Jurassic World Rebirth (2025)

_Jurassic World Rebirth_ tries to revive the magic but mostly goes through the motions. The dinosaurs look fine, but the sense of wonder’s long gone. The plot recycles old beats—corporate greed, a betrayal, someone shouting “Run!”—while new characters feel like action figures with catchphrases. A few set pieces land, and it’s refreshing to see a Hispanic family in the lead, even if they feel a bit gimmicky. It’s not bad, just safe. If you want thrills, it delivers. Just don’t expect awe.

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"Jurassic World Rebirth ends up reflecting the franchise's current state. A visually competent product, with talent in front of and behind the camera, but lost in its lack of purpose and narrative ambition.

The cast is excellent, but the characters are hollow. The dinosaurs are still impressive, but their presence no longer holds the same weight. And the themes - once so rich and provocative - have been replaced by modern dilemmas that, while valid, don't truly belong in this universe.

Maybe it's time to accept that life does, indeed, find a way - but that way isn't always through continuation. Sometimes, the best thing we can do… is let go."

Rating: C+

"Jurassic World Rebirth" proves, yet again, how fossilised this franchise has become.

The ossification of fresh ideas is glaring, with a tedious, formulaic story, a lack of narrative depth and equally shallow characterisations.Expositions competently done but in isolation, that's not saying much.

In short, this is a superficially polished but nonetheless lazy effort, that adds nothing of value to a creatively exhausted franchise.

In summary, an unoriginal, uninspiring, generally a lazy effort, that moves this franchise ever closer, to cinematic extinction.

Eh, sure better than the last couple outings but also pretty forgettable. Nice everyone involved, including Scarlett Johansson, director Gareth Edwards and the screenwriter David Koepp, got a paycheck but can't say I'll remember this one come next week. Most positive thing I have to say is it doesn't overstay its welcome as it is under two hours when you take out the credits. **2.75/5**

Sometimes movies have a way of surprising us in unexpectedly pleasant ways. And this latest installment in the “Jurassic” franchise is just such a case. Admittedly, I had more than a few reservations going into this one; I couldn’t help but think that this was a cinematic commodity that had run its course, that it was essentially out of gas to offer anything new of genuine value, and, to a certain degree, that’s true, at least where originality is concerned. However, despite the picture’s expected plunge into familiar territory, director Gareth Edwards’s latest feature offering is nevertheless highly entertaining, even if not particularly groundbreaking. Perhaps that rests with the fact that this is arguably the most Spielbergian installment in the series, in many ways reflective of the iconic production that launched the franchise in 1993. In yet another story involving self-serving agenda-driven characters placing themselves in tremendous peril by venturing into a world of dangerous, genetically manipulated dinosaurs recklessly brought back to life for profit and entertainment purposes, the film follows a narrative formula that most viewers will find more than a little recognizable. But what helps to set this installment apart from many of its predecessors is the quality of the filmmaking itself, specifically its ability to effectively build and maintain tension, its capacity for presenting story arc elements in fresh and inventive ways, and its overall production values, most notably its fine (and occasionally unanticipated) special effects and its efforts in upping the talent quotient of the cast with such commendable additions as Scarlett Johansson and Mahershala Ali. Most importantly, though, this offering is to be applauded for its continuity in staying on track in terms of tone, self-aware of what kind of a movie it truly wants to be. This differentiates “Rebirth” from many of its previous releases, which often couldn’t decide whether they wanted to tell bona fide sci-fi-based tales or present themselves as campy romps (as seen, for example, in the now-famous (or is it infamous?) Bryce Dallas Howard high heel sequences in the first “Jurassic World” offering (2015)). What’s more, Spielberg’s influence in bringing this production to life is clearly present in the finished product, both in terms of honoring the merits of the series’ premiere installment, as well as in its respectful homages to the auteur’s classic 1975 offering, “Jaws.” To be sure, there are some aspects here that are wholly predictable (such as little doubt as to which characters will be offed and when), and there are times when the pacing could stand to be brisker, particularly when the film strives (sometimes a little too hard) to invoke a greater degree of character depth and development than what has typically been the case in previous “Jurassic” releases. In addition, the picture suffers from occasional plot holes, several contrived narrative devices (including one egregiously silly element near the film’s outset that nearly cost me my hopes for the remainder of the release) and more than a little blatantly shameless product placement shots. On balance, though, this is a surprisingly good picture in a series that’s now seven installments deep, an accomplishment that few franchises (other than the “Star Trek” and “007” series) can boast. Don’t be too quick to sell this one short; it may not be perfect, but it’s certainly enjoyable summertime action-adventure fare that makes for a good time on a lazy Saturday afternoon when you don’t feel like going outside to brave the heat.

