Five years on from the events of Jurassic World Dominion an expedition is put together to head to an island once used to cross breed dinosaurs for the Jurassic World park. Their goal is to extract DNA from the three largest living dinosaurs with the goal of making a medical breakthrough that could save or extend millions of humans lives. Those dinosaurs are the aquatic Mosasaurus, the land-locked Titanosaurus and the flying Quetzalcoatlus. 

The man putting the expedition together is Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend), who works for ParkerGenix, a company who has purchased and obtained all of InGen’s technology. His goal is to obtain the DNA for his company so they can win the race to develop a drug that would make them billions of dollars. His ethics come straight from the Carter Burke school of corporate behaviours that you may remember from the film Aliens. 

Leading the group is ex-special forces operative Zora Bennett (Scarlett Johansson) who has suffered some trauma in her most recent mission. And alongside her are Duncan Kincaid (Mahershala Ali), another mercenary with a sad backstory and palaeontologist Dr. Henry Loomis (Jonathan Bailey). They do have some other team members but in true Jurassic fashion they may as well be wearing red coats so the film spends little time introducing them. 

As they reach the island they also cross paths with a family who have found themselves lost at sea due to a dinosaur attack. Reuben (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo), Teresa (Luna Blaise), Xavier (David Iacono) and Isabella (Audrina Miranda) give us another Jurassic film staple, children in peril. 

The overall result is one of efficiency over emotion. Everything that you would want from a Jurassic movie is present and the action sequences are well crafted and effective. But I am unsure that there is anything here that will be particularly memorable. 

All of the film’s storylines and plots feel somewhat undercooked. We have a prologue set seventeen years earlier that shows us another island with mutated dinosaurs which will give us our setting. In a text write up at the beginning we also have a quick summary of events since Dominion and the fact that people are now bored of dinosaurs. Both of these things together are doing a lot of work to give us a short cut to the main story of two different groups of people stuck on an island being hunted by dinosaurs. Then the plot points for those characters are very thin as well. Krebs is a corporate monster, Bennett and Kincaid are competent ex-mercenaries with sad backstories, there is a tiny hint of a love interest between Bennett and Loomis and the family have the usual family issues. Oh and there is a cute baby dinosaur. Everything works functionally to deliver us dinosaur peril. 

So what about that peril? It is well executed and occasionally spectacular. At the helm this time we have British director Gareth Edwards who is well versed in big blockbuster material. His debut low budget movie Monsters (2010) showed he has an affinity portraying large creatures in a natural environment. Since then he delivered Godzilla (2014), Rogue One (2016) and The Creator (2023). So portraying giant dinosaurs for his fifth feature is something he has taken in his stride. A sequence that features the Jurassic staple of a T-Rex is perhaps the best in the film but the nature of having dinosaurs in the land, air and sea gives some welcome variations to the action. 

So let’s double check… 

A corporate representative who underestimates the power of dinosaurs? Check. 

Genetic experimentation that has gone wrong? Check. 

Children in peril? Check. 

Abandoned park ruins? Check. 

A palaeontologist in constant awe of the dinosaurs and always wanting the best for the world? Check. 

Some stunning dinosaur set pieces including some fan favourites and some new additions? Check. 

The tone of this review may sound slightly dismissive but I need to underline that this is a perfectly acceptable family film that will entertain. In the pantheon of Jurassic movies it might even find a slot somewhere in the lower middle order. It is just that it feels monumentally uninspiring as though it was the result of passing the script through a series of A.I. Prompts of what an audience would want of a Jurassic movie. The fact that for me the most memorable facet of the film is the unbelievable way that Loomis is constantly taking his glasses on and off and how they seem to remain on his head through thick and thin is rather telling.

Acceptable summer entertainment but I would hope that any further entries in the franchise utilise a little more imagination.