiple people get killed by vicious animals, the viewer is also asked to consider the value of human life. Duncan had a child who died, and Zora had a friend that was killed by a random car bomb. Duncan told Zora, “He didn’t deserve that.” Later, Duncan chooses to rescue the Delgados before finishing the mission. Loomis at one point says, “It’s a sin to kill a dinosaur.” Loomis carefully harvests the DNA from an egg because he doesn’t want to “hurt the embryo” of an animal that a few minutes later eats one of their own men. Loomis gets teary-eyed seeing the titanosaurs, but later, Zora shoots and kills a Mutadon.

In an evolutionary worldview, death is the hero because it supposedly brings about natural selection and evolution. But even those who don’t believe in God know that human life is special somehow. As Christians, we can rest in the truth of God’s Word, knowing we are created in God’s image. We have a guidebook for our morals and ethics. We also know that death is the enemy that Christ has defeated, and someday, he will make all things new.

Image ©Universal Pictures.

Life Did Not Find a Way

This movie is branded as a “reboot,” but even inside the movie, the references all seem to be pointing toward a collapse. Seeing dinosaurs alive has become too commonplace and boring for people. It may have also caused dinosaurs to be regarded only as killing machines when the carnivores have interacted with people. Being terrified or bored seems to be the public’s reaction to dinosaurs.

We’re not led to believe that “life finds a way” as Dr. Ian Malcolm said in JP1. We’re confronted with overfamiliarity that caused the researchers from InGen to up the ante with unnatural dinosaur monstrosities. D. rex may have even been a nod to the popularity of alien movies. Mutadon is just an obscene blend of pterosaur and raptor and looks very impractical from both a flying and walking standpoint. Even though grotesque, Mutadon is a testament to intelligent design (as was I. rex and I. raptor in JW and JW2).

There are a few points of wonder in the show (like the titanosaur herd), but it is nowhere near the level of previous films. However, the major element is not wonder, or even the dinosaurs, but raw terror for the monstrosities that mankind has manufactured. Yes, the mosasaurs, pterosaurs, spinosaurs, and tyrannosaurs still scare people, but now, they are restricted to islands far away from most human eyes. Not to look at this too negatively, but it seems that JW has been “reborn” as a jump scare movie, and this author (Troy) does not expect there to be another JW movie anytime soon, if at all. Of the 7 JP/JW movies, this was by far the worst.