Today’s society gets bored rather easily — everyone is always searching for the next adrenaline high.
Feeling its attractions were becoming as ordinary as a trip to the zoo, Jurassic World theme park developed an ingenious plan to stay relevant and provide a jaw-dropping sight that would leave audiences mesmerized and terrified.
Introducing Idominus Rex
It appears to be the lovechild of a Tyrannosaurus Rex and a Velociraptor.
Part rex, part raptor and the rest is ‘classified information’ — in translation, it was made up of many different animal parts to up the thrill factor.
Born and raised in isolation, Idominus Rex never interacted with another living thing and was unable to develop social skills.
It can sense locations of warm bodies, similar to snakes.
For some odd reason, the folks at Jurassic World felt it was a good idea to cook up this creature in their lab, mixing all sorts of traits from different animals that had unexpected results — for example, the camouflage ability of a cuttlefish, or the ability to go thermally undetected like a frog.
To the creators’ surprise, this demon of a dinosaur outsmarts everyone, escapes and runs rampant across the island, killing for sport along the way.
Since the backbone of the park is made up of high-end executives who have nothing but money on the brain, they don’t seem to be very worried once this dino escapes, thinking they can track it and everything can go back to normal. Once they realize this isn’t the case, they are still hesitant to evacuate everyone — over 20,000 people — because they know the park wouldn’t reopen.
The body of the plot involves two young, feuding brothers — the youngest of which is obsessed with dinosaurs — visiting their aunt Claire [Bryce Dallas Howard], one of the higher-ups at the park. While exploring, the boys think it is a good idea to go off-roading in one of the ride vehicles and what results is a, well — what you would expect from a movie with wild roaming dinosaurs.
When all hope is thought to be lost, the dinosaur-taming badass Owen [Chris Pratt] steps in to save the day, and looks damn good doing it.
The remainder of the film is spent similar to the previous films in the series — with a lot of running, hiding and raptor attacks, all culminating in an epic dinosaur versus dinosaur fight to the death.
The special effects in this film are outstanding. With the exception of a few times when there was so much going on it made it hard to focus, they were excellent — especially during dinosaur on dinosaur action.
One of the coolest parts of the movie was when the two boys Gray [Ty Simpkins] and Zach [Nick Robinson] were wandering through the island, looking for a means of transportation to escape, and they stumble upon the visitor center from the first “Jurassic Park” movie (1993). In the absence of the charming Jeff Goldblum, this scene provides a bit of nostalgia that lovers of the series were longing for.
As for casting — it was impeccable. Howard did very well in the emotional roller coaster of a role she played. She began very calm and in control; however, once things got sticky, she turned into a woman who would stop at nothing to protect everyone around her, especially her nephews.
As mentioned before, Pratt was spectacular in his role as the military veteran turned raptor-tamer. He made you feel that if you were stuck in this crisis situation, or really any situation, you would willingly entrust him with your safety. His ability to not only communicate with the animals, but also his overall kickass demeanor showed he was fully capable of saving the day.
Speaking of saving the day, fans of the show “New Girl” will adore Jake Johnson’s role in the film, as Lowery, the savvy tech guy who braved the storm and stayed to help when all the other technicians in mission control evacuated.
The two boys did surprisingly well for child actors in a role like this. They had very emotionally taxing roles to play, and these two embodied them just right. My only slight complaint was that it was a very overdone storyline when it came to these two characters. If you recall the Jumanji-style movie “Zathura,” where the older brother terrorizes the younger one over something he loves, they bicker until they are forced to go through crazy circumstances together and eventually become best friends. There is nothing wrong with this story and it worked well in this film — it was just something that has been done many times.
Another complaint I had was the attempt at villainous characters. There were two characters that felt as though they were trying to make them seem like the bad guys, but never actually followed through. Hoskins [Vincent D’Onofrio] wanted to use the raptors for war-like activities, and then decided to bypass everyone and release them on this new beast. There is also the scientist Dr. Henry Wu [BD Wong] who appears slightly evil at times; however, just like with Hoskins, it just felt incomplete and poorly attempted.
Despite these few flaws, “Jurassic World” does not disappoint this historic movie franchise. Would I attend a park of this sort? No. Would I see this movie again? Absolutely.
