Jurassic World 2: Everything you need to know

‘Jurassic Park’ fans waited fourteen years for a fourth film in the classic series, and when it finally arrived it made a huge impact – becoming the fourth highest-grossing film of all time.

Why is quite simple: people love dinosaurs. More specifically, young people love them, and for younger generations ‘Jurassic World’ would have been a first taste of the series.

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Acting as a sequel and soft reboot, ‘Jurassic World’ continued the story by realising original park-owner John Hammond’s vision and showing us a dinosaur theme park that had been up and running without incident for six or seven years.

That changed of course, as the island’ scientists proved they had been so preoccupied with whether they should splice together dino DNA to create new animals and new money-spinning attractions, they didn’t stop to think if they should.

The most dangerous result of that scientific tinkering, called Indominous Rex, ran rampant on the island until it was eventually taken down by raptors, the original film’s T-Rex and a hungry Mosasaurus.

After taking home $1.67 billion at the worldwide box office, a sequel was as inevitable as lapse dinosaur contro, and it’s filming right now. Here is everything you need to know.

Who’s Directing?

That’d be J.A. Bayona, taking over from Colin Trevorrow, who is currently set to direct ‘Star Wars: Episode 9’ for Disney and LucasFilm.

Bayona is best known for Guillermo del Toro-produced horror ‘The Orphanage’, tsunami drama ‘The Impossible’ and earlier this year book adaptation ‘A Monster Calls’.

He’s a fascinating fit that can certainly do interesting things with the series.

Who’s in it?

Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard return as Owen and Claire, the duo who saved themselves (and by chance, the day as well) in ‘Jurassic World’. BD Wong also reprises his role as Dr Henry Wu, who appeared in the very first film back in 1993. Interestingly, he’ll be the only character to have starred in three ‘Jurassic’ films.

Nobody else from ‘Jurassic World’ or the ‘Jurassic Park’ trilogy are currently set to return – but that may change.

The three major newcomers are Toby Jones (‘Dad’s Army’, ‘Captain America’), Rafe Spall (‘Prometheus’, ‘Life of Pi’) and James Cromwell (‘Babe’, ‘The Green Mile’).

There’s also Geraldine Chaplin, Ted Levine, Daniella Pineda, Justice Smith and many others we don’t yet know of.

When’s it out?

‘Jurassic World 2’ (an official title hasn’t yet been confirmed) is set for release on 8 June 2018.

What’s it about?

With no synopsis and tight-lipped filmmakers, we simply don’t know yet.

Bayona has said: “I think the story is looking for a connection between ‘Jurassic World’ and ‘Jurassic Park’ – more than what ‘Jurassic World’ did. We’re leading the story to a place that the audience is not expecting, and that’s always exciting when you do a sequel.”

The director has also stated that it’ll be “darker”, while Trevorrow (who remains a producer) has said it’ll be “scarier” – both pretty standard ways to sell a sequel.

Bayona has also said it’ll be more timely. “I think it’s very interesting where the new movie is heading. It’s so different from the other films, it talks a lot about the moment we live in right now. It’s darker… but at the same time, it’s going to be a lot of fun.”

All in all, this doesn’t tell us a whole lot. ‘Jurassic World’ did dangle some plot threads that open up some potential avenues however.

Executive producer Frank Marshall told Cinema Blend, referring to BD Wong’s Wu, who escaped uneaten in ‘Jurassic World’: “When they take off in helicopters, you know they’re probably going to come back.”

During that escape, it’s revealed that he’s in cahoots with Vincent Donofrio’s Hoskins and Ingen – the company behind the original Jurassic Park resort. Their “side-project” relates to Hoskins’ desire to find a military use for the park’s scaly-inhabitants, and so Wu is sent off the island in a helicopter with the “assets” (most likely dinosaur embryos).

In a later scene we see inside Wu’s secret office, where Hoskins explains the plan to create miniature I-Rexs, and possibly other genetically-engineered breeds, then use them in the military.

Hoskins then, justly, gets eaten by a raptor.

We simply don’t know however if the sequel will pick up these plot threads.