The popular dinosaur saga has evolved. In Jurassic World: Dominion, the sequel to 2018's Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, the infamous prehistoric monsters have escaped into the wild, meaning the human race has to learn how to live on a planet with creatures that died out 65 million years earlier. We'll give you three guesses as to how well this will work out.
Jurassic World: Dominion also marks the end of a trilogy that began with 2015’s Jurassic World, and will complete the story that iconic filmmaker Steven Spielberg began nearly 30 years ago with his ground-breaking adaptation of Michael Crichton’s bestselling novel.
To mark the occasion, writer-director Colin Trevorrow has invited back original stars Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum to walk with dinosaurs once again. And, while there’s no theme park this time, Jurassic World: Dominion still promises to be one hell of a ride – an epic finale to a series big enough to compete with the most successful blockbuster franchises of all time, including the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Star Wars and Harry Potter.
Below, we've dug up every piece of information we can find on Jurassic World: Dominion, such as its release date, all-star ensemble cast, trailers and more. We've provided a brief rundown of the main points below but, if you want a more thorough examination of the film before it makes its way into theaters, you should carry on reading.
Release date: Jurassic World: Dominion will stomp its way into theaters on June 10, 2022.
Story: After a myriad of dinosaurs were set free in the final act of 2018’s Fallen Kingdom, the human race is coming to terms with a world where giant creatures roam the landscape once more. Can humanity survive? Or are we doomed to become prey for a legion of ever-more fearsome creators?
Cast: Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard reprise their roles as Jurassic World leads Owen Grady and Claire Dearing, but the main headline is the return of original Jurassic Park stars Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum.
Jurassic World: Dominion release date
Jurassic World: Dominion release date: June 2022
Jurassic World: Dominion is currently scheduled to land in theaters worldwide on June 10, 2022.
Having been mapped out alongside the first Jurassic World movie – and started its shoot just before the world went into the first pandemic-induced lockdown – the final instalment of the Jurassic World trilogy feels like it’s been almost 65 million years in the making.
Nonetheless, after a four-month hiatus between March and July 2020, the film was one of the first blockbusters to go back into production, with cast and crew going into collective isolation in a hotel complex to keep Covid-19 at bay. Inevitably, the production delay affected Jurassic World: Dominion's release date, pushing it back a year from its original June 2021 berth.
Director Colin Trevorrow (the Jurassic World helmer back behind the camera after handing the Fallen Kingdom reins to J.A. Bayona) believes some positives emerged from the extra time added to the schedule, though, telling Empire magazine: "It was nice to have the time to make sure that every character is honored in the way that they need to be."
Jurassic World: Dominion trailer
Jurassic World: Dominion trailer
After teasing hungry fans with short film ‘Battle at Big Rock’ and a prologue sequences, the trailer for Jurassic World was finally released on February 10.
The trailer opens somewhere icy and cold with a herd of parasaurolophus on the charge. Quickly, we see Chris Pratt's Owen Grady riding one of the beasts like he's galloping through the old West, accompanied by a couple of other riders in cowboy hats. As they ride, Richard Attenborough's famous speech as John Hammond from the original Jurassic Park plays over the top.
In the same location, we begin to see other dinosaurs, as well as Maisie Lockwood, the granddaughter of Benjamin Lockwood, the partner of John Hammond in creation of Jurassic Park and company InGen. We last saw Maisie escaping with Grady and Bryce Dallas Howard's Claire Dearing at the end of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.
Next we see Blue, the velociraptor with whom Grady had such a bond in Jurassic World. She's living alongside Grady, Dearing, Maisie and a whole other group of people, and is now a mother.
What plays out next is some of the collateral damage of having dinosaurs roaming the Earth, including a spectacular appearance of T-Rex at a drive-in cinema.
Then we meet Laura Dern's Ellie Sattler, who recruits Sam Neill's Alan Grant to return for one last job. Jeff Goldblum's Dr. Ian Malcolm is next, who tells us that humanity is losing the battle with dinosaurs
"Human and dinosaurs can’t coexist. We created an ecological disaster", Dern's Sattler warns, while Goldblum adds: "We not only lack dominion over nature, we’re subordinate to it."
What follows now is a series of spectacular confrontations between humans and dinosaurs. We see Dearing hiding underwater to avoid detection, Pratt pursued by raptors through a sunny European capital on a motorbike, and finally Grady, Dearing and DeWanda Wise's newcomer Kayla fly a military plane, which is set upon by a vicious pterodactyl.
At the trailer's climax, the cast new and old have united to face down what looks like the series' biggest dinosaur yet...
Isn't there a short film and a prologue too?
