The new trilogy nobody asked for reaches its peak with Dominion. And how better to conclude a trilogy nobody asked for than with the worst Jurassic movie ever made? I had little to no faith in this, even watching the trailers, so when the first reviews came out, and literally every single person I follow (and some liked either Jurassic World (2015) or Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018)) disliked this movie, I knew this must be something exceptional. But not in a good way, more in the “how do you fuck up so royally?” way. Let’s try to break it down.
I have many strong opinions, but most of them I am open to discussing and changing my mind. One of the exemptions that confirm the rule is this new trilogy started on an awful foot the moment it tried to convince us that you could train velociraptors, you could domesticate them even! I know we have done it to many other modern creatures, and honestly understand why they thought it was a great idea, but no. Let’s put the fact that they are dinosaurs from a long, long, long time ago aside. We would still have no way of knowing/learning so much about them to do anything remotely close to that, considering they were brought back to life not long ago, according to these movies. But ok, let’s say we have somehow managed. The other issue with this, and this was more important to me, is the creators are taking these smart, killing machines from the original “trilogy” (even though the Jurassic Park films aren’t trilogy per se) and effectively making them into “confused” wolves that won’t hurt you as long as you lift your hand up.
Another thing I also don’t understand is how Chris Pratt, somebody I loved in Parks and Recreation (2009 – 2015) and I still like in the Guardians of the Galaxy films, can be so bland throughout this trilogy he is supposed to be leading. I remember thinking back in 2015 that he was on track to become this generation’s Harrison Ford, leading two popular franchises and skyrocketing to the ultimate stardom, yet somehow, I don’t think it happened. And I also don’t believe this is me showing my bias against this trilogy; he just kind of exists in those films. Especially in this one, we had so many characters that it was hard to say there was any lead. That on its own isn’t a strange thing per se, ensemble movies exist and have existed for a while, but it seemed like his character got from the evident lead in the first film to “just a part of this group” in the last one. It almost felt like even the studio and/or people behind this film didn’t trust him enough. Weird.
One of the biggest selling points was that all your favourites from the previous movies would come back in this movie. And they sure have Laura Dern, Sam Neill, and Jeff Goldblum returned, and they are… serviceable. I thought their characters felt out of place, especially Sam Neill’s character. I had no idea why he had to be there. Don’t get me wrong, I was happy to see a familiar face, but from the story perspective, the movie justified both Laura and Jeff being there, but he came with Laura because… she needed a witness? Really? And when you have a film full of flimsy excuses just to get our “old favourites” and the “new generation” finally together, you know they stopped caring about logic and want you “just to switch your brain off and have fun”. Ok, let’s try it then.
Arguably the principal selling point of Jurassic World: Dominion; was the dinosaurs are finally living amongst us. No matter whether it makes any sense (no, it does not, and I could write a couple of paragraphs about the ending of the previous movie and how it made zero sense but let’s not), they are. So what fun is in the store for us? No island, fences, and dinos of all shapes and sizes roam freely, so we should undoubtedly get lots of tense moments. Wait, what? We get one decent action sequence on Malta, followed up by going back to some island where the movie takes place?!?!?!??!?!!?!? So the whole “how will we live together, species separated by evolution” plotline and idea were just scrapped? And I know the movie tries to have some nice sentiment about it in the last five minutes, but that was laughable. If all “bad, bloodthirsty dinosaurs” we see are on that island and not outside of it because we must have the locus plotline about evil big corporations controlling the world’s food supply, your theme no longer makes sense. And you can show us all the footage about “animals living together alongside dinosaurs”, but I am not buying it as that’s not how anything works.
The sad part is I understand and believe something similar might happen; in the future. Some giant organisations might think it would be neat to control the food supply, and I believe there is a decent thriller to be made with that idea at its core. But not in the third movie about dinosaurs where you keep promising people “dinosaurs are now roaming free”, and then we get three, four scenes max with the last five minutes saying: “Trust us, every single animal is living in total harmony with these prehistoric creatures that are crushing their territories, all good vibes and chills here, peace.” I believe that is where Jurassic World: Dominion fell short it tried to be so clever, but it lost the plot. If you delivered what you promised and explored the theme of dinos living freely amongst us, you might have had something there, like a fun movie. But in its current state, the film felt like a mess that doesn’t know what it wants to be with people who are just “kinda” there. Almost nobody stands out.
The only good thing about this film was the Maltese action sequence mentioned prior, and only because I was there in Malta a couple of years ago, therefore I recognise some of the streets. The only two people I thought did a good job were Jeff because he was just himself and DeWanda Wise, whom I haven’t seen anything else, but now have to because she seemed like she had fun and some funny lines. She seemed like the only person who had fun in this film; everybody else felt wasted; either wasted potential or their performance was “ok”.
I think that is how we could summarize this whole Jurassic World trilogy – wasted potential. There were nuggets of good ideas here and there and some great visuals, sure. But tonally, story-wise, or even character-wise, everything always felt off from the first movie, and it only cumulated in this last piece of the dino puzzle. It’s starting to manifest clearly, that nobody can replicate what Steven Spielberg did with the first two Jurassic Park movies. In the same way, nobody could reproduce what James Cameron was able to do with Terminator (and boy, did various people try several different times). And yeah, the second Jurassic Park film isn’t as great as the first one, but in my eyes, it is head, shoulders and one constant arm lift above any of the Jurassic World films.
Overall, Jurassic World: Dominion managed to surprise me. I went in expecting nothing and got even less than I imagined. The film has some brief moments of decent action and two fun characters, but it ultimately fails to deliver on its titular theme and fails to deliver on promises made not only to itself but, most importantly, to the audience. I don’t think I will ever rewatch any of these films, I would much rather rewatch even Jurassic Park III (2001), which is an objectively bad film, but at least it’s “funny bad” and still has some memorable moments. Dominion is just a bad movie.
That’s all for this one! Did you see it? What did you think about it? Let me know!
Until next time,
Luke
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