Jul 07, 2022
Jurassic World: Dominion has received, by far, the worst reviews and reception of the six-film franchise that has taught us the valuable life lesson that dinosaurs will eat people. Director Colin Trevorrow (Jurassic World) is back though he remained a screenwriter for the entire World trilogy along with Derek Connolly (Safety Not Guaranteed). It's also bringing the band back together by including Sam Neill, Laura Dern, and Jeff Goldblum as their beloved original trilogy characters (there's also B.D. Wong, again, if that does anything for ya). I've delayed seeing the movie because of my own sense of caution and resignation. Is it as bad as feared?
It's years after dinosaurs have become reintegrated into the human world. Owen (Chris Pratt) and Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) are living out West together with the clone girl from 2018's Fallen Kingdom. He's lassoing wild dinos and she's breaking them out of illegal testing sites. The BioSyn CEO (modeled after Apple's Tim Cook, here played by Campbell Scott) has big plans for… world domination? It's actually unclear besides general profit. The evil businessman hires kidnappers to abscond with the little clone girl, the baby dinosaur to Blue, America's favorite family-friendly raptor, and for good measure, he's also unleashing swarms of killer locusts. Owen and Claire are hopping the world to find their missing family (Owen promises the raptor he will return her baby) and uncover yet another evil scheme from an evil rich person.
There is a lot going on with Jurassic World: Dominion and yet so little is happening, at least from an intellectual standpoint. This feels like three different movies inartly slammed together and it is overstuffed with subplots all competing for screen time, so every few minutes feels like a possible off-ramp for another episode of what the opening concept portends. The concept of a world where humans are forced to co-exist with dinosaurs is a genuinely exciting starting point, and it's a Jurassic movie I would want to see, and I do… for a montage to open and close the movie. It's a shame that the most interesting part of this movie, the global acclimation of creatures of an older millennium rejoining our ecosystem, is kept as literal background. I suppose by the end nature just took care of itself. Instead, the majority of the movie is split between two less engaging stories: giant locusts and a rich guy's private dino enclosure. Yes, dear reader, you read that correctly. After five movies of dinosaurs in parks, where we begin with dinosaurs in the real world, it's back to spending time in another glorified dino park, and would you believe that something goes wrong at this park too? Why even bother setting up an exciting premise if it's abandoned so completely? The movie we do get is a lesson in diminished returns and accepting disappointment. This feels more like a giant locust movie for half, about a villainous corporation weaponizing genetically modified plagues to kill their competitors' stock. It's certainly something that seems plausible for a massive corporation, but what is this doing in my Jurassic World movie? Why did we need another blankly evil CEO, this time the guy who appeared in one scene in Jurassic Park, as if that mattered? Why do we need more extraneous characters taking away oxygen from the legacy characters returning especially when they seem too similar to the already established characters? Why should I care about three dinosaurs fighting at the end like I'm personally invested in any of these creatures? My sadness manifested watching this franchise descend into even more farcical dumb blockbuster nonsense.
The best part of this movie might actually be its most ridiculous. There's a mid-movie set piece where our heroes infiltrate an underground dinosaur fighting ring in Malta. That's cool, and we're introduced into new secondary villains we can enjoy get their just desserts once the dinosaurs inevitably get set loose. The lead trafficking lady says the raptors have been trained to kill anything that she shines a laser pointer on, which was also introduced in the last film. She targets Claire and then it becomes a foot chase between Claire and a determined raptor. It's a silly excuse for a chase but it has an extra sense of urgency. It's also completely ridiculous and ridiculously fun. Claire transforms immediately into Jason Bourne and is leaping from rooftop to rooftop and crashing through windows. Owen is riding a motorcycle through the narrow streets while being chased himself. It's all action movie pablum and it works for what it is in the moment. Treverrow's action set pieces have some moments that pop, especially Claire cautiously slipping into a pond to escape a supposedly blind dinosaur. There are even dinosaurs with feathers now. Alas, the movie can only work as dumb fun for so long before it just becomes infinitely more of the latter.
There are so many moments on repeat here that Dominion feels like it's stitched together like another genetically modified dinosaur clumsily patched with parts of the franchise's past. Oh, and you better believe we're going three movies in a row with a new genetically-modified super monster to better sell toys (at least this one isn't stated as being part raptor). The appeal of this movie, besides the concept abandoned above that I mentioned, is the old characters coming back together, even though Goldblum and Neill each headlined a Jurassic sequel. This action is also a tacit condemnation of the investment in the new trilogy's main characters. I doubt anyone is going to say, "Wait, Owen Grady and Claire Dearing are back for another movie? Count me in." I bet most people didn't even remember either of their names. But if we're bringing back important characters of franchise past, let's give them something important to do. They get into danger and scrapes but it's also always with a wink and a nod that is grating. Goldblum gets to wave his arms around to distract like he did in Jurassic Park. Dern gets to cuddle a triceratops like she did in Jurassic Park. Even Neill features in a dangerous teetering automobile like he did in Jurassic Park. The contrivances to get them all in the movie were already there, but then you give them little to do other than go through the motions of their past (I will always demand more Goldblum time). There are certain dinosaurs reappearing to hit that nostalgia button. It's the poison-spewing dinos, the ones that blinded and killed Nedry (Wayne Knight), and they're back, except they can also have their mouth grabbed shut in the most unintentionally hilarious moment. Why even bring back an evil CEO barely mentioned in 1993? Do we need that strained connection for a role recast because the original actor is in jail for assaulting a minor? It's an excellent example of losing track of the appeal of nostalgia by metric volume.
