The Esteemed Critic is back from a length sabbatical (note to self: do not call your boss a "vulgar Sumerian" in 2018), and I am ready to eviscerate all the pop culture detritus that I've ignored and you've gleefully consumed. First up: Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.
The first Jurassic World was a very dumb movie. I do not have anything against dumb movies; most people are dumb and thus require entertainment on their intellectual level. Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, however, takes stupidity to never before seen heights. Because of an impending eruption on Isla Nublar, dinosaur activists, including Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard), who is somehow not in jail, are appealing to the government to take action and rescue all the man-eating monsters from a second extinction. The government rightly concludes that saving these genetic abominations (where are the feathers!) would be a waste of tax payer money, and so Claire and her companions enlist the aid of another elderly billionaire that was apparently a secret partner of John Hammond. Of course, they need the services of Owen, played by the nearly charisma-free Chris Pratt (seriously; what happened to the guy from Guardians of the Galaxy?), and a predictable double-cross ensues. Turns out that said elderly billionaire (played by James Cromwell) is being manipulated by Evil Business Man (Rafe Spall), who wants to sell off the dinosaurs like an arms dealer. Five movies in, the Jurassic Park franchise is so divorced from reality that the audience is expected to believe that dinosaurs would have military applications. Here's a reality check, folks: dinosaurs were not magical monsters that would wipe out modern-day animals. Sure, they were really big and pretty cool, but they were certainly not as intelligent, fast, or adaptable as modern mammals. The movie tries to claim that velociraptors were just a step below humans in intelligence, a fucking ridiculous claim even in the bizarro universe of Jurassic World. In real life, velociraptors were covered in feathers and about the size of a turkey but likely not as smart. Even in the movie's ridiculous universe, the only reason anyone gets killed by a dinosaur is because they are not packing heat. Tyrannosaurs and their ilk did not possess Kevlar skin--they had hollow bones-- and they would be about as militarily effective as an elephant or a hippopotamus. But wait, I've forgotten to mention Fallen Kingdom's other plot point--Evil Business Man is working with Jurassic Park's Dr. Wu to develop the Indoraptor, a genetically-engineered super raptor programmed to kill by laser. Wouldn't it just be easier to shoot someone if you've already locked on to them with a laser sight? Who are they selling these dinosaurs to, Dr. Evil?
One of the reasons that the original Jurassic Park was so iconic was that it treated its dinosaurs like animals rather than movie monsters. It took many liberties with its dinos, but they were mostly true to the science of the time. The same can't be said for the Jurassic World films. At this point, they should just do a Godzilla cross-over. Or hell, throw reality out the window and make the next James Bond film set in the Jurassic World universe. The Critic would certainly watch that movie. I might not enjoy it, but I would certainly watch it.
No comments:
Post a Comment