Honestly, I didn't expect to like this. I was underwhelmed by the previous installment, and Fallen Kingdom's Freshness Rating (barely over 50% at the moment) didn't instill me with confidence.
But it turned out low expectations were for the best - I enjoyed this one quite a bit. Despite numerous flaws (most of which were inherited), Fallen Kingdom offered one of the best experiences in the series. At the very least, it's the best since The Lost World, if not the original Jurassic Park.
It helps this was the first Jurassic Park/World movie to feel at all different. That's not to say it didn't contain some familiar beats - there were a handful of plot points and twists that felt photocopied from earlier movies - but the setting, style, and tone were altered enough to make this feel new.
If you've seen the trailers, you already know the movie features two main locations. The first returns us to the island from the earlier movies, but the presence of an active volcano makes for a fresh change of pace. The whole thing feels somewhat reminiscent of the asteroid strike that killed the actual dinosaurs (well, technically it's reminiscent of the fake narrative of the asteroid strike, but the dinosaurs themselves aren't exactly scientifically accurate, either). Regardless, the apocalypse gives new life to the action sequences and makes a final trip to the island worthwhile.
The other set piece is a gothic mansion, which evokes the dusty museums and libraries where 19th-century scientists formed the concept of dinosaurs this franchise uses. The backdrop makes for a nice change of pace. Together, the two settings make this feel like more than just another retread.
And anything new is appreciated, because this movie has plenty of old artifacts trying (and mercifully failing) to hold it back. There's a new old man filling Hammond's shoes, a new villain barely distinguishable from the guy from Lost World, and the new monster is basically a scaled-down rehash of the Indominus Rex.
That said, the Indoraptor is a lot of fun. It's a small, streamlined killing machine. It's smart, fast, and... yeah, at the end of the day, it's just another raptor. And they'll probably never beat the kitchen scene from the first Jurassic Park in terms of suspense and thrills, but this comes closer than anything since. Fallen Kingdom makes full use of its haunted mansion aesthetic to make its new raptor feel demonic. The bedroom scene you saw in the trailer was the most extreme example of this, but most of the third act plays with this dynamic. This certainly isn't terrifying, but it has a few moments that are creepy, in that 80's PG-13 way.
In terms of heroes, we're still mostly stuck with the returning leads from Jurassic World. There's nothing particularly wrong with Owen and Claire, but they still feel more like they're copied out of other franchises. But as generic POV characters, they get the job done.
This falls far short of being amazing, but it's the best Jurassic movie we've seen in quite some time. In addition, it ends on an extremely promising note... which is going to make it all the more disappointing when Colin Trevorrow returns and inevitably drops the ball.
Please prove me wrong, Colin. Please.
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