I was surprised by how much I enjoyed Jurassic World in 2015. After such a long break in the franchise, I was sceptical but I thought it worked well. Here, Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard return as Oliver and Claire who are tasked, this time, with rescuing the remaining dinosaurs from Islar Nublar when a previously dormant volcano starts to erupt.
After a well-staged prologue, the film zips along nicely whilst the action is restricted to the island. The combination of creature-feature and disaster-movie looks like it is getting to work well. However, once the dinosaurs are shipped to an estate in California the film loses a lot of steam. The bad guys are too numerous and too comical to have any impact and removing all bar two from the action is a mistake.
For the last two-thirds of the running time this instalment feels just functional, and is often the case with franchises, there is too much focus on the setting-up the sequel. My other quibble is with the continuing of the idea of genetically mutating dinosaurs to create new ones. With the range and ferocity of the dinosaurs that actually existed, it feels like an unnecessary plot contrivance.
The talents of Pratt and Howard, as well as Rafe Spall and Toby Jones are largely wasted. Daniella Pineda as one of Claire’s team makes the biggest impression and deserved more screen time.
Rating: 5.5 out of 10