The Lost World (1997)

Ten Things I Hate (and a whole lot more) about The Lost World: Jurassic Park

When Lost World: Jurassic Park came out, some readers asked me if I intended to do a review of it. I said no. While the film annoyed me in many instances, it wasn’t nearly bad enough to qualify for a review. Besides, the end stuff, featuring the T-Rex running amok in San Diego, was everything that a kid growing up on poorly made monster movies could wish for. For that small bit, the film is quite fabulous.

Yet, the picture has idiocies galore. And the man to blame is Steven Spielberg. Why? Early in his career, as a kid really, Spielberg made Jaws, the finest monster movie ever. (No, I’m not going to argue over whether a twenty-five foot super-smart shark is a monster.) It’s simply a brilliant film. And it’s utterly different than LW:JP, much to the latter’s detriment.

The Spielberg who made LW:JP was at the peak of his powers, artistically and financially. Yet it’s obvious that he was bored with this kind of film. The plot had tons of errors big and small and the characters were extremely cartoonish and two-dimensional. If Spielberg had cared in the slightest, there’s no way that the film would have been so utterly sloppy and predictable. Frankly, Stevie, if your heart’s not in it, don’t make this kind of movie anymore.

For instance, every ‘expert’ in Jaws knows his business. Hooper is an intelligent and knowledgeable scientist. Brody’s a pretty good lawman. And Quint, other than being a psycho, is a masterful and crafty sailor. Meanwhile, in Lost World, every ‘expert’ acts like an idiot, in ways that no one in their profession would. See below for numerous examples.

Also, Steve’s politics have ‘grown’ into your standard lefty Hollywood ideology. This means that if you’re the right type of person; i.e., a headstrong female scientist, a radical environmentalist, a black kid, etc., you can do no wrong. If you’re the wrong kind, though, a mercenary, an Evil Capitalist or a lawyer (the first Jurassic Park), then you’re T-Rex meat.

The one quasi-exception here is Roland, the Great White Hunter. It’s clear that Spielberg doesn’t know what to do with him. The kid in him, the one that made Jaws and Raiders of the Lost Ark and grew up on classic movies featuring Adventurer Heroes, like King Solomon’s Mine and Gunga Din, wants Roland to be a hero. However, the adult Spielberg, locked into the politically correct mindset of Hollywood, can’t escape the feeling that making such fellows heroic is, well, Imperialist. So Roland, who started the film wanting to hunt and kill a T-Rex, disgustedly abandons his quest after a bout of spiritual growth and is allowed to live out the movie.

Spielberg’s also become a pacifist, refusing to let anyone in one of his more recent ‘entertainment’ films use a weapon effectively. Noticeably, no one in either Jurassic Park movie at any point uses a gun to advantage. Nor does Spielberg allow any character on his cartoon shows to carry a gun. So much for Elmer Fudd. This makes me wary of how he can possibly direct another Indiana Jones movie. (Remember the TV show, wherein the young Indy was portrayed as a pacifist? How did that character ever grow up to become the Indiana Jones of Raiders of the Lost Ark?)

Is this the man who made Jaws? Remember how many movies ripped off the ‘can’t close the beach’ thing? And how the guy who made that decision was always stupid and evil and got killed by whatever menace that particular film boasted? Well, in Jaws, the Mayor’s isn’t only not evil, but he’s given a terrific scene to show that he’s instead your typical, fallible human being.

Brody angrily demands that the Mayor hire Quint after the shark almost kills Brody’s son. Rambling incoherently, the Mayor immediately signs the papers. Shaken, he then looks up at Brody and says, “My kids were out there, too.” The Mayor wasn’t an evil man, just a guy who sold himself a lie because that’s what his job demanded. The realization of what he risked in pursuing that lie has obviously hit him hard. It’s one of the best moments in a film full of them.

And when Brody, the film’s main protagonist, gets assaulted by the mother of one of the shark’s victims, he has to face the fact that he’s partly responsible for the cover-up. While more hesitant than the other town fathers, he went along with the pressure to just believe that everything was fine. Brody, who hates the water, tags along with Quint on the shark hunt largely to assuage his own guilt.

