The Jurassic Park franchise has been a staple of cinema for more than 30 years now, starting back in 1993 with Steven Spielberg's brilliant adaptation of Michael Crichton's work. Since then it's been providing us with a steady stream of blockbuster hits and unforgettable dino destruction.
In 2015, the series was given a new lease on life with Jurassic World, bringing it back from extinction. And now the franchise has returned again with Jurassic World: Rebirth. In honor of the newest entry, let's look back at all seven movies (including Rebirth), and rank them from worst to best.
7. Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom
Coming hot on the heels of Jurassic World, the sequel is a big change of tone. After the collapse of the park, dinosaurs are once again living free on the island, but a volcanic eruption is threatening to wipe them out. A small team is sent in to rescue as many animals as they can, but as always, there are bad guys looking to exploit the creatures for profit.
This movie was a turning point for the franchise where it decided to leave reality behind and embrace pseudo-science and ever more ludicrous plots. The way this series doubles down on the dinosaur hybrids and even introduces human cloning brings it further away from the original Jurassic Park, which was more grounded. It misses the ideas of humanity, science and nature colliding in unexpected ways, swapping out the philosophical elements for cheap thrills.
It's a shame too, as the movie is well-directed by J.A. Boyena, with some great shots in the last act which take place in a large mansion at night, giving haunted house horror vibes. If the story had matched the visuals, this could have been a great movie.
6. Jurassic World: Rebirth
The latest entry in the franchise leaves you wondering if it's time for nature to select it for extinction. We return once again to a secret facility on an island where International Genetics Incorporated (InGen) has created dinosaurs. The mission is to collect samples from three species which are believed to hold the secret to curing heart disease. Being a Jurassic movie, things quickly turn bad as the team gets shipwrecked on the island along with some creatures that were too dangerous to ever be shown to the public.
Despite having the title Rebirth, there's not much that gets reborn in this movie. Dinosaurs are dying out and live in isolated parts of the world, despite the promise of Dominion showing them living side-by-side with humans, and again the action is confined to a small, uninhabited island. It's a strange choice, as the story here is just a rehash previous ideas. There's a dumb fetch quest plot, two-dimensional characters, and perfunctory action scenes.
Rebirth feels like a missed opportunity to provide a reset for the franchise after the extravagance of the World trilogy, either by going back to its smart, tension-filled roots, or else providing a basic, gritty action movie similar to Jurassic Park 3. Instead, it feels like a last gasp from a tired franchise out of ideas, but still churning out a new movie ever three years. It's a weird mix of tropes, nostalgia, and unused material from the books that's mashed together in an unpleasant mess.
5. Jurassic World: Dominion
This movie closed out the Jurassic World trilogy and sees the return of Alan Grant (Sam Neill), Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), and Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum) from the original films. After the dinosaurs were brought from the island in Fallen Kingdom, they escaped into the wild and are now living alongside humans. When a plague of giant locusts destroys crops and threatens food production, all evidence points to Dr Henry Wu, the original creator of the dinosaurs who's now working for corrupt bio-engineering firm BioSyn, being behind it.
It's odd that this movie introduced the idea of dinosaurs existing all around the world but never really shows it. There are a few early scenes showing them disrupting human activity, but we never explore this setting in detail, and most of the action takes place in an isolated forest where dinosaurs are living in a kind of nature reserve.
The main attraction of Dominion is seeing the original characters back together for the first time since Jurassic Park. It's an old trick but it works well enough, and the actors all seem to be enjoying their return to the franchise. Once again the plot doesn't hold up to scrutiny. The series is beginning to parody itself, but it's a serviceable ending to the trilogy.
4. Jurassic Park 3
This is something of an outlier in the series. Aside from the inclusion of Alan Grant from the original movie, it's mostly a standalone story, and the first film in the franchise not based directly on any of Michael Crichton's books. It also has a pretty basic plot, with a couple tricking Grant into returning to the dino-filled island on the pretense of a sightseeing trip, though their real purpose is to search for their son who went missing there. When their plane is destroyed by a spinosaurus, they have to travel across the island looking for an escape while trying to avoid being eaten.
