Heralded as the “epic conclusion of the Jurassic era,” the trailer nonetheless appears to tease a whole new era for this franchise that’s ready to begin as soon as we meet everyone’s favorite velociraptor: Blue. The carnivorous dinosaur won hearts and minds for a species of predators that was the essential villain in the 1993 classic movie which started it all. But the determined pluck and loyalty of Blue, the biggest raptor raised from birth by gamesman Owen Grady (Chris Pratt), won folks over—especially after she teamed up with Owen and no less than a T. Rex (the raptors’ mortal enemy from the original film) to take the Indominus Rex down. Blue is a loyal and quick-witted dino, and also a tragic one since at the end of 2015’s Jurassic World she becomes the last raptor. Indeed, that status is what much of the plot in 2018’s Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom hinges on, as Owen and Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) return to a crumbling Isla Nublar to save the last raptor there will ever be. Yet if that’s the case then how does one explain the below image? The haunting vision of a blue-striped raptor hunting in a snowy wood with her child comes after we’ve seen a number of disquieting juxtapositions: a T. Rex in front of a drive-in movie theater; an apatosaurus walking into some kind of construction site; a fishing vessel pulled to the watery depths by the fearsome mosasaurus. All the while, several scenes of dialogue from Sir Richard Attenborough’s gone but not forgotten John Hammond culminate with him quoting Ian Malcolm: “Life will find a way.” For those who do not recall, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom ends on a cliffhanger where the human characters (perhaps unwisely) elect to release all the dinosaurs about to suffocate in the bowels of an evil mansion into the wild. Yes, this includes Blue. However, so many of the liberated dinosaurs are solo creatures, including Blue, the last of her kind. I believe there were some young Triceratops accompanying their parents, as well as a disturbing amount of compies, but by and large, how much of an existential threat to humanity is just one raptor pr just one T. Rex? To be sure, you wouldn’t want to run into Blue on a nature walk—or see the Tyrannosaur stumble into your movie night. However, eventually these creatures will die off (if they’re not hunted to extinction) first, so the damage they can do is short-lived in the grand scheme of things. But if they can figure out away to breed potentially asexually, reproducing their species? Well, it’s game over man. So it’s fun to imagine that this could be a major component of the threequel, although a scientific explanation other than “evil scientists from the last movie impregnated them in the lab” will need to land. Either way, it seems to be setting up a future where the dinosaurs proliferate and flourish. In this movie, we will see the human world on the teetering edge for dominance alongside their revived ancient companions. But if Blue’s child is any indication that they can breed even within their limited means…. Well the “Jurassic era” might be over, but a whole new future for the franchise where human civilization crumbles and a post-apocalyptic dinosaur hellscape rises could be possible. Who knows, maybe Jurassic World might be on its very own Fury Road, only this series is going to have raptors riding shotgun?