So how does a guy make a movie with this kind of three-dimensional characterization early in his career, and then turn out stuff like this twenty years later? Got me.

Anway, here’s some things that bugged me and some general observations:

1. Little Rich Girl wanders off in the beginning of the movie and comes across some chicken sized dino-predators. (This, by the way, was roughly the actual size of the Velociraptor. They were unscientifically embiggened to make them scarier in Jurassic Park.) She ends up being beset by dozens of these beasties for what I assume is meant to be several minutes. We are soon informed that she survived relatively unscathed. Later, though, a full grown man is completely devoured by the same wee dinos in fairly short order.
2. This, by the way, is a further indication that Spielberg shouldn’t make horror/monster movies any more. In Jaws, he was quite ready to make the devouring of a small boy, roughly the same age as the girl here, a pivotal event of the film. Jaws featured characters you didn’t want to see eaten getting eaten. Here, only Bad Guys and nobodies get et.
3. Spielberg didn’t learn from the first Jurassic Park not to put annoying brat kids into it.
4. Spielberg didn’t want to kill jolly ol’ John Hammond (Richard Attenborough), but did want to kill off an Evil Capitalist. Solution? He made Hammond sick and gave him an Evil Capitalist nephew.
5. Evil Capitalists wear suits that cost more than the college education of a scientist with an advanced degree in physics. (Say, rather conservatively, $100,000.)
6. This flick’s island, Site B (different from the island in the first movie), is supposedly Top Secret. Yet the yacht bringing the Rich Girl’s family had no problems landing there for a picnic. Not even a “Private Property” sign to be seen. So much for security.
7. As explained in the first movie, the dinosaurs were designed with a genetic failsafe in case they got loose. They were bred with a lysine deficiency that would cause their deaths without weekly supplements. How can the dinosaurs then still be alive without human intervention? “Life will find a way,” we’re told. Thanks. That explains it.
8. “The carnivores are isolated in the Interior,” Hammond explains. Oh. Then the dinos that chewed up the little girl near the beach must have been vegetarians.
9. It’s noted that Kelly, Ian Malcolm’s (Jeff Goldblum) daughter, was on the gymnastics team, all but kicking us in the head and saying “gymnastics, eh…bet she’ll be using those skills later!”
10. This super secret island is “two hours” by plane from San Diego.
11. Everyone is shocked to learn that the Site B island and the others in its cluster are called Las Cinco Muertes, or The Five Deaths. This despite that fact that the big map in their mobile headquarters labels the islands…Las Cinco Muertes.



