How Jurassic Park 3 Ruined The Franchises Winning Formula

How Jurassic Park 3 Ruined The Franchise’s Winning Formula

Jurassic Park and The Lost World: Jurassic Park broke many box office records upon release, but Jurassic Park 3 did significantly worse.

You Are Reading :[thien_display_title]

How Jurassic Park 3 Ruined The Franchises Winning Formula

Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park and its follow-up, The Lost World: Jurassic Park, shattered box office records at the time of their respective releases, but Jurassic Park III saw a downward shift in the success of the franchise — due to it deviating from the established winning formula. 1993’s Jurassic Park is one of the most iconic films of all time, achieving monumental breakthroughs in special effects and remaining a universally recognized cultural touchstone nearly 30 years after its initial release. The third film in the franchise, however, almost ruined that legacy.

While The Lost World: Jurassic Park wasn’t as well-received critically when it hit theaters four years later, it still broke many records of its own, going on to become the second-highest-grossing film of 1997. But when Jurassic Park III debuted in 2001, it was the lowest-grossing installment of the franchise by far, raking in less than half of what the original made. The film had a massive legacy to live up to, and should have been able to leverage the previous movies’ success to attract audiences; however, Jurassic Park III was undermined from the start by various production difficulties — like a screenplay that was in constant flux. Jurassic Park III met with a polarizing critical reception, and the series would not see another entry until 2015’s Jurassic World.

Even on paper, it’s easy to see where Jurassic Park III failed: for one thing, it was the first film in the series not to be based on a novel by Michael Crichton, and it was plagued with script problems throughout production. With Steven Spielberg not returning to the director’s chair, the two names most closely linked to the series were nowhere to be found, resulting in a film that just didn’t feel the same as its predecessors. Furthermore, Spielberg handing directorial duties over to Joe Johnston resulted in the sequel moving away from the core elements that endeared audiences to the first two films.

See also  Awkwafina’s Katy Could Fix An Avengers Problem After ShangChi

Jurassic Park and The Lost World established a franchise formula that audiences loved: sci-fi thriller action, balanced with moments of wonder and philosophical debate. Jurassic Park III deviated from this, increasing the action but decreasing the story’s complexity and nuance. For example, Jurassic Park III created the franchise’s worst problem by introducing the idea of one single dinosaur as the “villain” of the film, a trend that continues to this day. Jurassic Park is such an emotionally resonant film because it depicts the humans of the film as the villains, as is often articulated by Jeff Goldblum’s Dr. Ian Malcolm. While, yes, they are terrorized by the T-Rex, but they brought their fates upon themselves by artificially altering nature. From Jurassic Park III onwards, humans are seemingly targeted specifically by dinosaurs like the Indominus, missing the core theme of the series entirely.

In the two decades since its release, Jurassic Park III has been redeemed by some, and is still a capable film by its own merits. While it doesn’t live up to the high expectations of the previous movies, Jurassic Park III is an exciting action-packed blockbuster in its own right. The third movie may have moved away from the winning formula of the previous films, but it did so in a manner that established a new format that the Jurassic World movies have used — and while the later films haven’t met with the same critical acclaim, they have been highly profitable. With Jurassic World: Dominion hitting theaters in 2022 and uniting the stars of the original trilogy with those of the Jurassic World films, perhaps it will see a return to what made Jurassic Park so memorable in the first place.

See also  Harry Potter Every Horcrux And Why Voldemort Chose That Object

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/how-jurassic-park-3-ruined-the-franchises-winning-formula/

Movies -