Jurassic World: Battle at Big Rock

[DinoToyForum]

Take care not to personally attack each other, that's against the forum rules.  I'm not pointing fingers, I just noticed some accusations and heated comments, skimming through. (This is not a thread I'm following properly, [Jar Jar Binks v babies!?] and I don't intend to unless my duties as a moderator demand it. I'm sure they won't because I know you all respect the forum rules  )

[HD-man]

Plus, nothing about the babies behaviour is unreasonable. It sees a large animal it´s not familiar with - it cries.

As previously mentioned, that explanation doesn't make sense ("Also, why did the baby only start crying then? It's not like it only just saw what was happening. It had the same view throughout the whole fight, so it saw either all of it or none of it").

Anyway , seeing that you´re now resorting to ad hominem attacks ( the "no offense" part), I see no reason to continue this discussion.

Only said how "your posts come off", not how you personally come off, so technically not "ad hominem" (especially compared to your "revenge fantasy" comment), but I digress.

Take care not to personally attack each other, that's against the forum rules.  I'm not pointing fingers, I just noticed some accusations and heated comments, skimming through. (This is not a thread I'm following properly, [Jar Jar Binks v babies!?] and I don't intend to unless my duties as a moderator demand it. I'm sure they won't because I know you all respect the forum rules  )

This.

This has certainly gone off the rails a bit, but I absolutely do understand how from the perspective of an audience in a film a child endangering everyone would feel obnoxious and annoying, just like any other Scrappy character. Especially in this franchise where we've had hit and miss child main characters through the franchises entire run. It's going to both make people more critical of these characters and somewhat justifiably make the audience want the latest annoying kid to pay for all the other annoying "kid moments" the audience suffered through previously.

I don't understand the insistence on necessitating this, nor do I think it would work for a film going for a similar tone to the previous ones (the best way to keep the tone as it is but be more serious is to just not have a child main character [please]), but it makes sense as something audiences would like to see from this franchise. Just like it would make sense that audiences of Star Wars might want to have Jar Jar die. It's a natural reaction to these characters becoming so prevalent within a given franchise.

Also this. I tried to say more-or-less the same thing w/the "Land Before Swine" review video. To use a another quote from said video, "If the writer is doing their job correctly, no character should EVER be in that situation unless they are a villain" (hence my original point, "They should either make the animals more realistic so they eat the stupid/annoying humans or the humans less stupid/annoying so we root for them more, maybe both, for an overall better movie").

This kid just wasn't even that bad though, I say, as someone who doesn't even like babies. The role was almost inconsequential too, anything could have alerted the Allosaurus, like an alarm clock or the DVR recording a TV show.

Yeah, they could've used anything as that plot device, & they chose to use the baby. As previously mentioned, it comes off as "Youth Is Wasted on the Dumb" ("But, yeah, whatever! Kids are dumb! They can be used as literally whatever plot device you want, and it's totally fair no matter what they do!": https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/YouthIsWastedOnTheDumb ).

[brandem]

Seemed a lot like the short imperiling both the Nasutoceratops baby and the camper's baby was to mirror humans and the creatures, just like the Nasutoceratops rallied to save theirs so did the humans. It forms a link between the two within the story. They did and excellent job of building suspense in that scene just through composition, even when you knew the baby would be fine.

If you just straight up kill the baby immediately then you're trying to tell a very different story. One that rings of hopelessness. 'Jurassic world:the road' if that's a reference anyone gets.

[HD-man]

If you just straight up kill the baby immediately then you're trying to tell a very different story. One that rings of hopelessness. 'Jurassic world:the road' if that's a reference anyone gets.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIp-0V6YKfQ

[Coelophysis]

I might as well chime in here too, and this is more an issue with media in general, but Jurassic Park is especially guilty of having child/baby characters purely to raise the stakes but we all know nothing will ever happen. I can't honestly say for a second that any of the children other than Tim and Lex in the original were ever really at risk. They're obviously in dangerous situations but there's no real risk because they'd never dare kill a child! The filmmakers only place them in those situations to elicit an emotional response, but anybody familiar with the franchise knows they won't be eaten or hurt in any serious manner. Even Cathy survived being swarmed by the Compsognathus if the deleted boardroom scene is canon. I think Battle at Big Rock could've made a big difference by killing one of the child characters. Having human-acclimated and sometimes enormous predators roaming freely across the Americas is a massive safety concern and what better way to show just how dangerous it can be than by having one of your big predators break the JP formula and actually kill a child? It'd be horrible and there'd be outrage, sure, but it'd also show exactly what the consequences of letting the dinosaurs free is. Nobody actually got hurt in the entire short! For all the tension and risk nobody even had a scrape on them as far as I can remember. Now imagine the sort of in-universe ethical debates going into the next film had the Allosaurus snatched the baby (or one of the other kids.) There'd be people calling for capture or even euthanasia for the dinosaurs and animal rights groups arguing for their freedom despite the risk, and it'd have the benefit of presenting the protagonists of the main films in a morally gray area which would be a LOT better than the cartoonish good guy vibe they have now.