Jurassic Park 3 is what you'd imagine a sequel to be like before the age of rigorously connected cinematic universes. It's a simple, quick movie about a bunch of people trapped on an island full of dinosaurs, and it doesn't overstay its welcome, with a sub-90 minute runtime. It lacks the thematic ambition of the first two films and doesn't come close to the spectacle of Jurassic World, treading the safe and predictable middle ground.
Even so, Jurassic Park 3 is probably the most underrated movie in the franchise. If you don't expect too much from it, it's actually a lot of fun, and has some slick action scenes. It's also the only film to give us a spinosaurus with a ringtone and a talking raptor!
3. Jurassic World
In 2015, the Jurassic franchise returned after a 13-year absence. Now, a new park has been set up named "Jurassic World," and it's been successfully operating for years with no major incidents. But looking to make more money and keep visitors invested with new attractions, the owners decide to create new, original creatures that are bigger, scarier, and far more dangerous when they inevitably escape.
It feels like a natural place for the franchise to go with a reboot, finally showing a working park, realizing John Hammond's dream of bringing these creatures to the public. Chris Pratt plays a likable main hero and the movie has some memorable scenes that go bigger and bolder than any in the franchise up to this point.
You can begin to see the trends that have defined the franchise from here on creep in. There are the hybrid dinosaurs, the evil corporations, and the priority of bombastic action over the kind of deep thoughts and introspective themes of the first movie. But it's still a fun watch, and the best movie of the World era.
2. The Lost World: Jurassic Park
The sequel to Steven Spielberg's masterpiece, released in 1997. This movie is a bit of a disappointment, partly because it fails to live up to its predecessor, which is admittedly a very tough act to follow, but also because it would have been much better if it has followed the plot of Michael Crichton's novel more closely. However, there is a lot of resentment surrounding this film that's unfair.
The story follows a team led by Ian Malcolm, who returns to the island to document the dinosaurs living there, hoping to spur public sentiment to protect these animals. As always, there are unscrupulous businessmen waiting to exploit the creatures, as a team of InGen mercenaries descend to capture several dinos and transport them back to the US so they can set up a new attraction in San Diego.
The Lost World definitely lacks the polish of the original, but it's still a thoroughly entertaining watch, and also contains some of the themes of its predecessor. Rather than these creatures being fenced in and controlled, they're now roaming free, and the humans who venture to the island are stepping onto their territory. If it has stuck to the book more closely, it would have been able to explore these ideas even more. Sure, the T-Rex in San Diego part might have been one act too many, but the whole scene where the Rexes attack the trailer is one of the best sequences in the entire franchise.
1. Jurassic Park
Based on Michael Crichton's bestseller, this isn't just the best movie in the franchise, it's one of the best movies in Steven Spielberg's diamond-studded filmography. InGen CEO John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) invites several people to view Jurassic Park, where dinosaurs have been brought back from extinction and put on display, before it opens. But everyone soon discover that nature doesn't want to be controlled, and there are fatal consequences in bringing back some of Earth's mightiest predators.
Much like he did with Jaws, Spielberg creates a movie that defies its premise. It would be easy to just dismiss it as a "dinosaur movie" (especially considering how many cheap rip-offs there have been), but it's so much more. The dinosaurs are certainly spectacular, and the effects — both practical and digital — still look amazing thirty years later. But the real brilliance of the film is in its writing and directing.
There's an emotional and philosophical intelligence to the movie. The theme of nature not wanting to be controlled runs throughout it, and the character of Ian Malcolm provides cogent commentary on why this is a bad idea and will end in failure. It's a cautionary tale about human arrogance and scientific hubris.
Jurassic Park is such a joy to rewatch and discover new things to be amazed by. There's not an ounce of fat in the script, and it's a near-perfect film. It's one of Spielberg's finest offerings, and the very definition of a spectacular summer blockbuster.
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