Thursday, 5 June 2025

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom Critique 5/6


*****SPOILERS*****

 

False Alarms: Science (Dinosaurs/Gas)

 

These are false alarms because they are non-problems: at first glance, they seem like obvious mistakes, but just a bit of thinking reveals clever justifications for their existence.

 

There were two false alarms with the pachy.

The pachy looks different from those in other films, in regards to the head spike length and overall colour. Some could claim this lacks consistency. Perhaps this shows a different species or sexual dimorphism? Indeed, the headbutter here is Stygimoloch spinnifer, whereas those in the rest of this franchise are Pachycephalosaurus wyomingensis. Yet some palaeontologists believe these two species are actually the same species. So that doesn’t answer my query, only reaffirms that the guesses were in the right direction.
The pachy headbutts a guard who goes flying. If enough force sent the guard that high and that far, that guard would have serious damage. Yet this one looks dazed, not injured. Perhaps the guards wore body armour? That would make sense, especially considering the room was full of dangerous people.
 

Whilst the volcano is exploding and all the dinosaurs are fleeing danger, a t-rex and another predator fight. Some say this is unrealistic. However, the most common threat to any predator is other predators. In real life, predators will fight each other in the middle of bad situations because, statistically, other predators are the deadlier issue than environmental disasters like volcanoes.

 

A stray bullet hits a cannister in the lab, letting out hydrogen cyanide gas to poison the dinosaurs. Many complained about this gas even being there, even though toxic chemicals are used every day in science.

Also, if any of the dinosaurs weren’t sold, they’d cost a fortune to feed; they were brought here specifically to make money, not cost money. So having poisonous gas ready to kill of ‘surplus’ dinosaurs would make sense for money-grabbing Miles. Plus, the longer the dinosaurs are there, the more likely the authorities would discover them and thus punish Miles. So any surplus dinosaurs would be a threat to Miles’ liberty, not just his wallet.
On another note, hydrogen cyanide is proposed to have played a role in the creation of life. Plus, it is confirmed to make the so-called ‘building blocks’ of DNA and proteins, without which InGen couldn’t have made the dinosaurs in the first place! So this gas is a nice nod to those areas of science. (Even if hydrogen cyanide isn’t typically used in genetics research.)
 
 

False Alarms: Blue

 

Blue attacks the Indoraptor the very first time she meets it. How did she know the Indoraptor was a danger? Perhaps she heard all the scuffling whilst she was following Owen’s scent. Sure, but rather than being the true motivator itself, this would have reinforced what was actually the true motivator: Indoraptor scent.

Now, the Indoraptor was made of Blue and the Indominus-rex, meaning the Indoraptor would likely smell a little like both. For something to smell like you, it would most likely be family. Blue is part of an intelligent social species so of course she would be curious about possible family. That alone gives her a good enough reason to investigate the Indoraptor’s scent.
Also, the Indoraptor smelt like the Indominus-rex, the creature that killed her pack mates and who threatened Owen. Naturally, Blue would be wary about anything that smelt like the I-rex (including the Indoraptor).
Furthermore, Blue would have scented the Indoraptor on the corpses throughout the manor. So Blue knows the Indoraptor is a danger. Blue has shown before that she’d defend Owen from danger, so leaping on the Indoraptor is a given!
 

When Blue was a baby, she was paler than her adult form and more of her body surface is blue in colour. Why?

Perhaps this was done so that the audience could immediately recognise the baby as Blue? A paler background colour would have contrasted with the blue better than Blue’s adult background colour. Plus, baby Blue having the same percentage of blue coverage as her adult form would’ve made it unnoticeable due to the smaller size. In both these cases, it allows the blueness of baby Blue to stand out, meaning it’s much easier for the audience to actually identify her as Blue immediately.
However, this could also just be a case of animals changing colours as they age. Babies often have different colourings to adults to help the adults keep track of them. This includes bird chicks, the dinosaur’s closest modern relatives.
 

Blue cries a tear. Did dinosaurs have tear ducts? Is it something that can be deduced from fossils? Was this just a detail put in for compassion rather than accuracy? Although I suppose when Wu was filling in the dinosaur genomes he could have added a tear duct (this would be beneficial so it’s not out of the question).

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