Jurassic World
Rebirth
IMDb Rating
98K+
IMDb Votes
71%
Rotten Tomatoes
$748M
Box Office
Synopsis & Review
Set five years after the events of Jurassic World Dominion, Jurassic World Rebirth takes a decisive step away from the sprawling, globe-trotting chaos of the Dominion trilogy and returns the franchise to something closer to its terrifying roots. The world has adapted — uneasily — to coexisting with dinosaurs, but the largest prehistoric species have retreated to three remote, equatorial habitats where the climate and ecosystem conditions best support their biology. The pharmaceutical company Biosyn Genetics, in the final stages of developing a potentially revolutionary cardiac medication derived from the tissue of the three largest surviving dinosaurs, dispatches a covert extraction team to a storm-ravaged island off the coast of South America to collect the samples they need. The team is led by Zora Bennett (Scarlett Johansson), a seasoned covert operative, and accompanied by paleontologist Dr. Henry Loomis (Jonathan Bailey) and a crew of specialists — none of whom fully appreciate what they are walking into. When their extraction mission intersects with a family of civilians stranded on the island after a shipwreck, the operation becomes a survival ordeal that tests every member of both groups to their absolute limit.
The hiring of Gareth Edwards — the director of Rogue One: A Star Wars Story and The Creator, and a filmmaker with a demonstrable gift for making humans feel small and fragile in the presence of overwhelming scale — was the shrewdest creative decision Universal made in developing this film. Edwards and screenwriter David Koepp (who wrote the original 1993 Jurassic Park with Michael Crichton) deliberately designed Rebirth around scarcity rather than abundance: fewer dinosaurs on screen, more time spent in the dark before they arrive, a sustained attention to the mechanics of fear that the franchise abandoned somewhere around Fallen Kingdom. The result is the most genuinely tense Jurassic film since Spielberg's original — a film where the T. rex sequence in the river at night is already being discussed as one of the great set-pieces in the franchise's history. Scarlett Johansson and Jonathan Bailey generate genuine chemistry despite being given relatively spare dialogue, and the decision to keep the film's scope deliberately small and its stakes personal rather than civilisational pays off handsomely. Jurassic World Rebirth is not perfect — its third act slightly overextends — but it makes a persuasive case that there is still extraordinary cinema to be made from this premise, if the filmmakers are willing to be afraid.
Why Watch This Movie?
Jurassic Fear, Properly Restored
The Jurassic franchise spent the better part of a decade making dinosaurs feel like action movie props rather than predators. Edwards reverses that trend methodically, rebuilding the grammar of dread that made the original film so effective: sound before sight, suggestion before revelation, the stillness before violence. The film's night river sequence — in which the team attempts to navigate a river channel while a submerged Mosasaurus tracks them by sound — is the most effectively terrifying scene in any Jurassic film since Dennis Nedry met his end in the rain.
A True Franchise Reset
Koepp's screenplay is scrupulously respectful of franchise continuity while making absolutely clear that this film is a new beginning rather than a continuation. New characters, new setting, new threat structure, new emotional stakes. Fans of the original trilogy will find satisfying connective tissue; newcomers will find nothing that requires prior knowledge. This is an increasingly rare accomplishment in franchise filmmaking, and it represents a template that Jurassic should follow for whatever comes next.
Practical Effects Lead, CGI Supports
Edwards and his production team made a point of maximising practical dinosaur construction — animatronics, hydraulic rigs, on-set stand-ins — and using digital effects to enhance rather than replace physical work. The T. rex in particular is rendered with a combination of practical hydraulic elements and digital finishing that makes it feel more physically present and more dangerous than any version of the animal has since 1993. When it moves, you feel its weight. This attention to tactile filmmaking is what separates Rebirth from the green-screen fatigue of its immediate predecessors.
Cast & Crew
Director
Gareth Edwards
Screenplay
David Koepp
Studio
Universal / Amblin
Zora Bennett
Scarlett Johansson
Dr. Henry Loomis
Jonathan Bailey
Remy Black
Mahershala Ali
Manuel
Manuel Garcia-Rulfo
Original Score
Alexandre Desplat
Cinematography
Salvatore Totino
Official Trailer
© Universal Pictures / Amblin Entertainment. Trailer embedded via YouTube.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need to watch the previous Jurassic World films first?
No — and this is a deliberate design choice. David Koepp's screenplay is written as a clean entry point into the franchise. The film's opening five minutes efficiently establish the world's current state (dinosaurs are loose, society has adapted, coexistence is uneasy) without requiring the viewer to have seen any prior film. Characters from earlier entries do not appear. Returning fans will find the world-state consistent with Dominion's ending, but newcomers will not be disadvantaged in any way. Rebirth is designed to function as both a sequel and a first chapter simultaneously.
Which dinosaurs appear in Jurassic World Rebirth?
The film centres on three massive species whose tissue is required for the pharmaceutical extraction mission: Tyrannosaurus rex, Mosasaurus, and a new sauropod species (Apatosaurus-adjacent but distinct) that the film's scientists have designated the largest land animal ever recorded. In keeping with Edwards' philosophy of restraint, these three animals are the primary dinosaur presences and are given extensive, carefully staged screen time rather than being diluted among a large roster. Supporting appearances include a Parasaurolophus herd sequence and a brief but extraordinary Quetzalcoatlus encounter in the film's second act that has become one of the most discussed sequences of 2025.
How does Rebirth compare to the original Jurassic Park (1993)?
Rebirth does not surpass the original — no Jurassic film has, and it would be unfair to hold any to that standard — but it comes closer than anything released since The Lost World (1997). The elements that made the 1993 film so enduring — the sense of genuine danger, the patience before revelation, the human characters who behave with something resembling intelligence in crisis situations — are all present in Rebirth in a way they conspicuously were not in the Trevorrow trilogy. Edwards himself has cited the original as the blueprint he returned to when approaching the film, and his admiration for Spielberg's control of suspense is evident in every major sequence.
Is Jurassic World Rebirth appropriate for children?
The film is rated PG-13 and is more genuinely frightening than any Jurassic film since the original — which itself received a PG rating that surprised many parents in 1993. Parents of children under ten should consider carefully: the film features several extended suspense sequences, implied (off-screen) character deaths, and two scenes involving dinosaur attacks that are significantly more intense than anything in the Trevorrow trilogy. Older children and teenagers who enjoy survival thrillers will find it thoroughly gripping. The film does not contain graphic gore, but the tension is sustained and effective in a way that younger or more sensitive viewers may find overwhelming.
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