Jurassic World: Rebirth review: Everybody loves the dinosaur

Open the door, get on the floor, it's time again to watch more dinosaurs.

As Jonathan Bailey’s wide-eyed Dr. Loomis has tears run down his face in complete awe of touching a dinosaur, you get a quick reminder of what made the original so special.

You're transported back to the first time you saw these unfathomable animals on the big screen. Your full of wonder and disbelief almost like you're Anton Ego at the end of Ratatouille.

It is the epitome of what made these movies great in the first place. It's a reminder that yes, dinosaurs are still cool, no matter how many times this franchise makes them seem otherwise.

It's just a shame that it is an outlier in an otherwise average film.

When it was announced there would be yet another addition to the Jurassic World universe, only three years after the pitiful ending of Jurassic World Dominion, many of us were left tired. What more can you really do that hasn’t been done?

Turns out, not a lot. Jurassic World: Rebirth feels disingenuous as a name. Maybe swap rebirth for identical twin and then your on the right lines.

It follows the Jurassic Park formula to a tee. Conniving businessman Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend) wants to exploit the dinosaurs for his own personal gain. He recruits a team of experts, played brilliantly by Scarlett Johansson, Mahershala Ali and Jonathan Bailey, who slowly realise he is not the good guy he seems to be.

On the mission, innocent people get caught in the crossfire, this time, the Delgado family, and have to navigate these life-threatening situations.

After a few people are killed by the dinosaurs in a gruesome fashion, they face up against the dinosaurs to end all dinosaurs. In fairness, bonus points for creativity because this new concoction of a dinosaur - dubbed the Distorous Rex - seems like a T-Rex’s and Predator’s love child.

You’ve seen it done before to varying levels of success, and in fairness, it leans to the positive side for the most part.

The dinosaurs are scene stealers. Luckily, for this franchise, their screen presence has never dwindled. The Distoroius Rex acts as a good final dinosaur to face, but in the grand scheme of things, feels very underutilised considering how cool it looks.

The characters are more likeable and grounded than Chris Pratt’s posse. Duncan (Mahershala Ali) is a protector and doesn’t hesitate to put him selves in harm's way, Zora (Scarlett Johansson) is a badass yet still flawed, and Dr. Henry’s (The charming Jonathan Bailey) innocence and one-liners make for the most memorable moments of the whole film.

He has a great monologue towards the middle of the film about how humans think they control animals and nature, even though both will carry on long after we are all gone.

It is capped off with a killer one-liner, “Survival is a long shot.” Which, don't get me wrong, is a great line, but with a cast filled with A-listers and a chance for a revival of the franchise, survival is a given.

It is a safe revival. It blows its Jurassic World counterparts out of the water, but never dares to be great, bar a few moments. And at this point, that’s ok.

We are not expecting much, as long as you give us some good dinosaur action and a little bit of humanity, we will accept that.

It’s a fun time, nothing more, nothing less. But I’ll still have my head in my hands if a new one is announced.

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️