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Thanks! I do wonder if there is a low key suggestion that Dr Malcolm may potentially be the most dangerous element in every situation he is in, even when he is trying to be helpful! Or maybe especially when he is trying to be helpful! Such as in the first T-Rex scene where, after Grant has seemingly successfully distracted the beast with his flare, Malcolm jumps out of the car with his own flare to lure it back in a display of jumping on the bandwagon-style heroism, which only succeeds in injuring him and getting the lawyer eaten!

In that sense Dr Malcolm is perhaps illustrating the dangers of someone far more used to abstract concepts (and despite the heavy criticism for Hammond's folly being more than content to stay on the rails of the theme park experience and critique the concepts from a safe position rather than truly subversively and impulsively leaving the car, or diving hand first into the dino droppings. In some ways it makes sense that Hammond and Malcolm end up paired off and bickering together over the right way to read a map in the bunker whilst the other characters are doing the action stuff!) trying to awkwardly apply them to real world crisis situations!

I am not really sure what the general consensus is on Jurassic Park III, but after being underwhelmed and annoyed by The Lost World: Jurassic Park, I remember being really pleasantly surprised by this one even back when it was new, and remain so on re-watching it over the weekend. It is not as groundbreaking as the first Jurassic Park of course, but it feels like a great example of a sequel that is derivative of all the elements of its predecessors but on those terms provides a very entertaining and satisfying watch. It also, after Spielberg's sequel film kind of ignored it completely, actually does adapt the ending of Crichton's sequel book The Lost World, with the ending in the nest and run to the beach escape scene.

I think some of my antipathy towards The Lost World: Jurassic Park, and conversely appreciation for Jurassic Park III, comes from the way the films treat their characters. The Lost World: Jurassic Park to me is edging more towards the 'cruel Spielberg' end of the spectrum and the ultimate example of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Both sequels are structuarally taking a lot of cues from the first film but I think most telling is what happens to the expendable equivalent of the Dennis Nedry character, who has to be killed to add some early jeopardy to the situation and show that the dinos are not playing around - in that first film Nedry is the betrayer who causes the entire situation and for that behaviour really does deserve to pay for what he has done by getting eaten by the dinos that he has unleashed. The Lost World: Jurassic Park's twist on this is with the Eddie character who is doing everything he can to save the others in the trailer being pushed over the cliff (even down to doing the 'comic' pratfalls in the mud by hooking up his jeep to the trailer with a line and then wrapping the other end around a tree stump equivalent to Nedry. Only here that 'humiliation ritual' doesn't work in his character's case, and the sequence is only playing more purely just as a series of tension stretching obstacles) before getting eaten in more graphic detail than seen previously in either Nedry (or the lawayer's!) deaths! Moving to Jurassic Park III we get the initial guide, Udesky, who similarly has to die once he has gotten both the parents and Grant onto the island, because his role is now redundant with Grant there and able to be a more effective guide in the situation. But at least he is constantly presented as a decent person in over his head and his death is both presented as something sad and to be, at least briefly, mourned. Not as part of a spectacle action sequence that then continues on to the trailer finally going over the edge of the cliff.

I think that in particular most illustrates the difference in tone between those two sequels (add in the way The Lost World: Jurassic Park treats the girl getting attacked at the start of that film with the way even the new boyfriend/stepdad stupidly getting the boy trapped on the island in Jurassic Park III is at least given some closure, albeit as a skeleton!), and of course the other big tonal difference is with Dr Malcolm's constant bickering over relationship woes contrasting against Grant's withheld reticence towards anything but getting off the island. Jurassic Park III even re-does the 'overgrown second complex exploration' sequence with a little bit more depth than The Lost World: Jurassic Park - always so desperate to get to the next dino action scene or relationship moment - does!

