If there's one thing audiences can't get enough of it's dinosaurs, but for some reason, there aren't as many big budget films featuring dinosaurs as you might expect (same goes for pirates). So when the Jurassic Park franchise was reborn with Jurassic World in 2015, audiences flocked to theaters to the tune of $1.67 billion. That blockbuster film spawned a sequel film, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, which will hit theaters next summer. Now in an exciting bit of news and some of the best comments we have heard on the subject, Colin Trevorrow has spoken about a potential Jurassic World 3 and his plans for a trilogy, noting,
I knew where I wanted it to go. I remember telling Steven [Spielberg] even while we were making the first movie, 'This is the beginning. Here is the middle. And here's the end of the end. And this is where we want to go.' I feel like that kind of design is crucial to a franchise like this if you really want to bring people along with you and make sure they stay interested. It needs to be thought through on that level. It can't be arbitrary, especially if we want to turn this into a character-based franchise with people who you lean in to follow what they're going to do. At the end of this movie, it's not a cliffhanger, but it's designed for people to want to know what's going to happen next, whereas the earlier Jurassic Park movies had pretty clear definitive endings. They were much more episodic. So in working with Derek Connolly, my co-writer, as we designed this film, we were also thinking about where it was gonna go in the future.
Nowadays franchises, strong brands and cinematic universes are the blue chips every studio strives to acquire and produce. When Jurassic World became one of the top five highest grossing films of all time, it was easy to assume that Universal would milk this dinosaur(?) as long as it could. But what Colin Trevorrow told Sebas Tabany paints a much more creative and less cynical picture. Colin Trevorrow wrote and directed the first film, and while J.A. Bayona has stepped into the director's chair for Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, Trevorrow will still write and produce. He clearly has a vision for these films, as well as where the story will go over the course of a trilogy.
Jurassic Park was more of a stand-alone film and did not necessitate a sequel, making the follow-ups less essential. But Jurassic World has a larger overarching narrative in mind. Fans may love to hear that the Jurassic World franchise has been somewhat planned out in at least one person's mind and that the series is working towards something. Fallen Kingdom looks like it will be putting an emphasis on the animal rights implications of the failed park and a looming extinction level event. It will be interesting to see where that leads and based on Colin Trevorrow's comments, the end of Fallen Kingdom will hint at a direction for a potential Jurassic World 3. It is somewhat ironic that Colin Trevorrow is emphasizing the importance of having a plan for a franchise, considering he was fired from Star Wars, a franchise that did not have the sequel trilogy fully mapped out through Episode IX, but to each his own.
Colin Trevorrow also speaks to wanting this franchise to be character-based so that audiences can invest in where the story goes and what happens to the people in it. Dinosaurs are great but no matter how awesome or scary they are audiences won't be as interested if they don't care about the characters. The characters are a big part of what made the original Jurassic Park so great. Jurassic World already started off strong in this area by casting the talented Bryce Dallas Howard and audience-favorite Chris Pratt. I also have a hope that Jurassic World 3 can accomplish what Star Wars failed to do by reuniting the big three of Ellie Sattler, Ian Malcolm and Alan Grant. Jeff Goldblum is already back for Fallen Kingdom and Laura Dern seems open to the idea.
You can see the middle chapter in the franchise and get a hint where Jurassic World 3 might go when Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom hits theaters on June 22, 2018. For all of next year's biggest films, check out our release schedule.
