Universal Pictures
It’s not every day that a baseless, completely insane internet rumor is proven to be in fact 100% based and sane. But yesterday was one such day.
You see, a week and a half ago, JoBlo.com unleashed a torrent of supposed Jurassic World rumors on the world, and they were met with an array of eye-rolls, tut-tuts and other typical responses that convey the words “Yeah, no way pal.” But Peter Sciretta of SlashFilm had the stones to straight-up ask the movie’s director, Colin Trevorrow, if the rumors are true.
Surprise! They totally are.
Now for a brief disclaimer. Trevorrow mentions in all this that he’d prefer if “audiences could discover this on their own,” so those looking to have absolutely nothing spoiled about Jurassic World should turn away immediately.
However, Trevorrow was also willing to spill the beans when asked, so it can’t be too big of a deal. If he wasn’t willing to go the J.J. Abrams “Yes, we all know it’s Kahn but I will continue to play coy for no reason” route, we’re probably in the clear here. So if you’re interested, let your eyes venture below.
JoBlo’s rumors, amongst other things, included these three saucy sentences:
Business is good at the park, but the powers that be start to dream up new ways to keep customers coming back; namely by splicing Dino DNA with other dinos (and other species). That becomes the problem. They splice together a T-Rex, raptor, snake, and cuttlefish to create a monstrous new dino that, of course, gets loose and terrorizes the park.
And Trevorrow, after confirming Jurassic World does contain a weird hybrid dino, adds the following disclaimer:
This animal is not a mutant freak. It doesn’t have a snake’s head or octopus tentacles. It’s a dinosaur, created in the same way the others were, but now the genetics have gone to the next level. For me, it’s a natural evolution of the technology introduced in the first film.
There were other story points reported by JoBlo that also got the thumbs up from Trevorrow, such as how the titular “Jurassic World” is a working dinosaur theme park and popular vacation resort, Chris Pratt’s protagonist is a raptor expert and the film may contain dinosaur-on-dinosaur action – as in combat, so get your mind out of the gutter, please.
Trevorrow is prepared for the outrage this all will cause, how Jurassic Park fans will hear of dino-splicing and immediately soil themselves in the purest form of hatred known to man. One doesn’t drop the phrase “ruining our childhood” unless one is prepared to receive George Lucas levels of fan bile. These folks, of course, are jumping the gun much too much. But it’s still ok to be a little hesitant.
Because for a chosen few, the concept of DNA-splicing dinos is an incredibly painful memory. As a child of the ’90s, plastic dinosaurs stamped with the Jurassic Park logo were my bread and butter. So, for myself and for other Dino-Damage enthusiasts, this news brought something to mind, a Lovecraftian nightmare that the human brain cannot truly comprehend:
Jurassic Park: Chaos Effect.
After the release of The Lost World: Jurassic Park, Kenner was churning out a steady stream of toys for children young enough to be traumatized by a man bisected by two hungry T-Rexes, but not so young that they can’t still enjoy a “The Lost World T-Rex Chomp ‘n Kill Playset.” But by 1998, a year after the sequel’s release, the creative well had run dry. All the basic options, like “dinosaurs,” and “humans, who may be eaten by dinosaurs,” had already been produced.
The only option left was to splice dinosaurs together, through the power of DNA. No longer was it limited to filling small holes in dinosaur genetic code with similar, malleable chunks of frog DNA. Now, those three little letters meant you could say, “I’ve decided that bears and turtles should be the same thing.” Which gave us easily pronounceable creatures like:
- Compstegnathus — part Compsognathus (the little guys that eat Peter Stormare in The Lost World), part Stegosaurus and part tree frog.
- Ankyloranodon – part Ankylosaurus, a 13,000-pound armor-plated cow, and part Pteranodon, a light and breezy flying beast. Presumably, every one of these things would have attempted liftoff, snapped every hollow bird bone under such titanic weight and died screaming.
- Ultimasaurus — a T-Rex with a Triceratops head, which was never actually sold in stores because it was too cool. Also because the Chaos Effect toys were a giant money pit, and because a few children reportedly stabbed themselves with the Ultimasaurus horns.
- Chaos Effect Ian Malcom – sadly, just Jeff Goldblum in a tight yellow jumpsuit, not a dinosaur with Goldblum’s trademark feathered hair and open shirt.
Chaos Effect was a disaster, it sold terribly and was more or less wiped from our memories in a massive scorched Earth policy. Or, more likely, just forgotten for the crime of being indefensibly stupid. All we have left now is an out-of-focus TV commercial that someone haphazardly recorded with an old camera phone.
It’s safe to say that there won’t be an Ultimasaurus in Jurassic World. But whatever Trevorrow’s new hybrid is, it’ll need a name. A name that will almost certainly ride the line of being Chaos Effect-level ridiculous. And make no mistake, Jurassic World will kick off a whole new wave of hybrid dino toys, for 2010s kids to smash into each other and eventually lose track of under the couch.
I wish Colin Trevorrow the best in his pursuit of newer, cooler dinosaurs. But please, for the good of all our sakes, proceed with caution.
