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Should Jurassic Park be more scientifically accurate?

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In 1993 legendary director Steven Spielberg amazed the world with the release of Jurassic Park. Based on the Michael Crichton book of the same name written three years prior, Jurassic Park used practical creature effects, animatronics, and computer-generated imagery (CGI) to bring Dinosaurs back to life, well on the cinema screen at least. Scored by the legendary John Williams and starring Sam Neill, Jeff Goldblum, Laura Dern, and the late, great Richard Attenborough, Jurassic Park went on to become one of the few movies, at the time, to earn over a billion dollars at the worldwide box office.

Working closely with Paleontologist Jack Horner Spielberg resurrected the movies Dinosaurs using the leading theories and ascertained knowledge base that was available at the time, such as the theory that many theropod Dinosaurs may have evolved into birds, which inspired the behavior of many of the movies Dinosaurs such as the T. Rex and the Velociraptors.

However, artistic license was used to exaggerate certain elements of the movie, most notably with the movies infamous 'Raptors'. In Jurassic Park and its many sequels, the Velociraptors are depicted as being approximately six feet tall when in reality Velociraptors were, on average no bigger than a wolf. The movies Velociraptors are more akin in size and appearance to another theropod Dinosaur known as the Deinonychus, which also was never as big as those depicted in the movies. Many Hollywood movies use artistic and creative licenses to simplify or exaggerate certain elements within a movie for dramatic effect, but with Jurassic Park and its sequels, such licenses have had a negative impact on the movie, and one that may not be immediately apparent.

In the first half of the nineteenth century, Gideon Mantell (and allegedly his wife Mary Ann) and Sir Richard Owen were credited with having discovered the first fossilized remains of the herbivorous dinosaur Iguanodon. Based primarily on Owens' assertions of what he believed the Dinosaur looked like the Crystal Palace Dinosaur statues unveiled in 1854 depicted erroneously two Iguanodons as oversized crocodilian creatures (pictured above). This inaccurate depiction of Dinosaurs as slow, lumbering overgrown lizards continued well into the twentieth century. Previously Paleontologists were woefully underfunded and underequipped to effectively perform the important and delicate work necessary to retrieve fossils and other specimens, however, with many technological advances in recent years Paleontologists have come to learn more about Dinosaurs in the past two decades than what was hypothesized and speculated for the past two centuries.

In Jurassic Park, the depiction of its Dinosaurs is based upon what Paleontologists believed to be accurate at that time, with a certain amount of creative license of course. However, since the movies release twenty-six years ago Paleontologists have uncovered that many of the movie's depictions of its Dinosaurs, especially the theropods, such as the T. Rex and Velociraptors are inaccurate, with many such theropod Dinosaurs now known to have been covered in feathers, quills and other similar forms of plumage. This means that despite the original movie's best intentions to bring Dinosaurs back to life, its Dinosaurs are now more akin to movie monsters such as Godzilla, as in that they are a fictional creation.

Which leads us to the question that will likely be scorned by the movies fanbase, which is - with the knowledge acquired since the original movies release would a Jurassic Park movie (remake or sequel) with a more scientifically accurate depiction of its Dinosaurs, such as a Tuft-Haired T. Rex (pictured above), be a good idea, or should Hollywood continue to promote an inaccurate and, in the case of its more recent instalments, monstrous depiction of what were some of the most successful and majestic creatures that ever walked the Earth?.

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Written by GavinPublished on 2019-11-18 21:25:33

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12 Comments

Xenotaris

MemberAllosaurusNov-18-2019 9:33 PM

It would be nice but these are genetically modified dinosaurs we are talking about so they are by definition man-made monsters using dinosaur DNA and modern animals

dk

MemberTyrannosaurus RexNov-19-2019 12:51 AM

I don't think a remake reflecting updated knowledge is either necessary or desirable. Maybe incorporating in future films would be better. I think JP is a little like Godzilla in that we know it's a story and the message is what the movie is about- essentially cautionary tales. There are plenty of good documentaries out there about dinosaurs if people want to see them.