12. Later we learn why the dinosaurs survived without being given lysine. The herbivores ate plants containing lysine. The carnivores ate the herbivores. Man, that was some brilliant failsafe. (I think I liked “Life will find a way” cop-out better.)
13. A “cutting-edge,” trained field zoologist, Sarah Harding (Malcolm’s girlfriend) dives right into the nest (or whatever) of a Stegosaurus family and manhandles the baby dino. Now, I’ve seen enough nature specials on TV to know that there are some animals who abandon or even kill pups who smell of human contact. This makes Sarah look somewhat less than brilliant, as will pretty near every action she takes in the movie.
14. Baby stegosaurs act just like dogs when you pet their heads.
15. Cameras, when you finish a roll of film, make lots and lots of noise, enough to panic adult stegosaurs.
16. When attacked by the stegosaurs, Sarah, who has had extensive field experience in Africa, runs into the middle of the stampeding dinos, rather than away from them.
17. Sarah lectures everyone on how they mustn’t disturb the island’s ecology in even the most minute fashion, not even “bend a blade of grass.” This is after she walked up to a baby dinosaur and rubbed her hands all over it and caused a dino stampede that presumably bent many a blade of grass.
18. The film implies that Malcolm’s coming to ‘save’ Sarah is an antiquated, sexist act. She is, after all, an experienced, super-competent professional in her own right. This is what we’re told, anyway. Everything we see indicates that Malcolm is fully justified in coming to save her, because Sarah is shown to be a complete moron, over and over again. Most of the people who ignore Malcolm’s advice are portrayed as idiots and thus die horrible deaths. When Sarah acts like an idiot, though, it’s because she’s a ‘strong’ woman, and hence pays no price for her stupidity (although others do).
19. The good guys come by boat. The bad guys come by helicopter. Why didn’t the good guys come by copter? So that they could be stranded when the boat owner refuses to stay near the island.
20. The good guys all stare in horrified shock when the bad guys capture some dinosaurs. I guess it’s mean.
21. Roland, played as a very savvy and experienced safari guide and (apparently) mercenary, has as his second in command Dieter, who’s both a sadist and a complete fool. I could buy one or (just maybe) the other, but not both. Someone as smart as Roland would never have this guy in a position of authority.
22. If you’re a scientist like Sarah, or an environmentalist like Nick the Photographer, a.k.a. Earth First Guy (Vince Vaughn), you’re automatically morally superior to the grubby capitalists. Therefore, it’s OK to sabotage their camp, even if it gets a lot of people killed. And no one will in any way imply that you’re a terrorist. This is an example of Douglas’ Designated Hero™ rule, which partly stipulates that those that a movie chooses as its heroes shall never be held responsible for any deaths caused by their actions.
23. Sarah was originally doing work at the San Diego zoo, but is apparently horrified by the idea that the dinosaurs would be captured and…taken to a zoo in San Diego.
24. I admit that they didn’t know that anyone else was on the island, but I still think professional mercenaries would have put some kind of guard on the cages holding the dinosaurs.
25. A car that explodes in camp will fly into the air and land directly on a tree holding Peter the Evil Capitalist and Roland the Great White Hunter. (Yes, they escape.) This and more indicates that Roland was luring enraged T-Rexes real close to his base camp. (They’d be enraged because he’s using their pup as bait.) Yet Roland earlier chewed out Peter the Evil Capitalist about his proposed location for the camp, because it was in predator territory.
26. You can carry a scared and wounded baby T-Rex in your arms and it won’t try to bite you or disembowel you with its clawed feet.
27. Sarah agrees to take the baby T-Rex with them, her biggest worry being that Malcolm won’t like it. (This kind of falls into that “Sarah is a moron” thing.) Teddy, a member of their team who had nothing to do with bringing it into camp, is later horribly killed because of this. Again, no one casts any blame at Sarah or Earth First Guy, nor do they themselves ever indicate any guilt over getting this guy killed.
28. You can put your torso inches in front of a scared and wounded baby T-Rex’s clawed feet, and screw with its broken leg, and it still won’t disembowel you.
29. If you’re on an expedition whose lifeline is a radio, only one guy will know how to use it. Also, if you’re in a part of the world where no one (oddly) speaks English (i.e., two hours out of San Diego), then you will be assigned only one guy who speaks the local language. These fellows will never be around when you need them.
30. If three adult scientists/naturalists and a kid are in a truck with a baby T-Rex making a lot of noise (despite its mouth being bound shut with a belt), only the kid will worry that its cries will attract the attention of other dinosaurs.
