'Battle at Big Rock' Stirs Some Excitement for the Third 'Jurassic World' Movie

It has long been announced that Colin Trevorrow is back at the director’s chair for the third installment of the Jurassic World series (he directed the first one; J.A. Bayona did the second one).  But even though that movie is slated for a 2021 release, we won’t have to wait until then to see a new Colin Trevorrow-directed Jurassic World film – granted, it’s only an 8-minute-long short film.

The short is titled Battle at Big Rock, and is set a year after the events of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, which ended with the dinosaurs getting released into the world.  It centers on a newly formed family of five that still hasn’t fully adjusted with each other yet.  In an attempt to bond, they take a campervan into Big Rock National Park.  One night, they become witness to a battle between a family of Nasutoceratops and an Allosaurus.  But when the Allosaurus shifts its focus toward them, they find themselves being the ones fighting for survival.

From that synopsis alone, we can tell that it has more depth than Fallen Kingdom.  Bringing a family with issues closer together after experiencing a dinosaur ordeal has always been a major trope with the original Jurassic Park trilogy, and Battle at Big Rock nailed it well.  In fact, it’s as if this short is teasing that, even though its stakes are potentially going to be the highest they’ve ever been in this franchise, Jurassic World 3 is going to be a “back to basics” of sorts.  After all, the short film‘s “dinosaur attacking a campervan” aspect is also reminiscent of that iconic scene in The Lost World: Jurassic Park (a film which, for the record, I love as much as the original).

But what I enjoyed most about Battle at Big Rock (and what gave me some cause for excitement for Jurassic World 3) were the end credits scenes, which were “found footage”-type clips of various human encounters of the now at large dinosaurs (one of which was a horrific yet hilarious footage of a little girl being terrorized by a group of Compsognathus – another callback to a scene in The Lost World).  Seriously, if we can overlook the plot hole of why the US military hasn’t eliminated these dinosaurs yet, the idea of dinosaurs overrunning human settlements should make for an intriguing premise.

In the end, Battle at Big Rock is fun but unnecessary.  With the third installment still two years away, it seems to me that it’s still too early to create buzz for it.  And it’s not that this franchise needs to win back goodwill.  Yes, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom was hilariously dumb.  But it’s not like it killed the franchise – it still grossed over a billion dollars regardless of its mediocre quality.  Surely, there’s no reason to believe Jurassic World 3 won’t sell tickets.  Moviegoers love them dinos.