Dir Colin Trevorrow

Written by Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silva, Colin Trevorrow, Derek Connolly (Michael Crichton – characters)

Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Vincent D’Onofrio, Irrfan Khan, Ty Simpkins, Nick Robinson, Jake Johnson, Lauren Lapkus, BD Wong, Katie McGrath, Judy Greer, Andy Buckley, Jimmy Fallon.

It’s been several decades since the original park’s failure, and a new modernised, and ‘tech heavy’ park exists. The park is run by the workaholic Claire (Howard), with the investment of multi billionaire Khan. A new ‘attraction’, the genetically modified ‘Indominus Rex’ breaks free of its enclosure, and wreaks havock. One of the parks trainers Owen (Pratt) lends a hand to bring the Rex down, and bring Claire’s visiting nephews – lost in the park to safety.

Only okay film, that did not really need to exist has more cons than pros. Pratt is a solid lead, and this was one of his first ‘action star’ films having been the overweight comedy star of Parks and Recs a couple of years earlier. He does good work here, but the script is not nearly as good as the original. As one of the characters says the first one was ‘legit’.

The remaining cast are fine, but it feels like a carbon copy of the first film with the ‘kids lost in the park’ and the unnecessary human villain (played by the always reads the assignment D’Onofrio). One gripe I have is what happens to poor Zara (McGrath) who goes to be the first female death in the franchise.

Trevorrow tries his best to do the ‘Jaws’ thing by not showing the full monster straight away, but when it does.. it is somewhat underwhealming – with the Indominus Rex being less impressive than the original T-Rex. The graphics, also don’t seem as impressive as those in the original film either, and considering there is almost 25 years better computer technology, this is disappointing.

Jimmy Fallon has an unfunny cameo, replacing what the ‘celebrity’ voice was in the original film. The original score is back, but it is not credited to John Williams.

Followed by two sequels.

3/5