Jurassic World Dominion: A Rebellion

The movie Jurassic World Dominion was released on June 8, 2022. Putting a spin on the three original Jurassic Park movies and the two Jurassic Worlds, Dominion takes place four years after Isla Nublar has been destroyed, and dinosaurs now coexist with humans all over the world. This will reshape the future and determine whether human beings are to remain as the main predators on a planet that they now share with history's most fearsome creatures. While Owen (Chris Pratt) and Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard), try to deal with the killing of a large number of people, the original trio of Ian Malcolm (Jeff Goldblum), Alan Grant (Sam Neill), and Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), reunite to face the dinos once again. In other words, the cast of the original Jurassic Park movie, directed by Steven Spielberg, unites with the new cast.

Dominion has a variety of different elements; some things were done well, and others were not. The screenplay and visual effects of the movie overall are great. There are some great shots of the dinosaurs, and fun action sequences take place, like in Matla, dinosaurs are seen chasing Owen and Claire throughout the city. Dominion well portrays how dinosaurs coexisting with humans has affected Earth, and this film has a lot of cool moments showing them all over the world. The action shots and motion pictures are also done really well. In addition, the return of the cast members make a great comeback to the series. According to one student who has been seeing the Jurassic Park and Jurassic World movies for a long time now, it “...brought back the nostalgia of the old, and combined it with the excitement of the new.”

Although Dominion has its highlights, overall, it is a very generic movie. I had a hard time understanding it, and felt like this movie did not explain very well the events that had happened since the previous film. For instance, In the previous film, Maisie Lockwood (Isabelle Sermon) has been living with Owen and Claire in protective custody, but she is kidnapped by Biosyn, who wants to control the food chain. A rescue mission begins for her, and the original cast, who are on their own mission, come into play. Eventually, these two missions did come together. That being said, I felt like there was overall a lot of confusion behind these events. Dominion could have explained why Maisie is living in an isolated cabin, especially because it has a lot to do with why the world is in chaos, and because this girl’s storyline was the downfall of Fallen Kingdom as well. In addition, the dinosaurs on land are part of a clone that we have already seen in the previous films. At this point, the dinosaur action has become so routine that it is not quite as exciting as before. I thought the film presented many unique ideas, but ultimately, failed to deliver them.

Despite this, Jurassic World Dominion definitely has some takeaways. All of the Jurassic Park movies in the series show us how mankind is continually trying to dominate and control nature. Even from the very first film when Hammond manages to clone dinosaurs, but thinks that he can control them in a theme park setting. However, as each film shows us, nature cannot be controlled. As Dr. Ian Malcolm states in the first film, “If there is one thing the history of evolution has taught us, it’s that life will not be contained. Life breaks free, it expands to new territories and crashes through barriers, painfully, maybe even dangerously.” This movie builds off of those same themes.

I personally would recommend this movie to others, but with incredibly low expectations. If you enjoy dinosaur action and humans running for their lives, this movie is definitely worth watching. I think fans would still get a kick out of Dominion in certain scenes, particularly when the dinosaur action goes down. However, the dinosaur action could have been more of a focus and less of a background in the movie. Overall, as a movie on its own, Dominion is just not up to par and is the least well done and entertaining movie of the series, especially as the finale of a franchise.