Jurassic World Rebirth (2025)

Jurassic Park raptured our hearts and adventurous spirits 32 years ago in 1993. Our rose colored glasses of hope that dinosaurs could successfully exist among us were quickly removed by the revelation of consequences exposed in the first film. That lesson was relearned in the sequels. Life may find a way, but is it worth testing its fierceness and how far it will go?

With the reboot of Jurassic Park in 2015, titled Jurassic World, we saw our fears from the original film play out for a fourth time with a fresh new cast. With a little more diversity overall, newer science, updated technology, and all the wisdom from the first attempt at Jurassic Park, one would imagine things would go a lot more smoothly. Still, mankind is as stubborn as life's desire to find a way. The consequences and lessons initially learned hadn't changed since the nineties, and with the following two sequels the theme stayed the same with an exciting splash of genetic alterations. When Jurassic World: Rebirth was announced I couldn't help but wonder how many more times can we make the same mistakes?

As this critic continues to look back at some of this Summer's films I have taken in, I would be remiss if I didn't mention one of the most overall unsettling trends in Hollywood over the last several years.....sequels, reboots, and remakes. Look, I am all for seeing more than one film for certain originals that made a splash, ie: "Jurassic Park", "Pirates of the Caribbean", "Transformers", etc. HOWEVER, once it all gets pushed TOO far over the course of TOO MANY follow-ups, sorry, but the luster, uniqueness, and quality heads decidedly southward.

I was already going into seeing this newest endeavor set in the realms of genetically grown dinosaurs with highly cautious, level expectations. What I ended up witnessing was grander proof that, as a whole, it's best to truly let certain creatures, and film series, go and/or remain extinct. While I perfectly and admittedly embrace the love of a Summer event film that just wows with its imagery, doesn't require much thinking, and provides entertainment, seeing this newest installment very much felt like beating a dead horse....or, um, REPTILE, sorry.