Well at least there is one scene where huge great dinosaurs walk, accompanied by John Williams’s original theme, to remember - but otherwise this is a really disappointing video-game of a film that offers us nothing at all that the Jurassic franchise hasn’t already. By now, these great creatures have largely been taken care of by Mother Nature and have been reduced to living in small groups in equatorial zones around the world where they just want to be left alone to eat and be eaten, protected from a humanity which is “expressly” prohibited from going there. The grasping “Krebs” (Rupert Friend - Orlando Bloom must have been busy) has a plan to cure heart disease and so recruits special ops veteran “Zora” (Scarlett Johansson) to help him secure the living DNA from three of the greatest of these creatures. They wouldn’t know one if they saw one though, so have to convince the nerdy scientist “Loomis” (Jonathan Bailey) to accompany them and their local fixer “Kincaid” (Mahershala Ali) and they head deep into these deadly waters. Meantime, a family are blithely sailing from Bermuda to Cape Town, apparently unaware of the dangers posed by these Vernian monsters. They are dad, young daughter, hormonal older daughter and her bone idle boyfriend, “Xavier” (David Iacono). Boy are they in for a shock when they cross some huge great, and angry, Mosasaurus and end up with most of their boat pointing the wrong way in the water, but with “Xavier” still able to catch some rays whilst they await rescue from, well you can guess who comes, and largely what happens from here on in. For much of the movie, we have two parallel storylines to underwhelm us: the unarmed yet remarkably resilient family have to find an abandoned HQ whilst the mercenaries play a sort of level-by-level game navigating the usual island full of beasties adventures that haven’t really advanced much since it’s nearest biological cousin - “Jurassic Park III” (2001). Oddly enough, I didn’t think these visual effects were anywhere near as effective as in the originals. Maybe we are all just too used to these great animals lumbering about on land, breaching like whales at sea, or swooping and pecking relentlessly from the air? Johansson does join in enthusiastically and Jonathan Bailey really has one one of those smiles on his face that suggests he is enjoying his days in front of the green screen knowing it has to be easier than singing “Not Getting Married” on stage eight times a week - and probably better paid. The others really only make up the numbers, though, with a few characters obviously designated as dino-fodder early-on as it rehashes scenarios from just about everything from “Indian Jones” to “Harry Potter”. It might be like comparing apples and pears, but I have to say I found the current “How to Train Your Dragon” a much more enjoyable adventure about man’s relationship with thick-skinned, scaly, predators, because this entirely forgettable film will do little more than slot nicely into the Christmas television schedules with little, if anything, to distinguish about it once it’s grand scale cinema run has concluded. PS: I don’t know about inventing a miracle-cure drug, but whoever designed JB’s glasses ought to patent a design that stays firmly affixed to his face the entire time without moving, cracking, breaking or even slipping down his nose!

17 years ago, a group of scientists got the bright idea to mutate dinosaurs. One of those mutations was a Distortus Rex, a Tyrannosaur mutation, also known as the D-Rex. Thanks to a Snickers wrapper, the D-Rex escapes, causing the facility to be shut down.

In the present day, five years after the events of Jurassic World: Dominion, dinosaurs are dying out and can no longer survive Earth’s environment. However, closer to the equator, the tropical atmosphere allows them to flourish. ParkerGenix, a pharmaceutical company, wants to manufacture a drug capable of preventing coronary heart disease. But they need to extract blood samples from three of the largest living dinosaurs: Mosasaurus (water), Titanosaurus (land), and Quetzalcoatlus (sky).

So a group of covert operatives decides to travel illegally to Ile Saint-Hubert to retrieve the samples, where they’ll most likely face certain death and where the D-Rex now roams free.

Jurassic World Rebirth is a lot like smashing the first three Jurassic Park films together with disappointing results. Written by David Koepp (Jurassic Park, The Lost World) and directed by Gareth Evans (Godzilla, Rogue One), Rebirth feels like it recycles all of the major action sequences from the Jurassic Park films with no character development whatsoever.

The motive for every character in Rebirth is money. The film gives these moments where it seems like it’s going to reveal some sort of back story or give some sort of reason for you to care about these emotionless doofuses, but the film quickly backtracks or gives a half-ass response before tumbling into non-seriousness.

Zora (Scarlett Johansson) just finished a mission where she lost someone she was close to. Duncan (Mahershala Ali) had a son who died, which caused his marriage to end. The people with Zora and Duncan are just in it for the money, like them. A family is sailing in the Atlantic Ocean as some last hurrah before the college-age daughter goes off to NYU and has the nerve to act like victims when the Mosasaurus wrecks their boat.

