Review - Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018)

        Hey guys, Chuck here. Well, I think it's time to wrap up my reviews of the Jurassic Park franchise with the 2018 J.A. Bayona film Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. 

       Okay, so we open with an extraction team harvesting a bone from the Indominus Rex, inadvertently releasing the Mosasaurus from its enclosure in the process. Obviously, some time has passed since the events of Jurassic World, since what remains of the park has become overgrown with plant life. Three years pass, and we learn that the once dormant volcano on Isla Nublar is now active, and is set to erupt any day now. Claire Dearing, former Park manager of Jurassic World, is now leading an activist group trying to mount a rescue of the dinosaurs on Isla Nublar, as all of them are in grave danger because of the volcano. Unfortunately, based in testimony from Dr. Ian Malcolm suggesting that the United States government let the volcano wipe out the dinosaurs, the U.S. Senate decides just that. 

          It's here that Claire is brought to the estate of Sir Benjamin Lockwood, located in the mountains of Northern California. We learn that Lockwood was previously the business partner of the late John Hammond, and the two of them developed the technology to recreate dinosaurs in a basement laboratory at the Lockwood estate. Lockwood, along with his assistant Eli Mills, detail a plan to extract the dinosaurs from Isla Nublar and take them to a Sanctuary Island, where they will not only be safe, but free from human interference and interaction. However, they need Claire to help with the dinosaur tracking system she utilized at Jurassic World, and they also need Owen Grady to help track down the Velociraptor known as Blue, as Blue is the last of her kind. 

           Owen is initially hesitant about joining the rescue mission, but after watching old video of him working with Blue and the other raptors when they were very little, he relents and meets with Claire at the plane, along with her associates Franklin Webb and Zia Rodriguez. They arrive along with a team led by mercenary Ken Wheatley to the island, where the extraction process begins. Blue is found, but is accidentally shot with a bullet as well as tranquilizer. Owen is also hit with a tranquilizer and left behind just as the volcano starts to erupt. Luckily, Owen survives, as do Claire and Franklin who were in a technician's room operating the tracking system. The two of them barely survive an encounter with an Allosaurus, and eventually run into a Carnotaurus. The volcano erupts, many dinosaurs are extracted, with the rest left to be enveloped by the ash cloud and the lava. 

          Back at the Lockwood estate, Mills meets with a man named Evorsoll, who is an auctioneer setting up an auction at the Lockwood estate. Auctioning what, you may ask? Dinosaurs. Yep, Mills' extraction plan wasn't to take the dinosaurs from Isla Nublar to the Sanctuary Island, but to have them delivered to the Lockwood estate to be auctioned off to the highest bidders from all across the globe. Mills then shows Eversoll a hologram of what Mills, in collaboration with Dr. Henry Wu, is planning to create. Hey, remember when Hoskins mentioned making a smaller version of the Indominus that would respond to human commands and be useful for military applications? Well, Mills and Wu made something like that, and called it the Indoraptor. 

          Lockwood's granddaughter, Maisie, overhears this and goes to tell her grandfather everything, but he doesn't believe her and sends her off to bed. Back on the boat, Claire, Owen, Franklin, and Zia all look to help Blue by firstly removing the bullet, and by giving her a blood transfusion with blood from a suitable donor: the Tyrannosaurus Rex also on the boat. The boat arrives at the mainland, and the dinosaurs are taken by a caravan of trucks to the Lockwood estate. Sir Benjamin, aware of what Mills is doing, orders him to call the police and confess to everything. Mills instead kills Sir Benjamin, thus making him Maisie's legal guardian, and carries out his plans for the auction. 

          Owen and Claire, who are locked in a cage, escape from their confinement with the help of a Stygimoloch, and meet Maisie, who takes them to the auction, where they witness the Indoraptor first hand. The auction is broken up, and the various bidders flee, with Wheatley being devoured by the Indoraptor when he tried to take one of its teeth as a trophy. Zia and Franklin free Blue, and an unfortunate leak of deadly gas begins to occur. Owen and Claire, with Maisie in hand, run into Mills who reveals the truth: Maisie is a clone of Sir Benjamin's deceased daughter, and it was Sir Benjamin's desire to use the cloning technology to recreate his daughter that ultimately drove Sir Benjamin and John Hammond apart. A massive chase through the Lockwood estate occurs, with Blue eventually defeating the Indoraptor by causing it to fall through a glass roof and get impaled on the horns of a Triceratops skull. Down in the basement, the gas has built up to lethal levels, and will kill all of the dinosaurs if Claire, Owen, Zia, Franklin, and Maisie don't do something. Claire initially tries to press a button to free the dinosaurs, but hesitates. Maisie ultimately presses the button, releasing the dinosaurs into the world. Mills is crushed to death by a Tyrannosaurus while trying to flee with the bone of the Indominus, Owen and Blue part ways once again, Owen and Claire decide to adopt Maisie as their child, and the dinosaurs now integrate themselves into our world, with Dr. Malcolm facing a Senate committee once again to express his concerns over this new world that humanity is now a part of. 

           Okay, so honestly, a lot happened in this movie, which is a bit of an issue. Whereas the original Jurassic Park and Jurassic World both had straightforward, easy to follow plots, Fallen Kingdom falls under the same trap as The Lost World by trying to overcomplicate the plot with several subplots. However, unlike in The Lost World, all of the subplots in Fallen Kingdom actually gel really well together, and make the complicated plot actually work. 

          The returning cast of Chris Pratt as Owen, Bryce Dallas Howard as Claire, and B.D. Wong as Dr. Wu are all great once again, and I definitely enjoyed newcomers Daniella Pineda as Zia and Justice Smith as Franklin. Ted Levine was a pretty stereotypical mercenary as Wheatley, but Rafe Spall was definitely entertaining as Mills. I also thoroughly enjoyed Toby Jones as Eversoll, as well as Isabella Sermon as Maisie. While I did think that the retcon of introducing Sir Benjamin as a former business partner of John Hammond was a bit forced, I did enjoy James Cromwell in the role. But the big marketing draw was the return of Jeff Goldblum as Ian Malcolm. But he's barely on it. As a matter of fact, Jeff Goldblum's role is basically a glorified cameo just to tie the Jurassic World trilogy with the Jurassic Park trilogy. I mean, I' m glad he came back, but jeez, at least give him more to do. 

        New dinosaurs in this movie, such as the Allosaurus, the Stygimoloch, and the Carnotaurus we're tons of fun to see. Hell, I e remember how psyched I got seeing Carnotaurus in the trailer for this movie. Visual effects wise, they all looked terrific. Where the movie kinda jumped the shark for me, though, was with the Indoraptor. Honestly, we didn't need ANOTHER genetic hybrid dinosaur. 

           Overall, though, I still enjoyed the work that director J.A. Bayona did with this movie. I'm giving Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom a rating of 4.05/5. Well, that'll do it for the Jurassic Park series until June with the release of Jurassic World Dominion. Meanwhile, I'll be taking a few days off. When I return, however, we will begin this year's edition of Marvel May with my review of the Disney+ original series Loki. This is Chuck signing off, and I'll see you guys next time.