Speaking of relationships, I really like that estranged couple relationship between Tea Leoni and William H. Macy's characters. How often in films do we ever see people who have split up actually falling back in love again over the course of a film? (It seems so rare that the only one that comes to mind recently is Shyamalan's Old!) And kudos to actually turning William H. Macy, of all actors, into a kind of action star in the final battle! (With him being battered around on the crane I kept thinking of the ending of Quatermass and the Pit so was expecting him to have to sacrifice himself there. But no, he survives to even beautifully do a great homage to the Indiana Jones-style "Oh no, he's dead! No, wait...he's popped up over here and is actually OK after all!" moment too!)

So I like Jurassic Park III a lot. It may even be my second favourite Jurassic Park film behind the first. Its not really original and not particularly pushing forward any of the pre-existing elements of the franchise that much, but sometimes that can be OK in itself if a film is juggling them around well enough to give an audience what it is expecting in a satisfying way. It also helps that together with taking elements from the first fim it is also 'salvaging' and re-doing better a lot of elements of The Lost World: Jurassic Park! And it may contain the very best scary-funny parts of the entire franchise in it with the jingle of the satellite phone moment(s)!

Yeah III is the best and I was the only one who voted for it on the 2001 mini list! It's lean and mean with eerie atmospheric action. The Pteranodon aviary attack sequence is classic.

I’d say it’s the second best sequel, at any rate

Jurassic Park
Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom
Jurassic Park III
Jurassic World
the Lost World

I haven’t seen the last two and don’t feel compelled to do so

It's been millennia, but I remember Lost World being palatable mostly by having an unhinged Jeff Goldblum lead performance where he's really hamming it up. Incidentally in a fit of exhaustion, I threw on the latest one with Scarlet Johannsen last night, and it wasn't AS dreadful as I expected, but still plenty bad. I don't think the writer/director even know what movie franchise they're working on, it's so vanilla and just a series of recycled tropes that I don't think AI could do worse. This one is basically just Aliens/Prometheus with dinos. Yet another evil corporation trying to get rich off of dino DNA. Yet another doubtful scientist. Everybody has a tragic backstory and guess what...they find redemption! Not sure what they have against French people, but they got eaten first. Johannsen has a good trainer and does her best to keep things moving.

I liked the third one because it was a tight 90 minutes, didn't really mess around with "development" for thin characters, and got right to dinosaur mayhem. Had a couple of decent set pieces as well. I'm also with domino on Fallen Kingdom being the best sequel, but the 3rd one holds up, too (and I went in expecting to hate it).

A couple of years ago, I rewatched all the Jurassic Park and Jurassic World films. Having looked at a few online rankings, I'm afraid I agree with the general consensus that Jurassic Park III is one of the worst films in the series, if not the worst. The only redeeming feature is the aviary sequence. I just find it dull, and it looks cheap and small-scale compared to the others. The rushed ending is one of the biggest anti-climaxes I can think of. It's kind of the Alien 3 of the JP/JW movies, both go 'back to basics' and have a small but fervent cult following who declare them the best of the sequels. All the running around on an island for a third time tested my patience, and of course there's no Jeff Goldblum.

When I first saw Jurassic Park, I was blown away by the dinosaurs and set pieces. The scene in which the T-Rex breaks out is one of the greatest action/horror sequences of all time. However, as someone who had enjoyed the Michael Crichton novel, I was disappointed by how much of the horror and scientific content had been toned down. I suppose it wouldn't have been as successful with an R rating, but apparently James Cameron came close to making it and I would have loved to see his version.

The third doesn’t even have memorable dialogue, something I thought Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor could’ve delivered

Lost World is a terrible film in every respect. Awful characters, it forgets key components of the original, and it has no ending. It’s up with The Color Purple as Spielberg’s worst, but at least it isn’t offensive like that

colinr0380 wrote: Mon May 04, 2026 9:08 am I am not really sure what the general consensus is on Jurassic Park III, but after being underwhelmed and annoyed by The Lost World: Jurassic Park, I remember being really pleasantly surprised by this one even back when it was new, and remain so on re-watching it over the weekend. It is not as groundbreaking as the first Jurassic Park of course, but it feels like a great example of a sequel that is derivative of all the elements of its predecessors but on those terms provides a very entertaining and satisfying watch.

