Jurassic World Rebirth Movie - Review

What’s fascinating about Jurassic World Rebirth is the way it invites us to wrestle with the idea of what happens when the novelty of dinosa...

What’s fascinating about Jurassic World Rebirth is the way it invites us to wrestle with the idea of what happens when the novelty of dinosaurs—the very thing that once made us all gasp and lean forward in our seats—finally starts to wear off, not just for the star characters on screen but for the audience as well, and it’s a fair question, especially given how recently we had another installment in the franchise, with Jurassic World Dominion’s lackluster reception still echoing online and the sense that maybe, just maybe, it’s impossible to ever truly recapture the awe and excitement of the original Jurassic Park; but the thing about Rebirth is that it’s acutely aware of how adventure movies have evolved since 1993, and rather than trying to outdo its predecessors on spectacle or nostalgia, director Gareth Edwards (who already proved his blockbuster chops with Godzilla and Rogue One) and writer David Koepp (a Jurassic Park veteran) set out to make not just another Jurassic movie, but a genuinely great adventure film, period.

Anchored by the charismatic trio of Jonathan Bailey, Mahershala Ali, and Scarlett Johansson—who play a ragtag but impressively skilled team tasked with leading an expedition into the last patch of land still claimed by dinosaurs—Rebirth quickly establishes its stakes and lays out its objective within the first few minutes, never bogging us down in unnecessary scientific jargon or shocking twists and turns, but instead moving swiftly to the heart of the storyline, which is less about revolution discoveries and more about the old-age human pull toward danger, curiosity, and the kind of adventure that’s both thrilling and just a little bit reckless as the story continues.

And while the film is packed with action and intensity, there’s a surprising undercurrent of sweetness (sometimes almost bordering on saccharine), as the narrative dips into themes of loss, moral awareness, and the importance of appreciating life and our own smallness in the face of something truly ancient—messages that, while hardly new, are delivered with an earnestness that might, if you’re open to it, get under your skin, even if they’re wrapped in familiar packaging; it’s hard to ignore, too, how the story makes a point about equal access to scientific discovery, reminding us that the wonder of the world belongs to everyone, not just a privileged ones.

What helps the film rise above the pitfalls of formula is the cast, which is stronger than any other recent Jurassic outing—Bailey, Ali, and Johansson bring real humanity to their roles, smoothing over any emotional bumps in the road, and while there’s an expository conversation between Ali’s Duncan and Johansson’s Zora that probably could have been trimmed, the actors’ chemistry carries it through, and it’s quickly followed by a pulse-pounding action sequence that more than makes up for the lull; the only real quibble is that Johansson, at times, seems just a touch less invested than her co-stars, but even so, she delivers when it counts.

In many ways, Rebirth’s smartest move is going back to basics, stripping away the clutter and letting a straightforward narrative and relatable characters take center stage, which gives the film a timeless quality and makes it feel less like a cash grab and more like a genuine attempt to rekindle the spark that made the first Jurassic Park such a phenomenon—because even if it’s naive to hope for lightning to strike twice, there are moments in this film that remind you of what it felt like to see dinosaurs come to life on screen for the first time.

Jurassic World Rebirth might not reinvent the wheel or shock you with never-before-seen twists, but it knows exactly what it’s doing, and if you let yourself go along for the ride, you might just rediscover a little of that old wonder, even in a world—both real and fictional—that sometimes feels too jaded to let the dinosaurs dazzle us all over again.