Any franchise that kicks off with an all-time classic is instantly put at a massive disadvantage, because the chances of replicating such rare magic are almost zero. In the case of Jurassic World Dominion, though, it put a huge dampener on a six-film arc that dragged on for 29 years, rounding off the sprawling dinosaur saga in tediously disappointing fashion.
Steven Spielberg’s original is one of the greatest blockbusters that will ever be made, of that there is no doubt. The second and third installments weren’t a patch on the opener, but Colin Trevorrow’s Jurassic World reignited the stagnant property with a bang, hoovering up close to $1.7 billion at the box office in the process.
Successors Fallen Kingdom and Dominion may have also crossed the covered billion-dollar threshold, but the law of diminishing returns set in. Rotten Tomatoes scores dipped from 71 to 47, and then to a Jurassic Park low of 29 for this summer’s smash hit. Leaning on nostalgia is often used as little more than a crutch to prop up substandard storytelling, and that was most definitely the case here. Bringing back Sam Neill, Laura Dern, and Jeff Goldblum for what was essentially a giant locust movie with some dinosaurs in it was lauded as the event we’d been waiting for, but the trio were completely wasted.
Nonetheless, Dominion continues to be an absolute monster on streaming, having taken a huge bite out of multiple platforms. As per FlixPatrol, the underwhelming end to an IP that should probably be placed on ice for a while is a Top 10 hit on both iTunes and Google Play Movies, while it also dwells on the most-watched charts of Prime Video, Rakuten, and Chili for good measure.