WARNING: The following article contains major spoilers for Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, in theaters June 22.


When the new Jurassic Park trilogy was announced, director Colin Trevorrow indicated it would send the franchise in a new direction. Well, Jurassic World did just that by tearing down the Isla Nublar facility in 2015, letting the dinosaurs room freely once again. J.A. Bayona's Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom continues to break even newer ground, now allowing the creatures a bigger space to roam: basically, they've been let loose into the world.

But as much as Trevorrow (who co-wrote on this sequel and who will be returning for its follow-up in 2021) and Bayona ventured into previously unexplored territory, the sequel also dives deep into a massive creative reshaping of what we experienced in 1993's Jurassic Park, the Steven Spielberg film which kicked off this prehistoric ride in modern times.

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Here's a look at some of the oh-so convenient retcons that took place in order to truly allow the franchise to transform into a jurassic era.

The Pop-Up Volcano

In our previous trips to Isla Nublar, there wasn't ever any talk of a volcano, so where did it suddenly come from? When Spielberg thoroughly explored the park, there was no sign it even existed. Trevorrow and co-writer Derek Connolly threw continuity to the wind and just added it in to advance Fallen Kingdom's first act, and provide a dramatic, action-filled excuse to put the dinos in danger.

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Seriously, are we really to believe scientists intelligent enough to resurrect dinosaurs would build their facility on an island with a dormant volcano? This retcon makes no sense at all, but, hey, at least it delivered a spectacle with our heroes and all the dinos fleeing waves of molten hot lava.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Lockwood

Benjamin (James Cromwell) is introduced here as a wealthy benefactor and former partner of John Hammond, the man who brought InGen and the entire park to life in Spielberg's movies. However, not once was Lockwood mentioned before, with Hammond always framed as the visionary behind things.

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Even when InGen was taken over by the Masrani Corporation in Jurassic World, there wasn't even the slightest hint Benjamin existed. It's hard to believe such a key player would be kept in the dark, especially when he just so happened to have another dino-sanctuary in his back pocket. Fallen Kingdom simply retconned him in to facilitate the dark dynasty of the Lockwoods, with a convenient business deal with Hammond gone sour making Benjamin the new boss with a god complex.

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The T-Rex's Selective Diet

In the original trilogy, we always saw the T-Rex in an intimidating light. No matter what, whenever it got a chance to eat humans, it duly obliged. Even in Jurassic World its appetite was insatiable, yet here, for some reason, it doesn't seem interested in munching on the movie's protagonists.

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When everyone was fleeing Isla Nublar, the T-Rex chose to bite into a Carnotaurus, but when presented with the opportunity to eat the heroes, it ignored them. Even on the Lockwood estate, the liberated T-Rex chose to go after the villain, Eli Mills (Rafe Spall) and rip him to shreds over anyone else. It's so convenient because he was escaping with the Indominus Rex DNA for future experiments. This selective attitude diminishes the impact of the once-famous villain of this franchise, who made its name running down vehicles and stalking kids.

Wu's The Villain?

When we first met Dr. Henry Wu (B.D. Wong) in the original trilogy, he was a bit misguided and yes, he did have tunnel-vision. But he exhibited no real signs of being a full-fledged villain. Sure, his ambitions did make him try to weaponize Velociraptors in Jurassic World, but it was in the name of military advancement. In his eyes, Wu was serving his country, something he was already doing with his research being used in medicine.

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In Fallen Kingdom though, all of a sudden he's creating hybrids for warlords to purchase, and auctioning off dinos to anyone who has the cash. It goes against his character because as sinister and scientifically adventurous as he was, he respected and revered dinos. Wu held them in a prestigious light and didn't see them as pets for the average man. However, this retcon's done just to have an evil genius, reducing him to nothing more than a black market dealer.

Ground Zero

In Jurassic Park, Hammond alluded to the first tests his scientists did (with dinosaur DNA being harvested from mosquitoes) taking place on Isla Nublar off Costa Rica. But in Fallen Kingdom, Benjamin reveals these pioneer moves in animal genetics took place at his California manor. In the books, Hammond and InGen did most of their groundwork in California before putting the park into motion, but when it comes to the movies, the island was the beginning of everything.

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Once more, this retcon seems to have taken place just to add importance to Lockwood's estate as the place the new generation of dinos were born and now, where their species might go extinct. Either way, it's not the best change because it devalues the heritage of Isla Nublar. Bayona and Co. went out of their way to make the Lockwoods key figures, and it's probably push the narrative more towards human cloning and possibly, human-dinosaur hybrids, apparently intent on moving as far away from Hammond's legacy.


Directed by J.A. Bayona and written by Colin Trevorrow and Derek Connolly, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom stars Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard and B.D. Wong, along with Toby Jones, Rafe Spall, Justice Smith, Daniella Pineda, Ted Levine, Geraldine Chaplin, James Cromwell and Jeff Goldblum. In theaters June 22.