m0ds

I have no idea what I just watched. It was all over the place. I didn't care for a single character. I didn't care for the Star Wars universe. I completely zoned out, I just wanted it to end.

Kudos to Hamill for reprising Luke, though it's clear now why he so badly wanted to avoid it. I've watched every Star Wars movie but by no means a fan, I just give them a chance and respect them for their tales, but this one was by far the worst, and not just a bad Star Wars movie, just an outright bad movie. Pacing, editing, acting, plot (was there one?)... gah! I want that 90 mins of my life back lol.

Probably just for kids. May be better on a second viewing?

Every scene was basically a lead up to one of the shots in the trailer(s). If you've seen all the trailers then you've seen the movie, what you haven't seen is the filler between all the moments in the trailers. Like Jeff Goldblum? You've already seen his entire part in the trailers, in fact, they cut out a couple of his trailer lines in the movie. If you've seen the Thai trailers with additional footage (like I had) then the entire experience will not have any punch.

It was alright, it was not a bad movie per se. Owen and Claire, though cute as always, are relatively useless in this movie. They extract some blood and escape a jail cell, that's about the long and short of it. The majority of death scenes are "implied" which is lame, though there are a couple of decent kill-count moments. I didn't like the music during the volcanic explosion, it sounded really cartoony and out of place. There are no great flourishes like Blue's "Lost World" cue in JW1 and the main themes from JP are not used (bar one piano note melody and JP theme for credits music). Nice to hear the JW themes but even they aren't used much.

Blue is probably the star and even she gets very limited time on-screen. All that aside though, it's probably fine, fun and scary for kids. And I have to accept that my fandom for JP comes from enjoying it as a kid. I think as a kid I would find it a very entertaining dino movie. As a pretty hardcore JP fan, I was left underwhelmed, but not entirely disappointed. There was still Blue, and dues-ex-machina Rexy, and Owen & Claire. The effects were decent enough, but as a whole it just never seemed to quite come together.

If you've kept yourself free from any promos or trailers, you should see it. All the iconic moments from the movie won't have been spoiled for you. If you got into the hype and watched the trailers I fear there's a chance you will be left underwhelmed, wondering why you paid for filler when you can pretty much watch the best bits in the trailers. That said, if you have kids, and view it as a kids movie (some distressing scenes mind you) then it could be "right up your alley". It wasn't right up mine, not even the back alley. But yeah a passable JP with Blue who remains a legendary raptor, so 6/10.

I tried to enjoy it, but I didn't find much to enjoy myself. The character who gets accidentally embroiled in the situation is the most interesting thing in this movie. I'd rather follow him than the mumbling lead.

The other characters are barely memorable, plot is incredibly so-so. An extra star awarded for Johnny Depp being in something that isn't made by Tim Burton, even if his screen time in this instalment was barely a minute long.

Check it out, a lot of people like it, maybe I wasn't really ready for it or had Harry Potter on my mind but for me it was simply "meh". Not overtly bad but not overtly good either.