Alright, let's get this new forum page started by talking about recent movie news.

Not too long ago we got an announcement that a trailer for the fourth Jurassic Park, Jurassic World, was to be released this week and now the trailer is here. Let's talk about this shall we?

Jurassic Park, for those who are unaware, is based on the classic Michael Crichton novel that is about a theme park that clones dinosaurs to attract tourists (more or less). Then the power goes out in the park and the dinosaurs run loose and start causing havoc. Then Steven Spielberg released a loose adaptation of the book in 1993 that showed groundbreaking CGI and brought filming to a whole new level. I first saw Jurassic Park when I was three-years-old and I loved the film. It was the film that got me into dinosaurs and made me want to be a paleontologist. To this day I still regard Jurassic Park as my all-time favorite film and I still continue my study as a paleontologist. I even like the two sequels that followed (even though they weren't that good).

So now we finally have a fourth Jurassic Park and honestly I'm not too excited for it. One of the reasons why is because this film has been in development hell for nearly 14 years and it hits theaters in June 2015. Usually if you take too long for a sequel it's a guarantee that it will fail. Also compared to the original CG dinosaurs in the first film, the graphics in this new one are not too appealing. I really thought those were real dinosaurs I was watching in the first film but with the new one I can obviously tell everything is CG and it's a real shame. The biggest gripe I have for this film is that they decided to make up an all new dinosaur specifically for the film. How lazy can one be? As a paleo, that pisses me off. There are hundreds of new dinosaurs discovered each year. Why didn't Universal just pick from any one of them? WHY?

But the overall question is: am I still going to see this movie? The answer: yes. The reason why is because I have a weakness for dinosaurs and I'm willing to watching anything, good or bad, just to see the dinosaurs in action. Plus, it's Jurassic Park. How can I not go and see this movie? However, my expectations for the film are going to be low. The good parts in the trailer are the fact that we finally see mosasaurs in a Jurassic Park film and Chris Pratt rides a motorcycle backed by a Velociraptor posse. As ridiculous as that is I have to admit it is pretty damn awesome.

So have you seen the trailer? What did you think of it? What is your favorite dinosaur? And which version of Jurassic Park do you like more: the film or the book? Whatever you got, be sure to leave your comment below.

--edited by Zach Heher on 12/1/2014, 12:31 PM--

Jurassic Park, for me, falls into the same category as The Neverending Story films:

 The first one: Absolute cinematic gold worthy of enshrinement and should only be discussed in reverent whispers. 

 Each and every sequel:  They all made made me want to reach through the screen and punch each and every soul listed in the end credits.  The sequels invariably fell short of capturing the wonder of the original.

Of course, I realized this could just be nostalgic rose-colored glasses on my part, so I watched the original just the other day to tease out what it was I liked about it so much.   Still holds up, even if some of the techno-babble is a bit dated ('It's a unix system!  I know this!').  I guess I'd have to say the thing works so well even twenty years later because the pacing was absolute perfection.

 The tension and foreshadowing was so elegantly subtle during the first third of the film it's hard to describe.  Matching the tension to the increasing winds of the storm that eventually knocked out the power was done perfectly.  And when the T-rex-in-the-rain reveal finally happened... well... I would have to call it one of my top scenes in cinematic history.

Do I think this sequel will have a chance to match that?  Probably not.  Will I see it just to be sure?  Oh yes indeed!

My favourite dinosaur?

I don't have a favourite dinosaur...

Does Jeff Goldblum count?