#REVIEW: “JURASSIC WORLD REBIRTH”

Review by David Baldwin for Mr. Will Wong

Zora Bennett (Scarlett Johansson) is a covert operative tasked with leading a top secret mission to an island that once housed a Jurassic World testing facility. The mission? To retrieve DNA samples from three massive dinosaurs that hold the key to a potential life altering medical breakthrough.

Of course, things do not go to plan – people get eaten, children are put in harm’s way, the exec representing big pharma has nefarious intentions, and a whole lot of scary creatures are none too happy about being bothered in their new natural habitat. In other words, your typical Jurassic Park…sorry, World film.

That description should tell you everything you need to know about JURASSIC WORLD REBIRTH, the seventh film in this now 32-year-old dinosaur franchise and the fourth film in the last ten years. It is very much the kind of picture where you know what to expect when you sit down in your seat, and expecting anything more is just setting yourself up for disappointment. Thankfully, this Film focuses on dinosaurs again (albeit, the genetically modified kind) rather than inexplicable crop killing locusts like in the last outing, Dominion. Sadly though, each new dino looks more digitally-manipulated than the next and the only things that look worse are the backgrounds that scream “Green screen!” David Koepp, the Screenwriter of Jurassic Park and The Lost World, returns to pen the Script here and outside of some intriguingly underutilized ideas to answer lingering questions from the last trilogy, cannot muster up much to make this latest entry feel fresh and new. And try as he must to homage Spielbergian Cinema at every turn, Director Gareth Edwards (whose last two films were 2023’s The Creator and 2016’s Rogue One: A Star Wars Story) cannot recreate the magic and wonder of the previous films – or more specifically, the legendary original film.

That said, the Film does have a handful of exciting set pieces that look mostly great and got the adrenaline of the audience around me pumping. A scene highlighted in the marketing involving a family on an inflatable raft trying to escape imminent death at the itty bitty hands of a Tyrannosaurus Rex is easily one of REBIRTH’s highlights, as is the team racing to escape from a Mosasaurus and their gang of Spinosauri circling their boat off the coast of the island (the Film clearly has an affinity for action scenes set on water). While I could have done without a reheated version of the original film’s nail-biting kitchen sequence, I would be lying if I said I was not at the very least entertained by the action beats here.

Of the main Cast, I thought Johansson did a good enough job carrying the Film and thought Jonathan Bailey was effective as Paleontologist Dr. Henry Loomis. Who does even better however is two time Oscar-winner Mahershala Ali. He gets many of REBIRTH’s best moments as well as the some of the most emotional ones. He gets just as undercut and underdeveloped as everyone else, but still manages to make an impact every time he appears on-screen. I would have loved to see him mine those elements further and it is a shame he is not afforded the time to do so.

JURASSIC WORLD REBIRTH is more of the same, and less of the different. It’s mostly mindless dinosaur chaos that franchise fans will find at least partially entertaining in small doses. And given the state of the real world, mindless dinosaur chaos might be the best thing for all of us to experience right now.

Universal Pictures Canada release JURASSIC WORLD REBIRTH on Wednesday, July 3, 2025.