Reuben (Manuel Garcia Rulfo) is a dad that decided to take his two daughters and her daughter’s boyfriend (who is a lethargic turd, by the way) out in a boat in the middle of nowhere because “they’d done it before.” His youngest just wants to eat licorice, the NYU-bound daughter makes terrible decisions, and her boyfriend Xavier (David Iacono) is lazy and unlikeable, and you just want to slap this entire family for two hours straight.

The film opens with the D-Rex escape and then flounders about in trite, boring dialogue for 45 minutes until the Mosasaurus shows up. The problem is that you end up despising all of the human characters. Zora doesn’t take anything seriously, Duncan laughs at everything, Henry Loomis (Jonathan Bailey) is a nerdy paleontologist who has no actual qualities about himself apart from his dinosaur knowledge, and everyone else either whines about everything and survives the entire film and whines forever, or is a loud but eventual dinosaur appetizer.

Rebirth does give more screen time to lesser-known dinosaurs, as velociraptors and T-Rexes are reduced to mere cameos. Most of the screen time is split between the Mosasaurus and Quetzalcoatlus, which allows Rebirth to spend more time in the water than previous Jurassic Park and Jurassic World films. Many people get eaten throughout Jurassic World Rebirth, which is satisfying given how painful it is to endure their presence. It’s also interesting that the dinosaurs get more birdlike throughout the franchise. The Quetzalcoatlus sequences are cool because of the claustrophobic nature of its nest and the sheer design of it, which resembles a bird with its feather-like appearance and beak-like nose.

The character development in Rebirth is nonexistent, but so is an actual ending. All these people die, and the survivors settle on doing this one specific thing, and then the credits roll as they’re riding in the boat away from the deadly dinosaur island. There’s all this dialogue about how they shouldn’t go there, how they know it’s stupid, and how it’s highly deadly and illegal. But then everyone acts surprised and angry when people start dying and things go wrong. The entire film is almost as dumb as the D-Rex design.

Jurassic World Rebirth is the worst film of the Jurassic Park/World franchise because it has nothing original to offer. It spends so much time paying homage to the films that came before it that it lacks its own identity. These are some of the most annoying and entitled cinematic characters of the year and you root for them to end up in an archaic intestinal tract and grunted out into antiquated dino shit.

“Jurassic World Rebirth” swings the franchise back to where it all started, both literally and thematically. Leaning hard into nostalgia, director Gareth Edwards peppers his film with sequences that mirror the most memorable moments from the original “Jurassic Park” so closely you can practically hear the 1993 film reel whirring in the background. But instead of feeling like a cheap rehash, these callbacks often land as thrilling homages that give longtime fans the satisfying jolt of seeing familiar sights updated with today’s high-tech CGI. If you love dinosaurs and all things in the series, this is a more than decent seventh installment.

The story picks up five years after the story line in “Jurassic World: Dominion.” Dinosaurs now barely cling to survival and live solely in isolated tropical zones that mimic their prehistoric habitats. At the behest of greedy drug company representative Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend), an expedition is launched to collect DNA from the last three colossal creatures with the intent to manufacture a revolutionary medical breakthrough (and of course, make the company mega rich). Martin assembles a team of mercenaries (Scarlett Johansson, Mahershala Ali) and a dino scientist (Jonathan Bailey) to help, but things take a turn when they rescue a family (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo, Luna Blaise, Audrina Miranda) stranded at sea.

While the story and tone may be a slightly different shift from the other films, this one still checks many of the usual blockbuster boxes (and sometimes it does so lazily). I caught myself thinking, “Haven’t I seen this before?” several times, but I stayed engaged with the story. Edwards brings a confident hand to the chaos, balancing massive action set pieces with quieter, tense moments that recall Spielberg’s original. Themes of empathy, redemption, and the perils of unchecked scientific ambition are explored, along with some not-so-subtle commentary on human greed and unlikely heroism. The characters are thoughtfully written too, with several showing personal growth during their adventure. By casting accomplished actors, the performances are strong and elevate the material significantly.

The visual effects are by far the best thing about the film, and they are nothing short of jaw-dropping. The dinosaurs look incredibly lifelike, and it’s thrilling to watch them roar and stomp throughout the tropical island. CGI technology has come a long way, and this is one of the best looking films in the entire series.

“Jurassic World Rebirth” knows what it is: a big summer spectacle. On that front, it absolutely delivers. This entertaining thrill ride is pure popcorn entertainment with just enough heart to make you care.

By: Louisa Moore / SCREEN ZEALOTS