Please don't take this as me rooting for a baby to get eaten because that's really not what I'm trying to say. I just think something like that would be a real wham moment for the series and would do wonders for setting the ethical/moral stage for the next film which is certainly going to have those themes anyway.

[ChrisLikesDinos]

So, here's my edit of the Allosaurus design:



Admittedly, the "before" version is a render from JW Alive and the animatronic head, which ILM seemed to change quite a bit in post, which looks closer to my "after". All the same, I wish they would have worked more to get an accurate design on the Allosaurus... Jurassic World has so many theropods, and with the introductions of hybrids, nailing those distinguishing features is key IMO.

[ITdactyl]

Wow.  I do like your edit @DemonCarnotaur , but original ol' One Eye still has a place in my heart.  I keep my real dinosaurs and JP characters in neatly separated brain partitions.

Seems the Fandom (with respect, I'm excluding those who already dislike the entire franchise) is of a divided opinion
There's "let JP/W embrace reality and change" vs "JP/W should stay the same"

I'm still amazed there are people who call the corrected allosaur hand posture a "cinema sin" of the consistency kind.  There are also comments asking for more realistic animal behavior but at the same time wishing the battle between the allosaur and nasutoceratops to have been more protracted.

On the subject of the short itself (plot spoilers.  It's only 8 minutes on Youtube, go watch it):

• I now appreciate the run-time (I've previously complained about how short 8 minutes would be). Had it gone on for longer, it would've dragged.
• On the subject of the crying baby - I didn't even read that as the baby crying because it saw the Allosaurus.  The whole family was turned away from him for a long time, I thought the baby cried initially because he was being ignored (as some babies do).  I agree that if not the baby, it could have been an alarm, a barking dog, a falling spoon, a creaking door... but something was needed to draw the Allosaur's attention.  I'm not too keen on a few seconds/minutes being wasted on the Allosaurus snuffling around like a scavenging cayote just to discover the family trying to hide.  The use of the baby isn't brilliant film-making at all, but it still works IMO.
• On the subject of the extra kid: 'seems the JP/W formula is Man+Woman+(1 or 2 children). I concede that the eldest and the baby could have been written out and this story would not have changed. But (unlike most of the online sentiment I'm seeing) I did appreciate the family dynamic that was shown.
• On the subject of the couple being too calm during the intrusion: There are people who are extremely calm (and perhaps numb) after huge physical trauma -
  Spoiler

  the trailer rolling over

  [close]
  .  Their panic was evident when they couldn't immediately get the straps off the baby - and I'm just glad the wife wasn't written as the hysterical stereotype.
• On the subject of the wife going Rambo with the fire extinguisher: uh... yeah... uhm... You do what you must... I guess.
• On One-Eye roaring during the money shot: I initially didn't like that she had to roar... but... "why you hooman spray me... WHY?!? I eat you!"
• On the subject of the crossbow: a lot of people seem to prefer that a different person should have fired it, but I'm of the opinion that having an extra save the day ruins the story.  The girl also acted her part wonderfully (despite the concept being fantasy stretched a little too far).

It seems JW is really heading into the direction of "The Walking Dead" with dinosaurs instead of zombies.  There's also talk that (despite the rumor of JW3 being the finale of the story) the corporate types are using BaBR, Camp Cretaceous and JW3 to gauge public interest and see if JP can become a cash cow similar to Star Wars.  It does seem to be heading in that direction, and JP style fictional dinosaurs are here to stay.

I'm still glad this short existed and I'm doubly glad it was available for "free".

[Brocc21]

Wow.  I do like your edit @DemonCarnotaur There's also talk that (despite the rumor of JW3 being the finale of the story) the corporate types are using BaBR, Camp Cretaceous and JW3 to gauge public interest and see if JP can become a cash cow similar to Star Wars.  It does seem to be heading in that direction, and JP style fictional dinosaurs are here to stay.

Oh god please no. We don't need the last Jedi but Jurassic Park. Just let it die peacefully

[Appalachiosaurus]

It's probably a smart idea to expect more JP. It's one of the few billion dollar franchises and Universal's only contender against Disney's Monopoly, they're going to keep stretching it till the costs outweigh the profit, then they'll shelve it for 15 years and probably remake the original. Our obsession with nostalgia means no semi-sucessful franchise will ever die.

[ChrisLikesDinos]

So, here's my edit of the Allosaurus design:



Admittedly, the "before" version is a render from JW Alive and the animatronic head, which ILM seemed to change quite a bit in post, which looks closer to my "after". All the same, I wish they would have worked more to get an accurate design on the Allosaurus... Jurassic World has so many theropods, and with the introductions of hybrids, nailing those distinguishing features is key IMO.

Here's another edit exploring a more accurate approach to this Allo design:

[Faelrin]

@DemonCarnotaur Those edits look great. And where was that top picture of the animatronic (in color) from?

[Funk]

Here's another edit exploring a more accurate approach to this Allo design:

Looks good, the eyes still seem to be placed too low in the socket (we know where the sclerotic ring was placed).

[ITdactyl]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MWA2cpDYWl4