How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love The T. Rex

I'm going to say something that may well piss you guys off: I don't think Jurassic Park is as great as people say it is.

Now, before you declare me excommunicado from the internet. Allow me to preface this by stating that I do love Jurassic Park. It's a fun movie with great dinosaur effects.

It's just not as smart as a lot of people like to think.

I can't even count the number of times I've seen science articles and such that talk about the implications of potentially cloning dinosaurs and inevitably Jurassic Park pops up, a lot like how Terminator pops up in discussions about artificial intelligence. In the public conscience Jurassic Park seems to be a cautionary tale about how cloning dinosaurs could be a bad idea.

Except I have never seen the film as such. While I do get the message from the original Crichton novel and the subsequent Spielberg film, that we shouldn't take the power of nature for granted and not allow our misplaced faith in our of technology to try and tame that power. There is a much more obvious message I feel is more applicable:

When you decide to make a zoo, hire people who know how to build a fucking zoo.

You see, the whole plot hinges on the fact that all the dinosaur paddocks are lined with electric fences. Flimsy conductive wire is what stands between the visitors to your park and the deadly animals. And you're telling me not one person on the design team stood up and asked: "What if the power goes out?"

Then there's the dilophosaurus paddock. We see it in a scene where the tour trucks drive by and the dinosaur is a no-show. However, if you pay attention, there is a sign asking visitors to KEEP THE WINDOWS ROLLED UP when driving through this area because the dinosaur in question can SPIT FUCKING VENOM TO BLIND ITS PREY.

Yet not one person designing the paddock for this monstrosity ever thought to suggest putting up spit shields or something to that effect. That was a fucking lawsuit waiting to happen.

Pretty much every large animal I've seen at zoos are put in special containment areas that are comprised of some serious concrete and designed like a friggin post-apocalyptic duel pit/thunderdome. Sure, the occasional child may fall in, but that's more a fault of the parents than you at that point (don't fucking send Harambe memes to me please). And, ironically enough, during the scene where the T. Rex attacks the trucks, its paddock magically spawns a large cliff for our heroes to hazard as they try to escape.

In fact, in Jurassic World the Indominus paddock was designed like this. The only reason it got out was due to bad writing needing a reason for it to find a way out. And I can't believe I'm using that movie as a good example of safely storing dangerous wildlife.

But in Jurassic Park, the place seems to have been designed by an incompetent supervillain. And yet no one really bats an eye at this obvious plot hole. But does that make it a horrible movie? No. I still enjoy it because it's fucking fun. Same goes for the others, though Lost World has the issue of having the so-called protagonists be annoying assholes who cause more death and destruction than the "villains." Three, I think, is the most enjoyable of the sequels, I just have fond memories of it. And the new "World" movies are... well they're dumb popcorn flicks. I stopped giving these films much credence when I found myself wondering why the bare bones staff at Jurassic Park can't fucking transfer a velociraptor without fucking up completely.

So I don't get so bothered by how silly the new movies seem to be, because these movies have always been silly. It's all a justification to get to the dinosaur action, and that's what we all came to see anyways. So chill out and just enjoy it!