Indeed there are. Back in 2019, distributors Universal debuted 10-minute short film ‘Battle at Big Rock’. Directed by Trevorrow – he also penned the script with Dominion co-writer Emily Carmichael – the short film focused on a family whose RV ends up parked in the middle of a fight between a hungry Allosaurus and a group of herbivorous Nasutoceratops.
Just as tantalizing as the dino-on-dino action, however, are the hints of what life is like for humans who now find themselves living in a literal Jurassic World – it’s worth sticking around through the credits when you watch it on YouTube.
Adding to the prehistoric carnage, IMAX screenings of Fast & Furious 9 were preceded by a five-minute prologue sequence, which you can view below:
Before the trailer's release, it gave us plenty to sink our teeth into. "I'm grateful that Universal and everybody were down with doing it," Trevorrow explained to ScreenRant. "Because it’s not just like we're showing the first five minutes; we’re showing a pretty major piece of what we're doing."
The prologue starts with a genuine first for the Jurassic movies – a flashback to the Cretaceous period, showing dinosaurs in their natural habitat. Alongside herds of familiar species such as Triceratops, we see franchise newcomers like the giant winged Quetzalcoatlus, and the series’ first ever dinosaur with feathers. "I feel like that [the Oviraptor is] going to be a bit of a headline for those who care about paleontological accuracy," Trevorrow told Empire's February 2022 issue.
From a dramatic point of view, the prologue serves as an origin story for one of the mainstays of the saga – the Tyrannosaurus Rex. In the footage we get to see the original T-Rex being killed by the even more formidable Giganotosaurus, before the most famous mosquito in cinema history sucks the blood that will be used to clone the predator some 65 million years later.
"I wanted to really put into visual terms this story that we've been told for 30 years about how dinosaurs were made from DNA fossilized in amber," the director added in his Empire interview.
After showcasing the famous bug, the sequence immediately cuts to the present day, where we see a T-Rex being hunted once again – but, this time, the pursuer is a helicopter full of humans with guns. Unfortunately for everyone involved, the T-Rex runs into a packed drive-in movie theater; another reminder of how civilization will have had to adapt to giant beasts roaming the Earth again.
Jurassic World: Dominion cast
Jurassic World: Dominion cast: who’s facing up to the dinos?
Here's the full cast list for Jurassic World: Dominion:
- Chris Pratt as Owen Grady
- Bryce Dallas Howard as Claire Dearing
- Sam Neill as Dr. Alan Grant
- Laura Dern as Dr. Ellie Sattler
- Jeff Goldblum as Dr. Ian Malcolm
- BD Wong as Dr. Henry Wu
- Omar Sy as Barry Sembène
- Daniella Pineda as Dr. Zia Rodriguez
- Justice Smith as Franklin Webb
- Isabella Sermon as Maisie Lockwood
- Campbell Scott as Dr. Lewis Dodgson
- Mamoudou Athie as TBC
- DeWanda Wise as Kayla
- Dichen Lachman as TBC
- Scott Haze as TBC
- Dimitri Thivaios as TBC
Assuming the character appeared in a previous movie and hasn’t already been eaten by a dinosaur, there’s a good chance they’ll be returning.
It’s no surprise, then, to see Jurassic World and Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom leads back once more: Chris Pratt as raptor expert Owen Grady, and Jurassic World manager-turned-dino rights activist Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard). Here's Pratt in action in a photo posted by Entertainment Weekly:
The much bigger news, though, is the return of original Jurassic Park stars Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum, as scientists Dr. Alan Grant, Dr. Ellie Satler and Dr. Ian Malcolm respectively.
Although Goldblum and Neill reprised their roles in the second and third Jurassic Park movies – Goldblum also cameoed in Fallen Kingdom – this is the first time the original triumvirate have appeared on screen together since the original movie. Trevorrow told Empire that the reunion was such a big deal that even Steven Spielberg "got very emotional" when he saw a photo of the three stars on set.
The three veterans of the original theme park haven’t just signed up for glorified cameos, either. As Trevorrow told Collider in June 2021: "Laura, Sam and Jeff are just as big a part of the movie as Chris and Bryce are, as far as screen time, as far as their importance to the story, everything [goes]."
Beyond the headline cast, BD Wong – who also showed up in Netflix's animated Jurassic Park spin-off series Camp Cretaceous – is back for his fourth movie appearance as Dr. Henry Wu, the morally flexible scientist behind InGen, the bioengineering company set up by John Hammond in the original movie.
Also continuing their stories from Fallen Kingdom are Isabella Sermon as kid-clone Maisie Lockwood (confirmed by a photo Trevorrow posted on Twitter), while Daniella Pineda and Justice Smith are back as Claire’s associates from the Dinosaur Protection Group – paleo-veterinarian Zia Rodriguez and computer whiz Franklin Webb. Lupin’s Omar Sy, who plays Owen’s raptor-training sidekick Barry Sembène, is also back for more dino action.