31. A well-equipped expedition will bring along gauze bandages, but no tape or clamps to affix them. However, chewing gum will work just as well, holding a splint together long enough for a broken leg to heal.
32. Sarah and Earth First Guy, who are aware that there is cause for pissed off adult T-Rexes to come calling, ignore the emergency phone no matter how many times it rings.
33. The best way to release a baby T-Rex to its furious parents is to walk outside of your armored truck with it. Personally, I’ve have opened the door and let it hobble outside by itself; but I guess I’ve not an experienced, field trained scientist.
34. An experienced field team will park their fortress-like vehicles, designed to protect them from attack by multi-ton predators, next to the edge of a cliff.
35. Any movie character can hang by their hands for incredible lengths of time.
36. Armored trucks come equipped with glass windows, rather than bullet and impact proof Plexiglas.
37. When a window is beginning to shatter beneath your weight (because it’s made of glass), a really brilliant person will raise themselves on their hands, thus centering much of their body weight on two small points. This is much better, I guess, than wiggling slowly to the side.
38. T-Rexes looking to kill the occupants of a truck are smart enough to push it half-way over a cliff, but not smart enough to push it completely over a cliff.
39. Any movie character can hang by one hand, while supporting the weight of a whole other person with the other. Nor will the shock of the other person suddenly coming to a stop when their fall is interrupted pull them loose.
40. Excuse me. My mistake. T-Rexes are so smart that they’ll push a truck half-way over a cliff and then hide while waiting for other people to come rescue the first group.
41. An expedition’s main truck won’t contain rope, but their cars will. Also, a guy unsure about the presence of T-Rexes will run about outside while leaving his weapon in his car.
42. If you’re climbing a rope which is secured to a tree, and it comes loose, you’ll fall a bit, but can continue to climb the rope.
43. A SUV on mud can, for a surprising amount of time, hold up the weight of a massive, segmented double truck as it slips over a cliff. Plus, if you put it in gear, although it’s hydroplaning around on mud, it’ll actually begin to pull the much, much larger truck back up over the cliff edge.
44. T-Rexes are not only smart, but they’re polite. Therefore, they’ll wait until the Designated Victim (here, the technology guy) saves the morally superior Malcolm (the ‘Man should be humble in the face of Nature’ guy), Earth First Guy, and Strong Woman Scientist. The last two, of course, are responsible for this predicament, including ultimately getting Technology Guy horribly slain, but the film will in no way acknowledge this.
45. Technology Guy, surrounded by T-Rexes, will waste almost half a minute before reaching for his super-duper deadly airgun, which is sitting by his right knee. Again, this falls under Spielberg’s current “Guns are icky and won’t be used constructively” rule.
46. Joining up with the Evil Expedition, Earth First Guy righteously accuses them of coming to ‘strip-mine the place.’ Can somebody explain what he could possibly be talking about? Of course, having a radical environmentalist blow every perceived Offense against Nature (not that man-created dinos are all that ‘natural’) insanely out of proportion isn’t really that odd, now that I think of it. Still, Earth First Guy isn’t supposed to be a loon, he’s meant to speak for the filmmakers. So again, what can he possible mean?
47. Malcolm then righteously makes fun of Peter, The Evil Capitalist, for thinking that bringing mercenaries would keep him safe and enable him to complete his capture of the dinosaurs. Uh, actually, Peter’s plan was working fine, thank you, until it was sabotaged by intentional human intervention. So much for the ‘moral’ here.
48. Inherent in Douglas’ Designated Hero/Villain rule is that positions won’t be judged on their objective merit, but rather on who is advancing them. Peter’s position that they have a right to ‘exploit’ the dinos (i.e., put them on display) because his company created them is hardly insane. However, the film dismisses the argument because it’s being advanced by the Evil Capitalist. More to the point, it has the argument advanced by the Evil Capitalist so that it can be dismissed. Yet, because Earth First Guy is a hero, his causing the deaths of literally dozens of people is ignored. In other words, the film openly judges the caging of (artificially created) animals to be more of a crime than killing other humans.
49. On a side point, the first film was premised on the idea that Man & Science will never be able to control Nature. This film seems to say instead that Nature can be controlled, but just shouldn’t be.
