An incredible return to form, Jurassic World is easily the best sequel in the series and while it hits on very similar beats to the original, it is amazing in its own right.

22 years after the events of the first film a new CEO, Simon Misrani (Irrfan Khan), has taken over from the now passed on John Hammond and has opened a dinosaur theme park on Isla Nublar, the site of the original Jurassic Park. This new park, Jurassic World, has been open for five years and is fully stocked and operational but it has seen its attendance begin to flag and corporate sponsorship which wants something new. So InGen does what corporations that only care about bottom lines do: it comes up with a new attraction that no one has seen before. Unfortunately, this is Jurassic World so that ‘attraction’ is a genetically engineered dinosaur hybrid that is a mix of T-Rex and some other things no one wants to talk about. Given that this is a Jurassic Park movie, things go wrong and all hell breaks loose. Also because this is a Jurassic Park movie, this happens when park executive Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) has her two nephews Zach (Nick Robinson) and Gray (Ty Simpkins) visiting and of course they are lost in the park and need to be saved. She enlists raptor trainer Owen (Chris Pratt) to help while a corporate conspiracy is happening amidst the chaos led by Hoskins (Vincent D’Onofrio).

So that was really long synopsis for what is a fairly basic storyline but it has a lot of moving parts and while it could have trimmed some of it up a bit, it adds to the chaos going on in the situation and makes for a film that feels more full and more substantial than, say, Jurassic Park III. There is even more going on than what I wrote up there but those are the most important broad strokes.

Going into this movie there was a lot of fear from some of the choices that the trailers suggested that could make this movie really stupid and now having seen it I can say that all of those choices worked in the context of the story. There are going to be people who are going to nitpick and say that some of these choices are stupid but given that the film is an indictment of corporate greed and forcing progress whether it is a good idea or not, those people are being needlessly critical.

Specifically, the hybridization of a dinosaur is really a fairly logical progression for a company that has shown no foresight or understanding of the power they are wielding. Ian Malcolm’s speech in the first film is just as valid now as it was then and the inherent intellectual superiority that people tend to have when regarding past scientific mistakes informs them that this time it will be different. This time we will be in control. Of course we won’t be in control but arrogance and greed are not often emotional states that lead to clear thinking.

The raptor training is another element that people have had issues with before hand and again it makes sense that if you have a theme park that has attempted to domesticate animals for exhibits you would have people trying to train them. Raptors are animals and as such are not immune to training. People have been training lions and tigers for hundreds of years. Is it completely safe? No. Do the animals stop being dangerous predators? No. Do they still occasionally turn on trainers and eat the holy living fuck out of them? Yes. So the training aspect of the raptors does not mean that they are weakened or neutered here and the film openly acknowledges this. In the context of the film and he explanation given it works and makes sense.

The training also speaks to something that the movie does that surprised me a little and may be a reaction to films like Blackfish. There is significant focus on the dinosaurs as living animals vs the corporation that sees them as ‘attractions’ and ‘assets.’ This disconnect is what leads to the creation of the Indominus Rex. The geneticists, led by Henry Wu (BD Wong), one of the only returning characters from the original films (the other being a brief appearance by the original T-Rex from Jurassic Park), and their corporate leadership, do not look at what they are making as a real living creature and as such give no real thought to what they have done or the overall impact on the world. They have not created a dinosaur, they have created a monster designed to scare guests and it does so by being the most dangerous creature on the planet.

So, all that out of the way, the movie is a lot of fun and brings back a healthy dose of the original’s magic. In starting us out at a functioning park there is a sense of wonder and fun to it all. It gives us the oohs and the ahs before all the running and screaming. It also allows us to make more of an emotional connection with the dinosaurs as animals which in turn ups the stakes for when everything goes to hell.

The characters are not the most fleshed out in the world but there is enough time spent on all of them for the audience to love or hate them appropriately for there to be real stakes. This helps when things go wrong and it is time to turn on the tension. And that tension is very effective. Even when evoking or quoting scenes from the original movie, the film is tense and exciting. It is impressive that at film four it is still exciting to see dinosaurs chase and eat people and Jurassic World amps things up quite a bit.

A ton of credit has to go to director Colin Trevorow who takes on a massive task for his second movie. His direction is sure and confident and he stages the action like a pro. His first film, Safety Not Guaranteed was great but it didn’t really suggest a big effects heavy popcorn movie so it was impressive to see just how good he was with this film.

The effects were largely CG with some animatronics mixed in but they looked great. The scenes between Owen and the raptors look particularly great and go a long way in helping the audience buy into these killing machines responding to a trainer they’ve had since birth. The Indominus Rex looks great both from an effects standpoint as wells as from a design standpoint. I was worried before hand that the CG heavy effects would fall short but this looks great and looks head and shoulders better than the previous sequels, particularly the third.

The performances were strong across the board with Chris Pratt offering a more serious hero than any of his previous work. Pratt gives us a brave hero who also knows how dangerous his situation is and that allows for a more human portrayal than someone who is all testosterone and macho swagger. Bryce Dallas Howard gives us an uptight workaholic who puts work before everything else but then eschews that by putting herself in harm’s way when her family is threatened. She is not a damsel in distress and she is very capable even when she is out of her element. Simpkins and Robinson have great brotherly chemistry together and they handle both closeness and irritation with each other very well. Robinson’s character is not terribly likeable in the beginning and that makes for an interesting survival dynamic.

Vincent D’Onofrio gives us the closest the movie has to a real villain but he never overdoes his character’s portrayal. He has a point of view and it is a monstrous point of view but he doesn’t settle with the black and white of good and evil but rather gives us a guy who thinks he is right and doesn’t care if others agree with him. Irrfan Khan is great as Misrani and provides an interesting evolution of the John Hammond type character with a bit of Walt Disney thrown in for good measure. Jake Johnson is great in a small but effective role and it was nice to have him in the movie.

Conclusion [9 out of 10]

While it is a little derivative of the first movie and packs in a little more than was strictly necessary on the plot side, Jurassic World is a lot of fun and brought me back to my childhood love of dinosaurs while also providing the action and tension that made the first film such a classic. I am sure there will be plenty of people who will nitpick and complain but for me it was a fun and exciting two hours that made me feel the way that summer blockbusters are supposed to make you feel. I had an absolute blast with this and I am looking forward to seeing it again.