actually I don't think "they are fine."
Michael Crichton wrote Jurassic Park to tell about the reckless use of science to gain money & where scientists forced by companies think they can control everything. Based on a very detailed research he managed to make his novel very believeable and thus thrilling.
This is his common formula he used on his other novels too, depending on what sort of technology was cutting edge at the specific time.
In the 60s it was about travelling into space (andromeda),
in the 70s it was about robots and artificial intelligence (westworld),
in the 80s it was about species extinction and computer technology (congo) & about astro-physics and psychology (sphere) ,
1990 it was about genetic engineering and chaos theory (jurassic park),
in the early 90s about sexual harassment by women (disclosure) and the new economy power of japan (rising sun),
1995 about extinction and behaviour (the lost world),
1999 about quantum technology and history (timeline),
2002 about nano technology and multi agent systems (prey),
2004 about global warming and eco-terrorism (state of fear) and
2007 about bio-design (next).
of course this list isn't complete.
spielberg turned jurassic park into a quite well done cinematic adaption and contained most of the scientific background of crichton's novel (although he toned most of it down to few simple mentions).
the movie showed the wonder of living dinosaurs but most important to this wasn't any scientific background but the CGIs and animatronics.
plus it was a general public interest in dinosaurs at that time.
that was what made the movie so successfull (and merchandising as well).
crichton never wrote a sequel to his books, but because of the huge success of his novel and the movie he felt to continue somehow (and the novel's and movie's publisher saw the financial potential too).
even the novel version of the lost world felt in some way "forced". it had nice ideas (scientific and location-wise) but couldn't catch up to jurassic park.
well and spielberg just wanted a base for another film. he just took the raw background from crichton's novel and david koepp estabished a rather simple story with unimportant characters. unless the first movie it wasn't a movie about the magic of dinosaurs anymore it was an action-movie with dinosaurs in it.
they didn't really want to tell anything. just show a mercedes M-class pulling a fleetwood RV up a cliff on muddy ground... dozens of special hunting vehicles jumping reckless over hills and all being destroyed in a few seconds, dozens of "marlboro-men" hunted to death, a magically vanished crew on a boat that hits san diego's harbor to finally have a t-rex-lookalike king kong causing havoc in the city.
i mean...come on.
so it's a nice easter egg and points out a core message very well, when we see the script writer david koepp being eaten by the t-rex in the lost world.
the third movie just maxed out everything and continued the series very well: getting away from the key substance and presenting more action and thrill. one t-rex was thrilling in jurassic park, but boring for the lost world, where we needed at least two, but hey...two are boring for jurassic park III, were we need something bigger, better.... spinosaurus!
a car in jurassic park, a RV and a boat in the lost world... what's left? well... A PLANE! yeah!
pterosaurs with teeth? why not they look frightening, raptors chatting with each other? not only, just use a rapid prototyped resonance chamber and even humans can talk to dinosaurs...... and a lonely man in a suit on the beach... just before the navy and the marines arrive! that's what people want to see!
keeping the direction this trilogy has taken, a story about amoured dinosaurs wouldn't be that far fetched, would it?
so if there isn't ANY GOOD STORY to tell, I can't wait for a remake, which stays true to the intentions that Michael Crichton had, when he wrote Jurassic Park.
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