Well, I just disagree completely. From what I remember of the now-extinct IMDb message boards, opinions were pretty split over these two films -- both of them had fans and haters, but personally I always liked The Lost World: Jurassic Park and hated Jurassic Park III. I find The Lost World underrated, it has some flaws for sure but I could never understand why it received as much hate as it did, no one gave a good explanation for why it should be a terrible movie.

I think some of my antipathy towards The Lost World: Jurassic Park, and conversely appreciation for Jurassic Park III, comes from the way the films treat their characters. The Lost World: Jurassic Park to me is edging more towards the 'cruel Spielberg' end of the spectrum and the ultimate example of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Both sequels are structuarally taking a lot of cues from the first film but I thing most telling is what happens to the expendable equivalent of the Dennis Nedry character, who has to be killed to add some early jeopardy to the situation and show that the dinos are not playing around - in that first film Nedry is the betrayer who causes the entire situation and for that behaviour really does deserve to pay for what he has done by getting eaten by the dinos that he has unleashed. The Lost World: Jurassic Park's twist on this is with the Eddie character who is doing everything he can to save the others in the trailer being pushed over the cliff (even down to doing the 'comic' pratfalls in the mud by hooking up his jeep to the trailer with a line and then wrapping the other end around a tree stump equivalent to Nedry. Only here that 'humiliation ritual' doesn't work in his character's case, and the sequence is only playing more purely just as a series of tension stretching obstacles) before getting eaten in more graphic detail than seen previously in either Nedry (or the lawayer's!) deaths!

The Lost World is at times darker than Spielberg's films are typically, but I have no problem with that -- you don't have to be nice to fictional characters. Someone might say that the Eddie character didn't deserve to die, but I find it kind of refreshing that Spielberg "dares" to kill a character who's just trying to help, it's a bit unexpected from him. It would be boring if all good guys in movies always survive and bad people die, you want to have some variation to it. And the dinos weren't being cruel, it was just their lunch time and he died fast. (The corporate villain had a crueller death at the end, and it was described in more gruesome detail in the book.)

Also I never thought that Eddie getting mud on him was funny or that it was meant to be funny, you're the first person I've seen suggest that there was supposed to be a comedic element to it. The mud was there to make his job more difficult and him fighting and plowing through the mud was only making him look more heroic, that's what I always thought anyway.

I think that in particular most illustrates the difference in tone between those two sequels (add in the way The Lost World: Jurassic Park treats the girl getting attacked at the start of that film with the way even the new boyfriend/stepdad stupidly getting the boy trapped on the island in Jurassic Park III is at least given some closure, albeit as a skeleton!)

We didn't see what happened to the girl but Hammond said to Malcolm that she ended up okay, IIRC.

So I like Jurassic Park III a lot. It may even be my second favourite Jurassic Park film behind the first.

I can't remember all the reasons for why I dislike Jurassic Park III because it's been over ten years since I last saw it (and I don't plan to watch it ever again), but I'll try to compare them a little and explain why I prefer The Lost World. In TLW the characters have reasons for deliberately going to the island, whereas in JP3 the script writers had to make up an excuse to get the characters there, and Grant had to be cheated onto the island. I like that TLW is slightly darker and more ferocious than the first movie, and you feel that there's a sense of danger in TLW. Whereas you don't really feel that the characters are ever in any danger in JP3 (I don't remember that anyone is in any way harmed during that movie), it feels safer and also more predictable. The trailer sequence in TLW is one of the best setpieces of the franchise (Spielberg builds suspense wonderfully therein), the scene where they are riding on motorcycles with the running dinos is good, Malcolm's scene with the raptor is great, I like seeing the T-Rex in the city, etc. On the other hand I can't think of a single memorable scene in JP3. The raptors' intelligence seems to be in the right spot in TLW, while in JP3 (and in the sequels afterwards) the raptors were made absurdly smart, to the point that it takes you out of the movie and you can't suspend disbelief. The CGI in TLW is the best of the series, for whatever reason the quality seemed to dip later (I guess it has to do with Spielberg's involvement). They pulled the spinosaurus out of nowhere in JP3 although that movie and TLW are supposed to take place on the same island. There are more things but I can't recall all of them now and I'll stop here.