50. The film uses the One Radio Rule™ (see the Glossary). Neither expedition has a spare radio to call for pick-up once their main one is destroyed. (More unbelievably, neither has arranged for an automatic pick-up should communications fail.) Therefore, the combined party must trek inland to locate a building containing an emergency radio.
51. The combined expedition decides that they must leave their present location. See, moving the T-Rex pup around has made the parents more territorial. So if they stay here (where the good guy’s original base was), the T-Rexes will inevitably attack them again. Therefore, they choose to trek through Velociraptor territory to reach the radio. See my problem, here? They’re in a clearing, one that they can defend. It’s bordered by a cliff, limiting the area from which an attack can come. They can create a defensive perimeter, and easily kill the two adult T-Rexes should they attack. (We’re talking at least twenty very well-armed men here.) Then they just wait until rescue comes, as it inevitably must. Instead, to escape this threat (two large, comparatively easy to kill animals attacking a defended position), they decide to travel by foot through territory containing dozens or hundreds of vicious, fast and difficult to shoot pack predators. This doesn’t make must sense to me. As an analogy, if you had a spear-gun, would you rather try to defend yourself from a shark or a school of piranhas?
52. I know it’s important to the script, but I find it hard to believe that the released dinosaurs destroyed every single one of the numerous vehicles brought by the Evil Expedition. Weren’t the larger ones armored against dino attack?
53. Dieter, Roland’s idiot second-in-command, has to ask what a Velociraptor is. Didn’t Roland brief his men on possible dangers to be found here?
54. Again, under the Designated Hero rule, when Sarah disagrees with the Expedition’s dino expert, she’s always right. By the way, she seems pretty smugly sure of her theories, given that they’re based on fossil records and such.
55. Roland, the Great White Hunter, carries his elephant gun with the barrels pointing skyward. You’d never do this. First, crap could fall out of trees and clog up the barrels, perhaps even causing the gun to explode when fired. Second, it’s pouring rain at this point, and you don’t want your barrels full of water if you can avoid it.
56. Sarah (here goes that idiot thing again), after warning people time and again that T-Rexes can follow scents for miles, continues to wear a jacket that is soaked in the blood of the baby T-Rex. This despite the fact that the blood “isn’t drying in this humidity.” (By the way, wouldn’t walking all night in drenching rains have washed the blood out of the jacket? Guess not.)
57. Roland leaves his gun unattended, despite the fact that Earth First Guy, you now, the one who sabotaged his encampment, has already attempted to mess with it.
58. Dieter, due for a gory death scene, leaves the camp to use the facilities. From all appearances, rather than going behind a nearby tree, he travels about half a mile away. (The guy he tells doesn’t hear him because he’s wearing a walk-man. Good mercenary.) Oh, Dieter goes so far afield that he gets lost and can’t find the camp. This, again, is Roland’s second-in-command.
59. Roland begins the group moving again without doing a head count, something that Boy scouts are taught to do. Therefore, no one notices that the group’s second in command is missing.
60. Roland, when they finally notice Dieter’s absence, goes to look for him. He takes two guys with him. Presumably, they are now in ‘Raptor territory. Meanwhile, the ultra-competent Roland continues to carry his elephant gun. So…a savvy hunter continues to pack a weapon designed for large, solitary animals (super powerful, limited ammo supply, slow to load, etc.,) when the current threat is packs of fast moving small predators. Roland, dude, trust me: Trade in for a semi-automatic shotgun or assault rifle.
61. Once Roland leaves, everyone refuses to obey the orders of Peter, The Evil Capitalist. For good reason, actually, because he’s an idiot. (Of course, so’s Sarah, only no one notices.) So who do they obey? Earth First Guy!! The man who caused the destruction of their camp!! Hel-loo!! So…Roland not only didn’t have a third in command, but didn’t bother to appoint a leader before leaving the group. Uh…yeah.
62. The group, with about two dozens guys at their disposal, who are presumably all professional mercenaries (what else would they be?), and who are in a locale containing man-eating predators, all go to sleep that night without establishing a watch!
63. Roland returns to camp. Explaining that they’re only a mile and a half from their destination, he decides to let everyone continue sleeping instead of pressing on.
64. A T-Rex can smell and track a bloody jacket for miles and miles, but not notice two people shivering under a blanket literally right under its snout. For, like, a minute straight. Despite the fact that you’d think you’d crap your pants when a T-Rex sticks it’s head into your tent.