As far as I'm concerned, that little clone girl, a.k.a. Maisie (Isabella Sermon), is responsible for all the pain and suffering in the world because of deadly dinosaurs. At the end of Fallen Kingdom, this little kid single-handedly rescues the dinosaurs from extinction because, as she said, "They're alive, like me." I guess her reasoning is they weren't supposed to exist, but they do, so we should value life. The problem with that occurs when that creature also happens to be a predator. I would have loved Dominion to explain why Maisie is living in an isolated cabin is because she's the world's most wanted person, as mobs of victims blame her for their loved ones dying at the hands, feet, and claws of dinosaur mayhem. The world is in chaos because of this little kid's rash decision. This cloned girl storyline was the worst part of Fallen Kingdom and now she gets to be the worst part of Dominion as well. Her entire presence is once again as a plot device. I guess she served a purpose as her realization over her identity lead to her decision to save the poor dinosaurs, but here she's a literal savior cure with legs. Apparently, the reason why the big bad corporation kidnaps her, along with baby Blue, is because her DNA is the key to eradicating genetic disorders. Fortunately, you only need some blood or saliva for a DNA sample and kidnapping seems like overkill. You could have just asked her nicely for a sample, fellas.
Why would this gesture work on other dinosaurs?
However, the dumbest aspect of this requires some sticky spoilers discussion, so you have been warned. Maisie was the grandchild of Benjamin Lockwood (James Cromwell), a retcon character to elbow in another rich co-founder of Jurassic Park that we just never heard about until the fifth movie. Except she was really his daughter but as a clone. Well now we get even more retconning because Maisie's mom, herself, gave birth to her… self. The adult Maisie impregnated herself with her own clone (because this was the easiest way to have a child?) but she's also genetically modified her DNA to exclude a terminal disorder killing the adult Maisie. If adult Maisie wanted to save others from having her genetic disorder, why not publicize this valuable information? Why not tell her colleagues? Why leave her clone as the lone evidence? This new info makes me kind of hate the adult Maisie. She brought her clone into the world and made her a target. This seems cruel and unnecessary. It also doesn't make sense for a person supposedly valuing life or the larger scientific community or even her own child. I'll say it: she's a bad mom.
The wild swings and retcons reminded me of what happened with the newer Star Wars trilogy. In 2015, both The Force Awakens and Jurassic World are released to massive success and kickoff reboots of their respective franchises. Both of the movies purposely leaned onto nostalgia for their originals, even repeating similar plot beats and reminders to trigger positive association. Then both directors, J.J. Abrams and Treverrow, left the franchise and the second movies, 2017's The Last Jedi and Fallen Kingdom, took big swings, tried to be something different from the mold, and were met with divisive responses from the larger fanbase. I appreciate both of these movies attempting to do something different with something so entrenched in formula. Then for the concluding movie, both franchises had the original director return to essentially retcon the retcons, to bring the movies back to what was familiar and ultimately dull. It's even more interesting when you take into account that Treverrow left the Jurassic series to spend a year of his life developing Episode 9 before being fired and hastily replaced with Abrams.
I remember the meta-commentary in Jurassic World about modern audiences becoming jaded and complacent to scientific wonders mirroring movie audiences becoming blasé to what used to marvel us in the realm of special effects extravaganzas. As it leaned into its considerable nostalgia, it was doing so in a thinly veiled satirical criticism of, "Is this what you want?" Now all the meta-commentary and irony have been stripped clean and it's simply a big, dumb, lumbering beast awaiting its own creative extinction as it meets an end. The franchise is still a colossal moneymaker and Dominion has a chance of topping one billion in box-office, so there will be more adventures cannibalizing the past for inevitably diminished returns, and then we'll get the special reappearances of, like, Jake Johnson's character or Guy at Computer #4 to the celebration of few if any. None of the Jurassic movies have ever come close to capturing that certain magic from the first movie but they have all been, in some way, serviceably entertaining even at their worst. Dominion is the worst of the franchise and feels devoid of passion and awe and curiosity. To paraphrase a clever man, the studio execs were too busy thinking about whether they could and less busy worrying about whether they should. I guess you could shut off your brain and possibly enjoy it but that's admitting defeat. Jurassic World: Dominion makes dinosaurs dull and that's a disservice of imagination.
Nate's Grade: D+
Verified