Kongzilla

MemberStegosaurusNov-19-2019 1:32 AM

It will be good for an other Dino-films or JP remakes. But I doubt about JW 3 - don't change the style and design in the one story.

TheLazyFish

MemberVelociraptorNov-19-2019 8:27 AM

A remake in the future (VERY distant future- like, by  the time we all have grandkids or something lol) I'd like IF THEY DO IT RIGHT. Make it a bit more akin to the book, but still incredibly unique. More accurate Dinosaurs (fix the movie monster thing by having the Big One a genetically modified raptor to be WAY bigger and more aggressive than the others). Also, maybe make a couple jokes about things that made a little less sense in the movies or books? I just feel a remake in the VERY distant future that is more accurate and, more importantly, unique.

MinecraftDinoKaiju

MemberStegosaurusNov-19-2019 8:28 AM

If they remade the franchise, then I think they should make the dinosaurs scientifically accurate. Otherwise, it would throw off the audience if it got introduced in JW3 (unless they have a scene where Blue interacts with a pack of accurate wolf-sized Velociraptors).

But that's just me.

Xenotaris

MemberAllosaurusNov-19-2019 11:25 AM

Well given the de-extinction technology is no longer InGen's because they sold off half of their clone dinosaur stock and perhaps most of their cloned embryos. I think other start up gen-tech companies will start tinkering with the de-extinct technology with their own scientists to make genetically "pure" dinosaurs, remember its Dr. Wu's fault for the reason why the dinosaurs look the way they do.

MinecraftDinoKaiju

MemberStegosaurusNov-19-2019 1:54 PM

Yeah, but I mentioned the scene concept so that the general audience could understand why we get frustrated with the scientific inaccuracies.

Xenotaris

MemberAllosaurusNov-19-2019 2:25 PM

Oh yeah, I agree with you. perhaps a company make these genetically purer feathered velociraptors and they encounter Blue

Lauchlan

MemberCompsognathusDec-14-2019 3:49 AM

 I think the only time this would be acceptable  if it was a remake the Jurassic Park lore  is already set  to be scientifically inaccurate  in that retcon  A lot a remake would have no lore  behind it   So  if was a remake  they wouldn’t be breaking establish lore 

Lauchlan

MemberCompsognathusDec-14-2019 3:52 AM

Well as both  a JP fan  and a fan of paleontology with scientifically accurate dinosaurs the article is mostly good except the part you  claim JP was scientifically accurate at the time The book was what feathers were found one year before movies so feathers  on dinosaurs  were accurate  at the time of the movie not at the books time  so Jurassic Park the movie  wasn’t even accurate for its time  

Dome67

MemberCompsognathusMar-01-2020 11:37 AM

I definitely think they should find a way to at least introduce feathers in  teropods. Today, unfeathered Velociraptors are a huge, huge no no. They're as nonsense as a naked turkey. Every reconstruction of a Dromaeosauridae you can find on google images shows completely feathered creatures, with wings at various levels of development, because this is what fossil record showed us in last decads.

Not only small Velociraptors had feathers and wings, also huge Utahraptor did. Unmistakable evidence of feather covering have been found even on various Tyrannosauridae. We've to cope with the fact that these animals without feathers today are totally nonsense. Today we know for certain that the vast majority of dinosaurs had some degree of feathering.

At least new dinosaurs ib the story should've feathers. They could pretend that amphibian DNA was responsible of the anomaly, and claim that they replaced it with saurian or crocodile or avian DNA for newer generations. And we can cope with that big size anomaly on Velociraptor, they could maybe pretend that they're Utahraptors which have been reclassified as Velociraptors' congenerics.

But those naked chicken are really unacceptable in 2020, seriously.

Xenotaris

MemberAllosaurusMar-02-2020 6:36 AM

That's why I said have a new batch of genetically modified dinosaurs that are genetically purer along side Dr Wu's  naked chicken creations

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