65. A guy will watch a T-Rex stick its head into the tent of his girlfriend and his daughter, but not rouse any of the armed men in his camp, or grab a gun himself.
66. Many people die because Earth First Guy removed the slugs from the shells of Roland’s gun. No one ever blames him for this. Also, this is perhaps the silliest way and most awkward way to disable a gun. First, you must remove the bullets from the gun. Then you have to pry the slugs out. Then you need to put the shells back in. Luckily for EFG, though, his plan works. This is for the following reasons. First, Roland never checks his weapon (after leaving it alone with a known saboteur in camp). Second, because Roland doesn’t carry any spare shells for the gun! Instead, he switches over to a tranquilizer gun.
67. People can outrun T-Rexes, who in the first movie almost outran a moving car.
68. Scared by a snake, a professional field scientist will rush into the jaws of the T-Rex he was just trying to avoid.
69. OK, you’re trained mercenaries. You’re entering a field of tall grass in territory occupied by vicious pack predators. So you march through single file. Uh, I don’t think so. You march in a box formation, using your weapons to establish an encompassing field of fire. Had they done this, many more of them would have made it out of the grass after the inevitable ‘Raptor attack. In the most ridiculous example of Spielberg’s ‘no good gun use’ dictum, not one mercenary will even get a shot off during the attack. Meanwhile, the heroes, who aren’t even carrying weapons (and that’s Spielberg’s point, I suppose), all make it out unscathed. I’m not sure that this is what would happen in the real world.
70. Ian hurts his leg (it’s the ‘90s, so it’s not Sarah or Kelly who does this), and Sarah orders him to rest while Earth First Guy goes to find the radio. The spot where Ian, Sarah and Kelly pause appears to be less than a city block away from where the ‘Raptors ate everyone else.
71. The maintenance buildings are utterly overrun with foliage and mildew, but the circuits of all the lights, the radio, etc., function perfectly once a transformer switch is thrown.
72. When Ian, Sarah and Kelly finally arrive at the compound, they don’t bother to close, much less secure, the main gate. Despite, you know, the ‘Raptors and all.
73. Due the to Hero’s Death Battle Exemption™, Sarah becomes the only character in either film to have a ‘Raptor jump on them and escape alive. In fact, she comes away completely uninjured.
74. Ian manages to evade half a dozen ‘Raptors for minutes and minutes on end while hobbling around on a hurt leg.
75. In a shed surrounded by ‘Raptors, Sarah and Kelly never grab the available heavy tools (there’s a huge steel wretch that must weigh twenty pounds just hanging there on the wall) to beat on the beasts as they awkwardly attempt to dig their way in. Why? Because Good Guys don’t use weapons in this universe.
76. Kelly distracts some ‘Raptors with, that’s right, gymnastics. Boy, I didn’t see that coming.
77. Of the two expeditions on the island, including a few dozen well armed and trained mercenaries, only Ian, Sarah, Kelly, Earth First Guy, Roland and Peter make it off alive. Peter makes it because, as the main Bad Guy, he can’t get killed until the end of the movie. Roland, having tranquilized a T-Rex, gives up hunting, so he gets to live. Meanwhile, our four Designated Heroes (i.e., the ones with the most meager survival skills and complete lack of weaponry), of course, all make it off.
78. Just in case we didn’t ‘get’ it, Earth First Guy makes a point of pulling the slugs from Roland’s gun out of his pocket. With this he leaves the film, and, typically, no one points out that the slugs are ironclad evidence that he’s guilty of Negligent Homicide, or, most generously, Depraved Indifference.
79. Peter the Evil Capitalist, who I guess doesn’t have a PR staff of any sort, holds a dockside Press Conference before the T-Rex is secured in San Diego. Meanwhile, there appear to be perhaps a few dozen reporters and almost no TV cameras amongst the Press contingent. In other words, the Press Conference is both too small and too large at the same time.
80. Peter has Ian and Sarah brought into the shipyard where they could, if they wished, harangue the Press with their opposition to his operation. Conveniently, though, it permits them to be on hand when the ship bearing the T-Rex rams into the pier.
