HOW MUCH OF THE WHEEL DOES COLIN TREVORROW NEED TO REINVENT?

JURASSIC WORLD director Colin Trevorrow has given a new interview to Slashfilm.com in an attempt to address recently leaked plot details for the upcoming film. Some of what he says is very reassuring, such as his conviction that "there’s no such thing as good or bad dinosaurs. There are predators and prey. The T-Rex in Jurassic Park took human lives, and saved them. No one interpreted her as good or bad." Yet there is a surprising amount of his comments that are quite disappointing and potentially very worrying for fans.

 "Jurassic World takes place in a fully functional park on Isla Nublar. It sees more than 20,000 visitors every day. You arrive by ferry from Costa Rica. It has elements of a biological preserve, a safari, a zoo, and a theme park. There is a luxury resort with hotels, restaurants, nightlife and a golf course. And there are dinosaurs."  - Colin Trevorrow

 Setting aside the fact that putting "nightlife" and a golf course on Isla Nublar feels like a tacky cheapening of novelist Michael Crichton's original concept, the very notion that the island has millions of visitors every year ruins a lot of the magic. Part of Jurassic Park's mystery and intrigue resulted from it being a secret. We, as audience members, felt thrilled and awed that we were fortunate enough to be privy to a hidden oasis of wonders that the wider world had little, if any, knowledge of. This also made things much more credible. It's very easy to suspend disbelief for the run-time of the movie, and accept that dinosaurs could very well be living on some private island, but all of that is lost if the general public worldwide is supposed to know about it. Because in real life there is no island of dinosaurs that thrives as a mainstream tourist attraction, so the only way to really buy into the idea is if we rationalize that it is all kept from public knowledge.
The creation of another park on Isla Nublar is in itself a very good idea, but having Jurassic World be an established and heavily-patronized destination effectively kills much of what made the original film seem so authentic and captivating in the first place. The mystique is gone.

Plus, having hoards of anonymous extras playing terrified holidaymakers threatens to turn things much too "Godzilla" for our liking (a lesson Steven Spielberg himself learned the hard way with The Lost World's cheesy and poorly received "T-rex in San Diego" sequence.)

"What if, despite previous disasters, they built a new biological preserve where you could see dinosaurs walk the earth…and what if people were already kind of over it? We imagined a teenager texting his girlfriend with his back to a T-Rex behind protective glass. For us, that image captured the way much of the audience feels about the movies themselves. “We’ve seen CG dinosaurs. What else you got?” Next year, you’ll see our answer." - Colin Trevorrow

This is a particularly alarming quote. Is there anybody out there who genuinely wants to see a Jurassic Park movie where people are presented as being "already kind of over it"?  Again, having living dinosaurs be treated as a normal and unremarkable fixture of an alternative modern reality cripples a key component of what makes Jurassic Park so fascinating. If the story's characters don't feel it's absolutely extraordinary for these giant beasts to be walking in front of our eyes, then likewise why should we care? That is the fundamental flaw in having the film's world already be used to the dinosaurs.
Trevorrow's suggestion that he needs to somewhat reinvent the wheel because he thinks many moviegoers are "over" the Jurassic Park movies is also miscalculated. Absence has definitely made the heart grow fonder. If anything, the series has grown even more in stature and iconic reputation in the the thirteen years since we last saw a JP sequel grace our screens. Jurassic Park was always a beloved classic, but time has even been kind to the critically-maligned The Lost World and Jurassic Park III, with both films sharing a bit more of their legendary predecessor's positive glow than upon first release. The lengthy gap has also allowed countless families to discover and fall in love with these films with a whole new generation of kids. Public demand for a new installment is at such a widespread and passionate level today not seen since the original Jurassic Park finished it's maiden theatrical run in 1994. We are not "already kind of over" John Hammond's dinosaurs. Not even close.
Oh, and seeing a teen texting his girlfriend because he's so nonchalant about the T-rex behind him is not an image that belongs in any Jurassic film. Period.

  "There will be one new dinosaur created by the park’s geneticists. The gaps in her sequence were filled with DNA from other species, much like the genome in the first film was completed with frog DNA. I know the idea of a modified dinosaur put a lot of fans on red alert, and I understand it. But we aren’t doing anything here that Crichton didn’t suggest in his novels. This animal is not a mutant freak. It doesn’t have a snake’s head or octopus tentacles. It’s a dinosaur, created in the same way the others were, but now the genetics have gone to the next level. For me, it’s a natural evolution of the technology introduced in the first film." - Colin Trevorrow

 It is not exactly clear what Trevorrow means when he says "new" dinosaur. If it turns out to be an actual T-rex, or some other genuine species, that has been made with the aid of other dinosaur's DNA to give it a different mood or characteristics, then that is perfectly fine, and keeping in the spirit of Crichton. But if the "new" dinosaur is in fact a completely fictional creature, then that is one step too far. Yes, in the original Jurassic Park the dinosaurs were created with the addition of frog DNA to fill unavoidable gaps caused by the age of the strand, but it still resulted in the birth of legitimate dinosaur species. A degree of creative license is perfectly acceptable and quite frankly necessary in this genre, but it does have very definite limits. It's unlikely that too many moviegoers flock to Jurassic Park films because they want to see an animal that is a total invention by the filmmakers, and doesn't represent a creature that actually existed. These movies hold such appeal because we feel like we are learning something about natural history while we go on the adventure. Introducing a fictional cross-breed, if that is indeed what they do, then it is just a mere movie monster, not a representative of something that may have lived, and it sacrifices the scientific credibility that Jurassic Park is famous for.

 "With all this talk of filmmakers “ruining our childhood”, we forget that right now is someone else’s childhood. This is their time. And I have to build something that can take them to the same place those earlier films took us." - Colin Trevorrow

We could understand and totally support Trevorrow's argument here if the original Jurassic Park was considered a relic of the 90's, and was only held in high esteem by older fans. But this is of course ridiculous. As we have said previously, twenty years worth of televison reruns, home video releases, and even last year's triumphant theatrical re-release in 3D have ensured that the Jurassic fanbase spans all ages around the world. The notion that it's only older fans who care about fidelity to the content and essence of the original is completely misguided. Trevorrow talks about wanting to make a movie for today's kids, but "today's kids" adore the first Jurassic Park as much as fans born decades earlier.
The kids of today want the same thing out of Jurassic World that kids of yesterday do: a truly great Jurassic Park sequel that excites us with different characters, dinosaurs, and situations, but also honors the original with some familiar faces (Sam Neill!) and places. It is welcomed for JW to push boundaries and be fresh, but not to go so far that it stops feeling like a true Jurassic Park movie.




While we have voiced some strong opinions here, we sincerely wish the Jurassic World cast and crew all the very best, and look forward to seeing what they come up with. We hope they can prove our concerns wrong. Our passion is only because we care so much. Colin Trevorrow pleaded in the interview to "give the movie a chance." And we will.

- @JP4NEEDSNEILL