Rob Reviews "Jurassic WOrld: Rebirth"

As long as there are kids, dinosaur movies will always be a thing, and they will always make money.  For the most part, the human characters function to keep the story moving around the advancements of visual effects that began with the original Jurassic Park in 1993.  And it continues with Jurassic World: Rebirth.

Gareth Evans (Rogue One: A Star Wars Story) directs the seventh edition of the franchise as Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend) seeks out the help of Zora Bennet (Scarlett Johansson) to take a secret mission into the last place on earth where the dinosaurs roam free to extract DNA from three different once to synthesize a drug that can help cure disease.  She assembles her crew alongside Duncan Kincaid (Mahershala Ali), and both Zora and Martin recruit New York Dr. Henry Loomis (Johnathan Bailey from Bridgerton) to help in this quest all while operating outside the law and crossing paths with a family in peril, led by Ruben Delgado (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo from Netflix’s The Lincoln Lawyer).

Does it have great special effects?  Yes.

Is there a good amount of action?  Yes.

Is this a great movie?  Not really.

Part of the problem is that there is SO much going on that this could have easily been two films.  I still am not sure what the function of the Delgado family really was other than to perhaps up the stakes, but that really isn’t necessary either given that THERE ARE DINOSAURS ON THE LOOSE.

That brings me to my other point: there seems to be A LOT less dinosaurs in this than in the past, and given this script is nothing to write home about, that is not a good thing.  Ninety percent of the creatures really don’t show up until well into the second half of Jurassic World: Rebirth, and most of them are dealt with quickly.  There is A LOT of exposition that could have been handled during the action, which would have made everything more intense and engaging, but it just kind of drones on and on within itself to the point where I could pretty much time it to when I could take a restroom break based on the cadence of dialog and action.  Not as bad as what was promised in Transformers: Age of Extinction, but I did keep thinking about that film when it came to the actual amount of the beasts in this thing.

There is nothing wrong with the cast, but there had to have been questions on the set of why certain lines were put in that really had no explanation or consequence later in the film.  Sure, there may be a Director’s Cut out there somewhere explaining some of it (there is a conversation on the boat between Zora and Duncan that is the biggest example), but that editing could have been done a bit further to get those loose ends out of it as well.

I still think Jurassic World: Rebirth is better than the first two installments of its namesake (I actually enjoyed the third one), but it isn’t far away from them.  Die-hards may enjoy it, but they may also be the most critical of it.  Check it out, but it does come with that “buyer beware” tag.