‘Jurassic World: Rebirth’ review: Dino well runs dry

Jurassic World: Rebirth signals the stalling point for the Jurassic Park franchise with a boring story and routine execution.

Is Universal Pictures having an identity crisis? The famous studio, still a titan in Hollywood, is stuck in the middle of a war between Disney and Warner Bros. The former is, of course, the almighty gargantuan that thrives off family-friendly frock and the now-middling Marvel Cinematic Universe. The latter takes big swings on their own cinematic universes (with mixed results) and the occasional auteur experiment. But what’s the calling card of Universal Pictures? Minions? Vin Diesel? J. Robert Oppenheimer?

The studio is trying to stay competitive in the IP wars of modern show-business via low budget horror flicks from Blumhouse and glossy cartoons from Illumination. But even those are starting to lose their luster with six films in the Despicable Me canon and thrillers like Wolf Man and M3GAN 2.0 bombing at the box office. Its lineup for the remainder of 2025 features a bevy of IP sequels, ranging from Wicked to Five Nights at Freddy’s. Does this show a definitive identity for what makes a Universal project exciting? Or is it just a functional business model that keeps money coming in regardless of how trite and unnecessary these sequels are? If we’re going by Jurassic World: Rebirth, the latter seems to be the case for the Jurassic Park franchise.

Five years after the events of Jurassic World: Dominion, dinosaurs that once roamed free in the modern world are starting to die-off due to the current climate. The public losing interest in dinosaurs also isn’t helping. However, pharmaceutical rep Martin (Rupert Friend) sees the DNA of dinosaurs as the key to developing life-saving medicine and getting mega rich off of it. He recruits smooth-talking mercenary Zora (Scarlett Johansson), meek paleontologist Dr. Henry (Jonathan Bailey), chill boat captain Duncan (Mahershala Ali) and a ragtag team to go to a forbidden island where the climate is still habitable for dinosaurs. The gang tries to find three specific dinosaurs and extract their biomaterials alive, all while dealing with a father (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) and his family marooned on the island.

Back to basics.

Photo Credit: Universal Pictures.

With Jurassic World: Dominion straining the possibilities of the franchise with dinosaurs running wild on Earth, Jurassic World: Rebirth implies that it’s an in-universe hard reset. Thankfully, there are little to no blatant callbacks to the other films or sequel teases that bog this adventure down. The best thing about Rebirth is that it’s not setting up a new trilogy or trying to due any franchise middle management; It’s just another summer adventure in the Jurassic paradise. And yet, the worst thing about Rebirth is that it’s not trying to do anything new or exciting with the premise of dinosaurs on Earth; It’s just another summer adventure in the Jurassic paradise.

The dino hunting is a less suspenseful version of the plot from The Lost World, while the marooned family subplot is less impactful than the marooned family in Jurassic Park III. There are teases of new ideas, like the fear of mutated dinosaurs left behind on an abandoned island or turning Jurassic Park into a treasure hunting adventure like Indiana Jones or Uncharted. But again, they’re “teases,” not fully fleshed-out into exciting set pieces because the movie has to make room for franchise staples. We need an appearance from a T.Rex and the obligatory “dinosaurs are majestic creatures” scene where John Williams’s theme (redone here by Oscar-winner Alexandre Desplat) swells as the characters marvel at the computer-generated creature that’ll be added in post-production. It’s as if screenwriter David Koepp (who also wrote the original) is filling-out a paint-by-numbers chart of everything typical for a Jurassic Park story.

On the upside, there are worse things to look at for 134 minutes. Rebirth might be one of the best-looking entries in the franchise thanks to its emphasis on warm lighting and vibrant coloring. Credit to director Gareth Edwards (Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, The Creator) and cinematographer John Mathieson (Gladiator) for making this Jurassic World entry look as lively as it does. It’s a shame they can’t craft a more energetic chase between the humans and the dinosaurs or make the dinos even remotely scary. The editing also doesn’t seem to in-sync with the score, as a few tense moments during action scenes are a second or two off from big musical stings to heighten the drama. As good as Rebirth looks, it never kicks into an energetic gear and stays at an oddly pleasant pace.

Team players.

Photo Credit: Universal Pictures.

Much like how Rebirth feels like a placeholder for a studio’s summer schedule, the actors involved are also mostly just killing time before their next projects. Johansson certainly has the star power to lead a franchise vehicle, and she knows it. She cruises through the entire movie with nothing but her laid-back charisma on display. Sure it could be called sleepwalking, but the script doesn’t give her much of an emotional arc to work with so it makes sense her only focus was looking cool while trekking through a jungle. To be fair, she does have some tender chemistry with Bailey while he tests his presence in something other than a musical.

But everyone else in the cast is just expendable filler and worse than that, they know it. Friend doesn’t lean into his corporate villainy for any comedic effect or increasing of tension. Ali, one of the most engrossing actors working today, has nothing but his smile and a beret to work with in his limited screen time. Garcia-Rulfo and the other actors in the family subplot are completely pointless, adding bits of awkward comedy and scenes with the youngest of the group playing with a baby dinosaur. Why? Because Universal needs its own version of Baby Yoda, obviously.

The bottom line.

Jurassic World: Rebirth is another routine case of a franchise going back to the well one time too many. All of the ideas and set pieces and characters have been done better in other movies, a couple of them in the same franchise. Now the series has officially run aground with no new ways of exciting an audience or taking advantage of such a fun concept of dinosaurs on the loose. How many times can we be wowed by dinosaurs grazing in the grass, or chomping at the bit, or menacingly swimming like they’re auditioning for Jaws? The franchise needs a radical retooling before its legacy becomes truly extinct.

Jurassic World: Rebirth is now playing in theaters everywhere. Watch the trailer here.

Images courtesy of Universal Pictures. Read more articles by Jon Winkler here.

Jon Winkler