With the release of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, it became clear that the franchise is exploring corners of the franchise more monstrous than the Jurassic Park movies did. When it comes to the events Fallen Kingdom, it's clear that Owen and Claire have quite a catastrophic dino problem to deal with. The trilogy closer could be the perfect time for Jurassic World franchise writer/director Colin Trevorrow to call upon some of the original characters to lend a hand, but does he want to? Here's what Trevorrow's thoughts on bringing back some of the '90s gang:
My want is to bring everyone back all of the time because I am such a fan. So I have to push against that and show restraint and really try to make sure that I am not just trotting them out to either sell more tickets or just for the sake of pleasing fans like me.
Jurassic Park vets include the likes of Jeff Goldblum, Laura Dern, Sam Neill, Samuel L. Jackson and Wayne Knight, among others. Seeing them back in their characters some odd years later would certainly be a treat, but it's nice to hear Colin Trevorrow has his head on straight about the implication of bringing them back to screen. It's clear he doesn't want to bring those stars back just for the sake of it or as a gimmick to get fans in theaters. If it's in service of the story of the Jurassic World franchise, then Trevorrow is all in for a little nostalgia. In his interview with The Hollywood News, he elaborated on this dynamic, saying:
I found in the first Jurassic World film, the character that made the most sense to bring back was Dr. Henry Wu because he was the one who was the father of all this genetic technology and in the second film Ian Malcolm made sense because we were looking at chaos theory made real. We were looking at all the warnings he gave us in the early '90s. A real-life figure that I thought did the same was Al Gore. He gave us a lot of warnings in the '90s about what was going to happen if we continued to treat the planet in the way we were treating it. And now we are dealing with those consequences and I feel like Malcolm is in a somewhat similar place of like, 'Well, it's happened so what are we going to do now?'
Thus far, we have had a couple characters make an appearance in the Jurassic World franchise. Bringing back Dr. Wu was a great way to tie together the world, and it made sense that the man responsible for the science for the original Jurassic Park would also be involved in the new one-- continuing to develop new technology to resurrect dinosaurs.
Dr. Ian Malcolm's return in Fallen Kingdom marked the homecoming of a Jurassic Park icon, but it turned out he had quite a small role to play (more so a cameo). As Colin Trevorrow has explained, he has tried to treat the original characters fairly, only bringing them in if it was natural for them to.
As Jurassic World 3 approaches, we would love to see Jeff Goldblum play a larger role in the franchise finale, or for the likes of Laura Dern join Bryce Dallas Howard and Chris Pratt in their crazy undertaking of a literal world full of dinosaurs. Since both of those characters have had first hand experiences with some of these dinosaurs and made it out alive before, it wouldn't feel out of place for them to come out of the wood work of feel like they have a stake in saving the world from the prehistoric monsters.
Then again, it is a stunning accomplishment that the new Jurassic World franchise has been able to stand alone from the previous installments-- and doesn't need to rely on nostalgia to deliver thrills. Jurassic World 3 seems eons away, as it won't hit theaters until June 11, 2021.