BoltzmannBrain wrote: Tue May 05, 2026 6:10 pm

colinr0380 wrote: Mon May 04, 2026 9:08 am I think some of my antipathy towards The Lost World: Jurassic Park, and conversely appreciation for Jurassic Park III, comes from the way the films treat their characters. The Lost World: Jurassic Park to me is edging more towards the 'cruel Spielberg' end of the spectrum and the ultimate example of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. Both sequels are structuarally taking a lot of cues from the first film but I thing most telling is what happens to the expendable equivalent of the Dennis Nedry character, who has to be killed to add some early jeopardy to the situation and show that the dinos are not playing around - in that first film Nedry is the betrayer who causes the entire situation and for that behaviour really does deserve to pay for what he has done by getting eaten by the dinos that he has unleashed. The Lost World: Jurassic Park's twist on this is with the Eddie character who is doing everything he can to save the others in the trailer being pushed over the cliff (even down to doing the 'comic' pratfalls in the mud by hooking up his jeep to the trailer with a line and then wrapping the other end around a tree stump equivalent to Nedry. Only here that 'humiliation ritual' doesn't work in his character's case, and the sequence is only playing more purely just as a series of tension stretching obstacles) before getting eaten in more graphic detail than seen previously in either Nedry (or the lawayer's!) deaths!

The Lost World is at times darker than Spielberg's films are typically, but I have no problem with that -- you don't have to be nice to fictional characters. Someone might say that the Eddie character didn't deserve to die, but I find it kind of refreshing that Spielberg "dares" to kill a character who's just trying to help, it's a bit unexpected from him. It would be boring if all good guys in movies always survive and bad people die, you want to have some variation to it. And the dinos weren't being cruel, it was just their lunch time and he died fast. (The corporate villain had a crueller death at the end, and it was described in more gruesome detail in the book.)

Also I never thought that Eddie getting mud on him was funny or that it was meant to be funny, you're the first person I've seen suggest that there was supposed to be a comedic element to it. The mud was there to make his job more difficult and him fighting and plowing through the mud was only making him look more heroic, that's what I always thought anyway.

I understand what you mean, but I do think as an audience member you can tell the underpinning tone and direction of this series (and in disaster films in general) by what they do to their supporting characters (see also the fate of one of the more sympathetic characters in Jurassic World), and that sequence with Eddie just played a bit too much, at least for me, like a beat-for-beat repeat of the Nedry scene from the first film (plus a bit of 'hiding in the car from the dinosaur jaws' moment that happened with the kids, except they had the plot armour of the plastic roof to protect them!) but with a character who did not entirely deserve that kind of treatment to be foisted upon them! I take your point about the dinosaurs themselves not particularly having to worry about who they are eating or not, but this is a still a series of films that does often decide who is, and who is not, disposable in the course of their narratives.

I think The Lost World and Jurassic Park 3 are both middling films, very different from each other, each with pros and cons.

