Jurassic World: Dominion

[Arachnerd]

All due respect to those you who enjoyed it, I found this movie unbearable just like Fallen Kingdom. I can’t decide which is the worst of the franchise.

They're two different kinds of bad imo: Fallen Kingdom just features an overabundance of mindnumbingly insulting cliches, one-note characters and hamfisted preachy morals that it's irritating to watch; Dominion, on the other hand, is just so aggressively mediocre and boring that it's a chore to sit through, and Trevorrow couldn't even do the basics of having dinosaurs running amok civilization as its main plot and instead chose to focus on the stupid locusts (not to mention pointlessly retconning clone girl's origin and also focusing on that over the dinosaurs) and Rise Of Skywalker-ing Dodgson who did absolutely nothing and was a pathetic excuse for an antagonist.

I would have been more forgiving of Dominion if there was more focus on the dinosaurs instead of those damned locusts since, y'know, they're kind of the main attraction that the entire franchise is built on. Much like The Rise of Skywalker there are some things in Dominion that I do enjoy but as a whole it's not good, although I can't bring myself to really hate it because the franchise has been near and dear to me since I was a kid.

Drizzle, you and I are on the same wavelength.

 

[Drizzle]

They're two different kinds of bad imo: Fallen Kingdom just features an overabundance of mindnumbingly insulting cliches, one-note characters and hamfisted preachy morals that it's irritating to watch; Dominion, on the other hand, is just so aggressively mediocre and boring that it's a chore to sit through, and Trevorrow couldn't even do the basics of having dinosaurs running amok civilization as its main plot and instead chose to focus on the stupid locusts (not to mention pointlessly retconning clone girl's origin and also focusing on that over the dinosaurs) and Rise Of Skywalker-ing Dodgson who did absolutely nothing and was a pathetic excuse for an antagonist.


Drizzle, you and I are on the same wavelength.

Your comment about Dodgson though, they could have done so much more with the character and when it was announced they were bringing him back I thought, "That's a great way of tying it back to the first movie and they have a real opportunity here to make Dodgson an interesting villain". How wrong I was because he ended up just being an evil Steve Jobs that

Spoiler

ended up suffering the same fate as Nedry while inexplicably carrying around the Barbasol can because...memberberries?

 

[spiderman2]

I still think JP 3 is the worst.

By far

 

[Arachnerd]

Eh, agree to disagree. JP3 at least holds some entertainment value in my opinion and I don't think I've come across any fan of the franchise that hasn't liked the pteroranodon sequence yet.

 

[Drizzle]

JP3 isn't very good but I still rank it above Fallen Kingdom and Dominion. It's a fairly straightforward "stranded on an island with dinosaurs" movie that stays in its lane and doesn't pretend to be anything more than what it is. My only real gripe with it was the Spinosaurus muscling the T-Rex out of the way but in retrospect I almost feel sorry for the Spinosaurus now since it's no longer on the official JP3 logo and it was kept out of the Jurassic World movies apart from the deliberate nod of the T-Rex crashing through its skeleton in JW.

 

[-Arya-]

I’ll take JP3’s lean 90 minutes over the bloated mess this new trilogy has become.

 

[Iceman]

My ranking after TLW is just "the rest". I enjoy dino action and appreciate any attempt at anything additional like drama, comedy whatever - noone's aiming for Spielberg levels anymore so they are fun but just light entertainment at this point.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

Dominion would have been much better if they ditched the locust storyline for me.

 

[Iceman]

Dominion would have been much better if they ditched the locust storyline for me.

Yeah, I really didn’t need that.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

Yeah, I really didn’t need that.

It just wasn't needed. Ellie, Grant and Malcolm could have all been studying or consulting on Dinosaurs in the wild and that's how you bring them in.

 

[Prison Mike]

For some reason the locust storyline didn’t bother me that much. I was too focused (and entertained) by the different group dynamics between Ellie/Grant/Malcolm and Claire/Pratt’s character (whose name I’m totally blanking on right now)

 

[LoganPool]

I'm one of the few that LOVE the entire "World" trilogy. Both Fallen Kingdom and Dominion are better than The Lost World and JP3.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

I really liked JW and feel FK is really under rated. Dominion just didn't do much for me.

 

[Prison Mike]

Of all the sequels , I would rank JW as the best. Definitely my number 2 after JP.

 

[Arachnerd]

Jurassic World, despite havings its problems, still think has much more entertainment value compared to what followed and I still find myself going back to watch it every now and again (helps owning it on DVD too).