81. OK, this is the part of the film that no one understands. It’s messy beyond belief. What happens is that the ship bringing the T-Rex smashes into the dock. None of the ship’s crew, which should be at least a dozen guys, is found alive. Oddest is that there’s a dismembered hand hanging from the wheel on the bridge. This is odd because the doorways to the bridge are both undamaged and too small for the T-Rex’s head to fit through. Certainly some of the crew, in a worst case scenario, would have barricaded themselves somewhere for safety’s sake. After all, how many areas of a ship could a fully grown T-Rex have accessed? Then there’s the extremely weird fact that the T-Rex is found by the investigators locked in the hold. So…I guess that the T-Rex escaped and killed everybody but one, who was fatally wounded. Then, the T-Rex re-entered the enclosed space in which it had been imprisoned. Finally, the fatally wounded guy managed to close the hydraulic hold doors that sealed in the dinosaur before expiring. Yeah, that’s the ticket. (I’ve heard some argue that perhaps ‘Raptors got on board. [See Ken and Andrew’s Rule of Plot Holes™.] However, nothing else in the film indicates this, and besides, even laymen should be able to spot the difference in wounds caused by a two-meter creature and a ten-meter creature, and nobody says anything like that.)
82. Sarah and Ian plot to capture the T-Rex is such a fashion so as to enable them to return it to the island. To achieve this, they plan to trap it when it comes to get the T-Rex pup, which has been flown directly to the zoo facility where the T-Rex was to be displayed. My problem is why no one else seems to be doing anything to stop the T-Rex. Why don’t the police shoot it down? (You’d think that this thing would draw police attention pretty quickly. Especially given all the reporters on hand when it escaped.) Also, since the T-Rex is likely headed for the zoo, why don’t Peter’s men kick Sarah and Ian off the grounds and just contain it there when it arrives? This is where they meant to keep it, so they must have plenty of equipment on hand.
83. However, no one thinks to stop them at the mysteriously almost deserted facility. (Shouldn’t there have been hundreds of people called in once the dino’s imminent arrival was known?) Meanwhile, Our Heroes’ plan again puts the interests of the T-Rex above the safety of humans. Should luring it back to the ship really be their one and only priority?
84. Malcolm, sitting in his car with the Sarah and the pup, tells a guard that the only way to stop them from stealing the T-Rex baby is to shoot and kill them. Apparently, blowing out the tires of his currently non-moving automobile so that he can’t leave just isn’t done.
85. I don’t want to harp on this. Still, when Ian and Sarah finally locate the adult T-Rex, there’s absolutely no indication of any police presence, not even sirens in the background. Considering that Ian & Sarah have had enough time to drive to the zoo, kidnap Jr., and then drive around and find the T-Rex, I think we have to assume that its rampage has been going on for some time. Why is this thing still alive?
86. Maybe thirty feet from the T-Rex, Malcolm notes that it will never notice Jr., if it doesn’t start making some noise (Jr.’s tranquilized). What about that omnipotent sense of smell we’ve heard about throughout the picture? For heaven’s sake, the pup is right under its nose, practically.
87. When five or six police cars show up and spot the T-Rex, they all turn around and drive off. I really have to believe that if multiple officers (at least 10, assuming two to a car) jump out and open fire with pistols and riot shotguns, the T-Rex would go down right quick.
88. Jr., who’s refused to harm the ‘good’ guys throughout the film, makes its first kill by munching on Peter, the Evil Capitalist. Wow. The very thing that he sought to exploit proved to be his destruction. How, uh, ironic. And so original, to boot. To make the scene even more nauseating, it’s actually played as ‘cute,’ with Pop T-Rex looking on with parental pride as Jr., makes his first kill. Ah, they grow up so fast, don’t they? And I’m not kidding, this bit is played like one of those cartoons where Momma Bird beams with joy when Sonny leaves the nest for the first time.
89. Meanwhile, as a side issue, it seems strange that the ship from which the T-Rex escaped (and which Ian and Sarah have it back to) isn’t swarming with police, the press, and customs officials by now.
90. Apparently the authorities, who finally appear after everything is wrapped up, agree not to destroy the beasts or to keep them for scientific examination. Instead, they (I guess) all agree that the Rexes should indeed be shipped back to their island. We see news coverage of the trip back. The cargo ship with the dinos is surrounded by what appears to be a convoy of Naval warships. “They’re taking no chances of a repeat of the San Diego incident,” a CNN reporter notes. Uh, so if the Rex breaks free, jumps ship and tries to swim back to the Mainland, I guess that our assembled destroyers and battleships will bombard it with their sixteen inch guns and sink it. Is that the plan?
91. We also see an ‘interview’ with John Hammond, noting that he hopes that all nations will allow the dinosaurs to remain isolated on their island. Yeah, right! Yes, I’m sure that everyone’s pretty much going to say, “Let’s forget that the dinosaurs are even there, and just leave them alone.” Uh-huh. Sure.

The film ends, appropriately, with another headache inducing moment. We fade out on a shot of a Pterodactyl. Oops, something that can leave the island at will. Can you say…Jurassic Park III? Be afraid. Be very afraid.