TL;DR – This continues to be a love letter to both Dinosaurs and Jurassic Park. You feel the danger and the wonder of dinosaurs at all times, even if that highway turnoff looks suspiciously familiar.  

Disclosure – I paid for the Netflix service that viewed this series.

Jurassic World: Chaos Theory Review –

It should be no surprise that I am a fan of dinosaurs, and if you are talking about dinosaurs, the reigning champion of that world was and still is Jurassic Park. While the movies have been a bit hit-and-miss lately, one thing I have been consistently impressed with was this younger demographic-targeted animation on Netflix. Jurassic World Camp Cretaceous was an actual love letter to the series and the giant reptiles that once walked the Earth. Today, we are looking at the next follow-up to that series to see if it can still capture that joy and wonder.

So to set the scene, we open as a Tyrannosaurus Rex crashes onto a highway. It is a wild new world as Dinosaurs roam the countryside, and the Department of Prehistoric Wildlife try to keep people safe. While everyone from Jurassic World Camp Cretaceous made it home and tried to help out, not everyone survived the rise of the dinosaurs. Darius (Paul-Mikél Williams) is out hunting for one particular Allosaurus that he has beef with, for reasons, when Ben (Sean Giambrone) arrives with news that the Nublar Six are being hunted, which is when a whistle blows out into the night. Now from here, we will be looking at the series as a whole, so there will be [SPOILERS] ahead.

Well, straight away, I want to talk about the love this show brings for dinosaurs. If there is a moment to show their beauty, or their danger, or even their majesty, the show takes it. Of course, there are those big set-piece moments, and yes, their understanding of Chekhov’s Tyrannosaurus Rex. But it is also those quieter moments, like releasing a strap on a trapped Pachyrhinosaurus or Ben (Sean Giambrone) and Sammy (Raini Rodriguez) looking at each other and immediately knowing that they were going to free the trapped Stygimolochs’.

Dinosaurs are always front and centre in this series, but we also do not beat around the bush that they can be pretty dangerous. Now, this is still aimed at a younger audience, so while there is a reasonably high death toll at the end, everything of that nature happens just off-screen. I don’t need to see someone get eaten to know they are dead, but your mileage might vary on that front. There is always a balance with these shows as to how much threat you can put your heroes under when you know they can’t die. Well one way to sell that is to ‘kill’ one of them off before the show starts. Now, every interaction is tinged with a touch more warry because if one of the Nublar Six is not safe, then none of them are. This also still holds true even when you realise the allosaur left no body.

My one concern with this series is that its narrative exists in the build-up to Jurassic World Dominion, which is an unfortunate low point in the series for me. However, I think they did the wise thing by looking at what exciting moments they could take from it and then working it into their setting. The hunting Atrociraptors, of which we are seemingly dealing with the first version, are genuinely terrifying, and you can absolutely believe that they would be used for hits on people. That someone from the Department of Prehistoric Wildlife would be helping to steal dinosaurs for sale to the highest bidder also feels sound rational. I am not sure if they ever entirely explained why they wanted all of the Nublar Six dead, but that is not a big problem.

All of the cast work well together, and it is their commitment that helps sell those more emotional moments that the show needs. There are a lot of highlights, including the Becklespinax rampage and the herding Parasaurolophus lux. While there is an element of a love triangle here, I am glad they resolved it maturely. Also, I liked that they didn’t undercut what would have been some intense trauma that the kids would be working through. The visuals were all well done in the style of animation that they had established. It did take a moment to get used to them being all grown up, but that is life. You blink for a second, and already that baby has a driver’s licence. However, I will say that it was surprising that every off-ramp in America looked the same.

In the end, do we recommend the first season of Jurassic World: Chaos Theory? Yes, we would. I honestly had a blast during this first season. They built on everything that had come before and then told an interesting story that was focused on what a Jurassic Park show should be on: The Dinosaurs.   

By Brian MacNamara: You can follow Brian on Twitter Here, when he’s not chatting about Movies and TV, he’ll be talking about International Relations, or the Solar System.

Have you seen Jurassic World: Chaos Theory yet ?, let us know what you thought in the comments below, feel free to share this review on any of the social medias and you can follow us Here. Check out all our past reviews and articles Here, and have a happy day.    

Credits – All images were created by the cast, crew, and production companies of Jurassic World: Chaos Theory
Directed by – Michael Mullen, Zesung Kang, Dan Forgione, Michael Mullen & Robert Briggs
Written by – Scott Kreamer, Bethany Armstrong Johnson, Travis Gunn, Sara Karimipour, Nick “Rocket” Rodriguez & Annie Arjarasumpun      
Created by – Scott Kreamer & Zack Stentz
Based On – Jurassic Park by Michael Crichton & Jurassic World Camp Cretaceousby Zack Stentz
Production/Distribution Companies – Universal Pictures, Dreamworks, Amblin Entertainment & Netflix
Starring – Paul-Mikél Williams, Darren Barnet, Sean Giambrone, Kiersten Kelly, Kausar Mohammed & Raini Rodriguez with Benjamin Flores Jr., Eugene Cordero, Andrew Kishino, Philip Anthony-Rodriguez, Carmen Moore, Alan Trinca, Brock Powell, Steve Blum, Luis Bermudez, Chris Jai Alex & Sumalee Montano
Episodes Covered – Aftershock, Rest Stop, Down on the Ranch, Brothers, Halfway Home, Free Fall, That Night, The Drop, Into the Fog & The End of the Beginning