#NowWatching ”Jurassic World.”

Which is one of my least favourite blockbusters of the past decade.

However, it’s a fascinating one, because it’s explicitly about everything that makes it so horrific.

In that “Jurassic World” is explicitly about taking something that was once a source of awe and wonder, but turning it into empty and focus-grouped product.

This aspect of the film is woven into the text itself, but not to critique or deconstruct it. Just to state, “This is.”

That said, the pandemic has really thrown “Jurassic World” into focus. Given how hard Disney fought to open Disneyworld, and how eager people were to go, the idea that the events of the first three films would stop a park from opening seems laughable naive.

“Okay, those of you in the front of the train should be able to see our main gate, built from the gate of the original park, over twenty years ago.”

“Jurassic World” treats so much of what made the original film so striking and memorable as nothing but empty nostalgia fuel.

I am horrified at how “Jurassic World” manages to take John William’s score and strip any meaning or power from it, but I also admire the honesty of it.

It’s nothing now, but a signifier of a movie that you remember loving, with no room left for wonder or majesty.

You would imagine that any “Jurassic Park” sequel would aspire to replicate or match that awe.

There’s an honesty in the cravenness of “Jurassic World”, a sense in which it’s just repackaging and escalating a memory of that wonder.

It’s a simulacra.

“Twenty years ago, de-extinction was right up there with magic. These days, kids look at a Stegosaurus like an elephant from the city zoo.”

Again, “Jurassic World” becomes a metaphor for itself, in the same way that “Jurassic Park” was.

But there’s no introspection or insight.

“Jurassic Park” plays as metaphor for the film’s impact on blockbuster filmmaking, arguably comparable in influence to “Jaws.”

“Jurassic World” takes that metaphor to the extreme, suggesting that we live in a world where that spectacle has been amplified, warped and distorted.

There’s a potentially clever movie in this idea, but “Jurassic World” does nothing but vomit up the idea and regurgitate old thrills.

The film is exactly what you’d imagine the metaphor to be critiquing, without any self-awareness.

“Imagine if we had these puppies in Tora Bora.”

The whole military-industrial complex angle of “Jurassic World” is indicative of the movie’s cold, hollow, empty cynicism.

It’s a superficially “deep” theme that makes sense in the context of the movie, but sounds “smart.”

Post-9/11, blockbuster cinema (especially superhero cinema) was largely reconfigured to play as a metaphor for the military-industrial complex.

Which, you know, makes sense when dealing with themes of superpowers and rights and justice and so forth.

I’m not saying that there isn’t an interesting “War on Terror” metaphor to tie to dinosaurs, though it’s an awkward fit.

However, “Jurassic World” puts no greater thought into the metaphor than that it should probably have one because most modern blockbusters do.

“Hey. Yeah, it's me. We might have an opportunity here.”

The original “Jurassic Park” was an ode to the idea of chaos, and a cautionary tale about mankind’s hubris.

No system was so strong that it couldn’t collapse in on itself at the weakest points. That’s the horror of it.

In contrast, “Jurassic World” seems incapable of grasping this.

The industrial espionage plot in “Jurassic Park” was a story about the folly of man.

But “Jurassic World” takes these conspiracy theories seriously. There’s always somebody plotting and scheming, vying for control.

Again, you see this as a general recurring theme in the blockbusters of the 2010s. There’s always a plan behind a plan, a man behind the man, an author of all the characters’ pain.

Logically, this is probably mostly an extrapolation of the success of Thanos and the MCU, but...

I do wonder to what extent these core recurring themes during the Obama era helped foster and fester the sort conspiratorial thinking that led to the whole “deep state” and even “QAnon” beliefs.

Blockbusters helped build a world where there was always a shadow cabal scheming.

Sure, there were conspiracies in nineties blockbusters, but there were also blockbusters like “Jurassic Park”, which were anchored in the idea that sometimes the world is governed by forces outside of human control.

Watching “Jurassic World” illustrates how things have changed.

Exactly this.

“Jurassic Park” mocks BioSyn’s scheming by having the stolen data lost in a freak accident at round the halfway point and everybody oblivious to the theft.

Now, you see them being repositioned as series-spanning villains, presumably with plans and schemes. https://twitter.com/huginspl/status/1354564038953480192

“Well, a promise tomorrow is worth a lot less than trying today.”

Boy, I had forgotten how much “Jurassic World” actively *hates* the women who refuse to conform to maternal and caregiving roles.

The film’s not even subtle about it.

It’s notable, for example that the movie’s most sadistic and graphic death is that of Zara, Claire’s assistant who fails as a babysitter and who dares to question her fiancé having a bachelor party.

Never mind that babysitting her boss’ nephews isn’t her job.

And, naturally, Claire herself even has to learn that - despite not wanting kids - her function is to serve as caregiver to her nephews.

Claire is repeatedly told that she was wrong to pursue a managerial career and - by most accounts - being quite good at the mechanics of it.

Indeed, you could argue that there’s something in the way that “Jurassic World” is the first “Jurassic Park” movie that treats the female dinosaurs as being morally wrong for rebelling, rather than suggesting that man is wrong to try to control them.

“Jurassic World” is the first “Jurassic Park” movie where the goal is to hunt and kill the rebelling (female) dinosaur.

In the other films, even when the dinosaurs kill the humans, there’s a strong sense that these creatures are beautiful, and not to be destroyed.

“Who’s the Alpha?”
“You’re looking at him.”

Again, it’s notable that the “good” (female) dinosaurs are the ones that bow down to the (literal) authority of man.

The raptors are good when they listen to Owen, but bad when they follow their nature or listen to the Indominus Rex.

Again, this is a weird sharp U-turn from the earlier “Jurassic Park” films, where John Hammond’s attempts to set himself up (to “imprint”) on the dinosaurs as a father is treated as folly.

In contrast, “Jurassic World” argues that Owen is right to “tame” the women around him.

It’s weird how the gender politics of a 2015 movie are somehow more regressive than the slyly subversive gender politics of the 1993 version.

It’s really, really, really uncomfortable.

Incidentally, rewatching “Jurassic World” reminds me that there’s no guarantee that “Duel of the Fates” would have been any better than “The Rise of Skywalker.”