Although The Hollywood Reporter reported, back in February 2020, that New Girl’s Jake Johnson (IT guru Lowery Cruthers) would also reprise his role from Jurassic World, Johnson has since departed the movie. ScreenRant reported that Covid-induced scheduling conflicts were to blame.
There are a few franchise newbies, too. Sorry for Your Loss’s Mamoudou Athie, She’s Gotta Have It’s DeWanda Wise, Altered Carbon’s Dichen Lachman, Antlers’ Scott Haze, and Rambo: Last Blood's Dimitri Thivaios have all joined the Jurassic World: Dominion cast.
The most intriguing 'new' recruit, however, is playing a character when the saga began back in 1993. Lewis Dodgson (originally played by Cameron Thor) was the representative of InGen’s corporate rivals, BioSyn, who asked computer nerd Dennis Nedry to smuggle dinosaur embryos out of the original Jurassic Park.
Although Dodgson was a major antagonist in both of Michael Crichton’s Jurassic Park novels, he’s not appeared on screen since. Now reportedly the CEO of BioSyn, he’ll be played by Singles and Roger Dodger star Campbell Scott. "He is the main villain throughout both of [Crichton's] novels," Trevorrow told Entertainment Weekly. "And I think what Campbell's done with the character is just amazing." We wonder if Dodgson will be that mysterious antagonist we mentioned earlier...
It also goes without saying that there’ll be plenty of new dinosaurs, including the Velociraptor’s "more brutish" cousin the Atrociraptor, and fellow meat eater the Moros Intrepidus. The latter was only identified as a species in 2019, so nobody can claim Jurassic World: Dominion isn’t up to date with its ferocious creatures.
Jurassic World: Dominion story
Jurassic World: Dominion story: what's it about?
If the unplanned dinosaur rampage of 2015’s Jurassic World turned a prehistoric theme park into a problematic business proposition, the island-levelling volcanic eruption of 2018 sequel Fallen Kingdom killed it outright. The Jurassic World: Dominion story will therefore have to go in a different direction to its predecessors.
Luckily, Fallen Kingdom provided the perfect starting point. When Owen and Claire freed all those dinosaurs from the Lockwood mansion's basement, they introduced extinct creatures into the ecosystem of 21st century Earth, and subsequently shifted the dynamic of not only the 28-year-old franchise, but also life as we know it.
We now have an official synopsis for the movie, which reads as follows: "Jurassic World: Dominion takes place four years after Isla Nublar has been destroyed. Dinosaurs now live—and hunt—alongside humans all over the world. This fragile balance will reshape the future and determine, once and for all, whether human beings are to remain the apex predators on a planet they now share with history’s most fearsome creatures."
This sit alongside what Colin Trevorrow had to say in a showreel unveiled at CinemaCon in August 2021 (reported by ScreenRant), where he said: "The movie will present the question: ‘If dinosaurs lived amongst us, would you be safe?’ The answer is no."
It seems pretty likely that the finale of Jurassic World: Dominion will bring down the curtain on this trilogy, with Trevorrow seeing it as "a culmination of one story” that’s been told throughout the six Jurassic movies."
"What was important for me was, when you watch Dominion, you really feel like you are learning how much of a story that first set of [Jurassic Park] movies was," he told Entertainment Weekly. "Everything that happened in those movies actually informs what ultimately is able to happen in this. If kids who are born today are going to be presented with six Jurassic Park movies, you hope they are going to get to feel like they watch one long story."
This new film won’t necessarily mark the end of dinosaurs roaming the Earth, however – in fact, the Jurassic World: Dominion story may just be the beginning.
"It’s the start of a new era," producer Frank Marshall countered when Collider asked if Dominion was the end of the franchise. "The dinosaurs are now on the mainland amongst us, and they will be for quite some time, I hope."
As Marvel Studios' cinematic juggernaut, Star Wars' unending projects and other film franchises have taught us, film series are here to stay. Duologies, trilogies and even quadrilogies are largely a thing of the past now, with the world's biggest studios looking to make boatloads of cash from cinemagoers who can't get enough of more of the same films.
Jurassic Park, then, much like its inspirational dinosaurs, is here for the long haul. Providing that the series doesn't re-tread old ground or lose audience appeal, we can expect more entries in the future. It would be a shame if the franchise was confined to the annals of history – after all, dinosaurs are cool – but much will depend on whether viewers continue to have an appetite for dinos duking it out on the big screen.
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