Jurassic World Rebirth felt off, as if two different scripts were awkwardly combined into one movie.
One plot is about a mercenary team sent to collect DNA samples on a dinosaur island. The other is a family’s survival story on the same island—a storyline we’ve already seen in Jurassic Park III and the Jurassic World series, so it no longer feels fresh.
And in the film Jurassic World Rebirth, these two plots are awkwardly intertwined, leaving neither fully developed by the time the story concludes.
The family storyline, in particular, felt utterly superfluous. While there’s a hint of the eldest daughter’s boyfriend trying to earn her father’s trust, this relationship remains ambiguous and unresolved throughout. Instead, this family seems to be treated as little more than a tool to establish the corporate villain as a “truly evil character,” lacking any real narrative necessity.
David Koepp showed great skill as a screenwriter in the original Jurassic Park, but in Jurassic World Rebirth, his talent doesn’t really come through.
The script’s weaknesses: a mercenary leader who seems too gentle and a family whose purpose remains unclear
The mercenary leader, Natasha, comes across as too gentle.
In “Jurassic World Rebirth,” Scarlett Johansson’s mercenary leader feels underdeveloped. It’s unclear if she’s supposed to be a cold-blooded killer, a cheerful hero, or a traumatized former soldier. Even her motivation for seeking heart disease treatment seems weak.
The main issue is that she’s shown as too gentle and kind. I expected her to have the cool, tough attitude of Natasha Romanoff (Black Widow) from the Marvel movies, but here she comes across more as a caring older sister, which doesn’t fit a mercenary. At times, it even seems like Johansson isn’t sure how to play the role.
The only character who truly felt human was Duncan, played by Mahershala Ali, who showed genuine grief at the loss of his comrades. The rest of the cast, however, lacked emotional depth, appearing more as chess pieces moved solely by the story’s convenience.
Here’s an interesting behind-the-scenes fact: they filmed both a sad ending in which Duncan dies and a happy one in which he survives. After test screenings, they went with the version where he lives. If Duncan had died, it would have felt harsh, but only because he’s the only character viewers care about. For the others, it wouldn’t have mattered.
The Purpose of the Stranded Family
Another puzzling part of Jurassic World Rebirth is the family vacationing inside the quarantine zone.
Why would a father take his family on a cruise to a dangerous dinosaur habitat? How did they bypass quarantine? The movie never explains.
The daughter’s boyfriend, a family member, is portrayed as a typical “jerk,” making you wish he’d already been eaten by a dinosaur. Unfortunately, he survives.
This family doesn’t add anything to the story and just seems to fill up screen time. If their scenes had been cut and the movie had focused more on the mercenary team’s drama, it would have been much better.
Repetitive Patterns and Lost Originality
Edwards’s signature is evident in the film’s scale, especially in the T. rex’s underwater scene, but during the dinosaur action scenes, the same chase-and-escape pattern repeats: dinosaurs pursue, humans flee, and narrow escapes occur in different settings.
But during the dinosaur action scenes, it feels like the same pattern repeats: dinosaurs chase, humans run, the dinosaur just misses, someone clings to something, the dinosaur snaps at their feet, and they barely escape. This formula happens again and again, just in different places.
At first, these scenes are tense, but by the third or fourth time, they just feel repetitive and boring. I missed the clever, suspenseful action of the Velociraptor kitchen escape from the original Jurassic Park.
Overreliance on the Original
Jurassic World Rebirth features numerous references and homages to the original Jurassic Park. The indoor chase scene is reminiscent of the Velociraptor kitchen escape (though this time with pterosaurs), the river rafting scene from Michael Crichton’s original novel—I understand the intent as fan service.
These references only highlight Jurassic World Rebirth’s lack of originality. The movie feels stitched together from earlier films—the core problem.
Ironically, just like the dinosaurs in the movie are made from mixed-up genes, Jurassic World Rebirth is made from bits and pieces of the earlier Jurassic films.
Technical roughness and lack of excitement
One thing that surprised me while watching Jurassic World was how obvious the green screen effects were. In some scenes, the actors are clearly on a set, and the CG island backgrounds don’t match the lighting, making everything look fake.
The original Jurassic Park felt real through its mix of animatronics and CGI. Jurassic World Rebirth’s heavy reliance on CGI cheapens its look.
Product placement is distracting. During action scenes, certain logos linger too long, diverting attention from the movie and breaking the tension.
No Longer Dinosaurs, But “Monsters”
The creatures here are more like Magic: The Gathering mutants than realistic dinosaurs, with little scientific realism.
The whole series is about genetically engineered creatures, but Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom pushes this so far that it feels more like a monster or sci-fi horror movie. The ‘new dinosaur species’ seems more like aliens than dinosaurs, making me wonder if this is even a dinosaur movie anymore.
A Franchise Reduced to Summer Blockbuster
If I had to sum up Jurassic World Rebirth, I’d call it a typical summer dinosaur movie.
It’s just another typical blockbuster: a major studio targeting summer box office, hiring big-name actors, spending a massive budget on CGI, and cramming in elements from past hits. The original Jurassic Park possessed a brilliance that made it a masterpiece destined for cinematic history. Jurassic World Rebirth lacks any trace of that.
The Lost “Spirit of the Park”
The original Jurassic Park (1993), born from the unbeatable collaboration of director Steven Spielberg and author Michael Crichton, stands as a pinnacle of science fiction cinema. Its innovative visual techniques blending CGI and animatronics, John Williams’s epic score, and the universal theme of “science run amok” all fused perfectly into a masterpiece.
The sequel, The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), was divisive, but at least it introduced the new premise of “bringing the dinosaurs back to the mainland.” Jurassic Park III (2001), while smaller in scale, worked well as a fast-paced action film.
Jurassic World (2015) reclaimed freshness by setting its story in a world where the theme park was actually operational. Its sequels, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom (2018) and Jurassic World: Dominion (2022), despite mixed reviews, also explored new directions.
Jurassic World Rebirth fails to revive what mattered most from the original—a fresh perspective and the spirit of discovery. Instead, it rehashes dinosaur chase scenes without innovation or true dramatic stakes.
The tense direction and mix of human drama with monster action that Gareth Edwards showed in Godzilla (2014) and Rogue One (2016) are mostly missing from Jurassic World Rebirth.
It’s fine for families during summer break, but it lacks real excitement or emotional impact for fans.
Commercially successful with over $800 million in box office revenue
Still, at the box office, Jurassic World Rebirth was a hit as a summer blockbuster. It opened with about $92 million in North America and $318 million worldwide in its first five days, making it the biggest opening of 2025. In the end, it made $869 million globally, which was plenty of profit for its $180 million budget.
But is this success anything more than brand inertia? Reviews were anaemic (51% on Rotten Tomatoes), and box-office figures show a steep decline compared to prior installments. Audiences showed up craving dinosaurs, not quality.
Summary: What Should Have Been Revived Was Not the “Land” but the “Spirit of the Park”
Jurassic World Rebirth superficially entertains with dinosaurs but fails at what truly matters: recapturing the spirit, inventiveness, and legacy of the original. It has many flaws that prevent a real revival of the Jurassic Park magic.
Shallow characters, chaotic structure, repetitive action, and constant recycling reduce Jurassic World Rebirth to cinematic mediocrity, stripped of all spark.
Jurassic World Rebirth reveals a truth: franchises can persist on brand power alone. However, as viewers, we long for genuine wonder and creativity—the qualities that made the original unforgettable. It remains to be seen if future entries can recapture that lost spark.
Just showing dinosaurs on screen is no longer enough. Audiences want true excitement and depth, not just spectacle.