As fan-service-y as it was, I still love that climax lol

 

[Iceman]

For some reason the locust storyline didn’t bother me that much. I was too focused (and entertained) by the different group dynamics between Ellie/Grant/Malcolm and Claire/Pratt’s character (whose name I’m totally blanking on right now)

I'd heard about it before seeing the film but at least that plot didn't completely take over as I was fearing. Could have done without the locusts entirely but at least they didn't ruin the film by themselves.

 

[chamber-music]

I prefer Dominion to Fallen Kingdom. Fallen Kingdom is one of the dumbest blockbuster movies I've ever seen.

At least I could find some dumb yet entertaining value in Dominion. The Dinosaur vehicle chase felt like Universal angling for Jurassic/Fast and Furious crossover.

 

[chamber-music]

The Lost World will always be the best of the sequels, honestly. it has it's issues, but it's a solid movie overall.

The Lost World is criminally underrated. The late Pete Postlethwaite was great as big game hunter Roland Tembo. I thing the third act is the biggest let down with that film. Rampaging Tyrannosaurus in San Diego was meh. Spielberg admitted he became disenfranchised later into the production and it showed in the third act.

 

[Drizzle]

I watched the full Dominion Extended Cut last night. It did improve the movie a little bit after all but not by a lot. Besides the prologue, the couple of scenes we get at the end with the JP cast and the JW cast interacting with each other and the few shots of dinosaurs co-existing with modern animals in the wild peppered throughout the film it's still pretty dull.

I also noticed that Jeff Goldblum was pretty much just playing himself here. It's a weird road that Ian Malcolm has as a character throughout this franchise:

Jurassic Park: Ironic, snarky commentator who thinks he's the smartest guy in the room (and usually is) who's also the comic relief but never a cartoon character.
The Lost World: Way more subdued and sedated compared to the first movie but that can maybe be chalked up to his PTSD from the first park incident. He looks exhausted through the whole thing.
Fallen Kingdom: Kind of similar to TLW, a much older and world-weary Malcolm who's still preaching the dangers of messing with nature.
Dominion: Everything kind of went out the window here and he's just full-blown Jeff Goldblum, rattling off non-sequitirs about Miles Davis's birthday while trying to save his friends who are seconds away from being eaten.

 

[Prison Mike]

I feel like his characterization being subdued and sedated in The Lost World was chalked up to him being the main character of the movie. His snarky personality works well when he’s a supporting character rather than a main character since it’s in smaller doses, IMO.

 

[Drizzle]

I feel like his characterization being subdued and sedated in The Lost World was chalked up to him being the main character of the movie. His snarky personality works well when he’s a supporting character rather than a main character since it’s in smaller doses, IMO.

And it's completely understandable given what the character's been through. There's just a few things Malcolm does in TLW that get on my nerves, one of which being in the trailer scene after they give the baby T-Rex back to his parents and he has the moment of realization that the Rexes are charging back towards the trailers to unleash some fury, his reaction is slowly saying to the others in a tone of voice that's barely higher than a whisper, "Hang on, this is gonna be bad," literally seconds before the Rexes slam into the trailers and send them flying. Like, dude, are you in a coma? Where's the urgency?

 

[DarkKnight88]

lol

I love the slow Goldblum whisper realization.

It’s also a Jurassic Park tradition lol

 

[Drizzle]

lol

I love the slow Goldblum whisper realization.

It’s also a Jurassic Park tradition lol

Muldoon knew he was ****ed. There was plenty of time for Malcolm to shout at the others in the trailer, "GRAB ON TO SOMETHING AND BRACE YOURSELVES!" before the Tyrannosaurs made impact lol

 

[DarkKnight88]

 

[Gothamsknight]

I think I'd take JP3 over the new films as well. I like JW, and I don't hate FK or Dominion for that matter, but they don't feel like they have much of the DNA the first 3 films did. Say what you will about TLW and JP3 in comparison to the first movie, but they all feel related.

The Lost World is criminally underrated. The late Pete Postlethwaite was great as big game hunter Roland Tembo. I thing the third act is the biggest let down with that film. Rampaging Tyrannosaurus in San Diego was meh. Spielberg admitted he became disenfranchised later into the production and it showed in the third act.

I honestly love the T-Rex in San Diego haha, that's still one of my favorite moments in any of the movies. But I do know that Spielberg kinda regrets that movie a lot, which is a shame because there's lots to love. I really liked that Ian Malcolm was a changed man in the movie, and while others complained he acted different, I mean wouldn't all of us if we survived an attack on an island filled with Dinosaurs?