Why Hollywood Needs 'Jurassic World' As Much As Universal Does

With most of the biggest movie franchises coming to an end within the next three years, Hollywood and Universal's survival may be left to the fate of 'Jurassic World'

(CREDIT: Twitter user @colintrevorrow)

by Jack Linsdell

We got, courtesy of Collider, an interview with Jason Bourne and Jurassic World producer Frank Marshall in which he confirmed that the upcoming Dinosaur threequel Jurassic World: Dominion will not be the last installment in the series. This is somewhat news if only because A) the series prides itself on explicitly stand alone "one at a time" installments and B) because it was thought of as the end of the current trilogy. 

Now, Jurassic World: Dominion is a actually the unification of the whole franchise. Its acting as both Jurassic World 3, by (presumably) wrapping up the arcs of Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard's characters from the last two movies, and as Jurassic Park 6, by bringing back Laura Dern, Sam Niell and Jeff Goldblum, the vets from Steven Spielberg's original trilogy. I expect this to make it more popular (with bigger global crosses potentially) than the last two movies, if only because its capitalising on the nostalgia of adults who remember the original Spielberg and Joe Johnston helmed movies, and those younger moviegoers who have enjoyed these two new movies to the tune of $1.6 billion and $1.3 billion worldwide respectively. We've seen this before in other franchises like with 2014's X-Men Days of Future Past which reunited the old cast of Halle Berry, Hugh Jackman and Patrick Stewart with the new iteration of characters played by Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult and James McCavoy amongst others. It's still the highest grossing X-Men movie (not counting Deadpool) to this day explicitly because it acted as the bridge between the old and new cast continuity. That's precisely what made it more of an event to moviegoers young and old. 

However, the announcement of new Jurassic World movies wasn't very clear in what format they would come. I'd presume a new trilogy focussing on new characters as Dominion does look set to wrap up the current cast (both old and new), which amongst other things, is its core commercial hook anyway. However, as much as Universal needs to keep their most profitable franchise going long after Dominion is released, if only because they're in short supply of franchises now, Hollywood needs it too. That's because all the "biggest" ones are wrapping up in the next three years. This year brings the end to Daniel Craig's James Bond series with the upcoming No Time To Die closing out the 5 film saga in November, which has grossed over $3 billion alone. We also have the two part finale of Universal's Halloween franchise starting this October with Halloween Kills, bringing the story of Laurie Strode and Mike Myers to a final conclusion. Then, next year, the curtain call, Halloween Ends will be released. 

In 2021, we also have the penultimate installments of both the Fast & Furious franchise (with Fast & Furious 9) and Mission: Impossible 7 before Fast & Furious 10 and Mission: Impossible 8 are released the following year. With Avengers Endgame mostly bringing the Marvel Cinematic Universe to a close as we know it, Hollywood will be out of its biggest and most popular franchises by 2022 at the earliest. So as much as Universal may need more Jurassic World movies after the Dark Universe failed to ignite and Vin Diesels car blockbuster series parks itself, Hollywood arguably needs them just the same. 

Blockbusters have become the entire cinematic diet of theatrical moviegoers, with all the biggest tentpoles making billions of dollars in revenue each year, whilst the mid-budget and adult counterprogramming flicks end up playing to empty auditoriums. Basically unless you're a big franchise or popular IP, you have very little chance of success in theatres. 

So, considering the whole "event movies only" emerging trend for audiences today in terms of seeing movies at the cinema, it's up to the franchises to keep theatrical moviegoing alive. And considering the biggest movies end up providing money for the smaller flicks to get made, its even more important for some series, like Jurassic Park, to remain ongoing. So, maybe it's not Hollywood that has to save the world from the dinosaurs, but the dinosaurs that have to save Hollywood from the ever changing world.