"Jurassic World: Rebirth" Review — Big Teeth, Big Screams, Same Old Blueprint

Jonathan Bailey and Scarlett Johansson in Jurassic World: Rebirth. (Image courtesy of Universal Pictures PH)

There’s a particular kind of hush that falls over a cinema right before a T-Rex roars — that split-second silence before the chaos kicks in, where you can almost feel the entire room gripping their armrests, waiting — and that’s exactly where Jurassic World: Rebirth finds its groove. Gareth Edwards, who’s no stranger to making monsters feel massive and moments feel drawn out in the best, most suspenseful way possible, returns with a film that knows exactly what it is, and maybe more importantly, what it isn’t. There are no pretenses of prestige here, no attempts at reinventing the dinosaur wheel, just pure monster mayhem wrapped in sweeping cinematography and sound design so immersive it could probably cause vertigo if you’re seated too close to the silver screen.

Image courtesy of Universal Pictures PH

And that’s the thing — this movie works best when it shuts up and lets the dinosaurs do their thing. The way Edwards builds tension is through patience and scale, with long, quiet stretches interrupted by sudden, terrifying bursts of chaos, like you're watching the earth itself decide it's had enough of people meddling again. The dinosaurs here don’t just feel like CGI creatures — they’re rendered with such textured detail and movement, set against John Mathieson’s rich, lush visuals, that they feel like living, breathing titans who happen to be caught in someone else’s disaster movie. Some sequences genuinely feel like they belong in a theme park haunted house — the kind that people dare each other to go into, and end up screaming the loudest in.

But once the human characters start talking, the spell starts to break.

Jonathan Bailey and Scarlett Johansson in Jurassic World: Rebirth. (Image courtesy of Universal Pictures PH)

Scarlett Johansson leads the charge as Zora Bennett, but unfortunately, she feels like she was given the wardrobe, the guns, and none of the internal logic to make any of it believable. It’s not even that she’s bad — it's that she seems adrift, as if someone dropped Black Widow into the wrong franchise and forgot to write her a character arc. Her chemistry with Jonathan Bailey’s Henry Loomis is about as forced as the movie’s clunky attempts at emotional depth, and though both actors are perfectly capable, the script gives them nothing to anchor into beyond “let’s flirt while running from apex predators.” Mahershala Ali, the ever-dependable MVP of any ensemble, brings gravitas to the otherwise underwritten team leader Duncan Kincaid, though even he feels like he's just here to give orders and look stoic while the plot barrels past.

And then there’s the subplot — oh boy, the subplot — involving a random family that Zora and co. have to save because they were stupid enough to go sailing near a region known to have active dinosaur sightings, which feels like the film equivalent of yelling “don’t go in there!” at the screen for 30 minutes straight. The first time we meet them, it genuinely deflates the film’s pacing, but weirdly, as the story rolls on and the body count ticks up, they end up being part of some of the most high-stakes, breath-holding moments. It’s messy, but not unwatchable — kind of like the movie as a whole.

Image courtesy of Universal Pictures PH

Of course, no Jurassic entry is complete without a cardboard-cutout capitalist villain, and Rupert Friend steps in to twirl the metaphorical mustache. His character is the same flavor of evil tech/industrial guy we’ve seen since the ‘90s, the kind that funds dangerous expeditions and then acts surprised when everything goes to hell. The film tries to wave around themes of corporate greed and exploitation, but it feels like lip service — like a checkbox on a list of things Jurassic movies are supposed to include, rather than a commentary it’s truly interested in unpacking. It’s not offensive, just boring, and in a franchise this old, boring is arguably worse.

Image courtesy of Universal Pictures PH

That said, there are still flashes of charm and self-awareness, like the cheeky Jaws homage where Bailey’s Loomis is placed at the bow of a ship with a rifle, looking uncannily like Roy Scheider’s Chief Brody if Brody had a better jawline and was hunting prehistoric monsters instead of sharks. It's in these little moments — the nods to Spielberg, the audience-wide gasps, the way everyone holds their breath before the T-Rex crashes through the trees — where the film reminds you why people keep showing up for this franchise, even when the stories don’t always evolve.

Jurassic World: Rebirth doesn’t reinvent anything, and honestly, it doesn’t try to. It banks on the visceral thrill of dinosaurs hunting humans in increasingly dramatic ways, and it mostly delivers, especially when the visuals are front and center. But the characters are thin, the themes are shallow, and the film can’t quite decide what to do with the quieter moments that should’ve been used to deepen the stakes. It’s loud, it’s pretty, and it’s exactly the kind of movie you watch with a bucket of overpriced popcorn and a crowd that knows when to scream. It just doesn’t leave much behind after the credits roll — and in this case, that’s literal. No post-credit scene, no game-changing twist, just a reminder that sometimes, spectacle is enough. But only just enough.

"Jurassic World: Rebirth" Cinegeek Rating: B+

Jurassic World: Rebirth is now showing in Philippine Cinemas.