The Lost World's strengths come from Spielberg's direction. The man knew how to generate suspense, and he was wise not to go through the exact same motions as the original. The Rexes' first appearance was one of quieter tension when the parents were not looking for a snack, but rather their missing baby. That sequence when they're standing there peeping in through the trailer windows was nerve-wracking on first watch. Their intent wasn't to harm the humans, but we didn't know that. And it seemed after the humans returned the injured baby, that everything was gonna be ok. The Rexes had left the scene...only to come back a few minutes later and push the trailer off the cliff, only to leave the scene for a second time. With the coast clear, Eddie joined the scene and did everything in his power to save his friends in the trailer dangling over the cliff, only for the Rexes to enter the scene for a third time and eat him. That entire sequence was Spielberg toying with us. We think they're in danger, then they're safe, then they're in danger again, but Eddie's gonna save them, but he gets killed in the process.

Spoiler

This does not happen in the book by the way. In the book, the Rexes push the trailer over the cliff, leave, and don't come back to the site after that. Thus Spielberg killing off Eddie thwarted the expectations of the novel-readers at the time.

Eddie's death, as someone pointed out, was Spielberg's cruel side, demonstrating that nature doesn't care who's good and evil. You could say it was over-the-top, but I found it was effective at keeping the suspense high throughout the film. He was a hero, and the first death of the movie. Anybody was fair game to be the next dino fodder. Spielberg later killed off another totally innocent character during the The San Diego Sequence. Showing us a T Rex in a populated city, rampaging, and killing people...that was nightmare fuel. The San Diego scene divides fans, and goes entirely off the rails of Crichton's source material, but I found it effective for cinematic spectacle. As for the weaknesses of the movie, there was one huge one. The script was simply lousy. Characters couldn't stay consistent. They flip-flopped their motivations and actions in random, arbitrary, and sometimes asinine ways. The characters played by Attenborough, Postlethwaite, Vince Vaughn, Julianne Moore were clear examples. Furthermore, the script did not say anything different from the first JP, nor did it add to its predecessors themes. I feel Crichton's novel succeeded in expanding a little bit on the themes of his first novel, thus The Lost World film adaptation was a missed opportunity to make something better. However, it's ok for a popcorn action film, with plenty of tension.

As for Jurassic Park 3, this was the first that had no novel to base off of, therefore, the first fully studio-manufactured entry from start to finish, and the first without Spielberg at the helm. And it was clearly missing both Crichton's imagination and Spielberg's directing talent. Yes to BoltzmannBrain's comment JP3 was just an excuse of a movie, that needed an excuse to get characters on the island. I'll add it needed an excuse to get Sam Neil back into the series. It really felt pointless. The script is simply 'kid gets stranded on an island with dinos, parents arrange a rescue mission and kidnap Dr. Grant and bring him along.' The movie still offered some fun though. I like how it swapped the Rex for the Spinosaurus as the main big badass predator. And it took us off guard by not waiting until the one-hour mark to make its first appearance. Jurassic Park and TLW held off showing the Rex for a long time. Not JP3. The Spinosaurus was the first dino we see at close range. And in the ensuing 7 minutes, the Spino eats two mercenary characters, causes the plane to crash, chases the survivors through a field and jungle, and fights and kills a T. Rex. Now that's what I call an entrance. I remember my dad taking me and my brother to see this in theaters and we were all wowed by this sequence. It was totally different from the first two because we were not expecting any mayhem for at least another 30 minutes. It was a clever, suspenseful choice to bring out the big guns and big teeth early. However, I find the movie peaked there, and no dino set piece afterward came close to that. The movie lost momentum and a great deal of suspense after that. The rest of the film had a few good elements. The aviary scene was fine. I'll echo the William H. Macy - Tea Leoni reunion worked. But I also must echo the movie felt overly safe after the initial Spino-plane crash sequence, and I never felt any of the characters were in peril. The plot provided armor to families and to legacy characters. So who did that leave? There was only one disposable mercenary character left. Once he got picked off by raptors, it was very predictable that would be the last death in the movie, and sure enough it was.

Anyway, I think both are about a 5/10, not good, not terrible. Nowhere near the first JP, but I'll definitely take them over Dominion and Rebirth.