Fridge / Jurassic World

Fridge Brilliance:

• Claire's response to Owen: Claire's response to Owen regarding him not being in control isn't Fridge Brilliance, rather Owen's coolness under pressure is. Owen is ex-Navy and thus has a greater grasp of the situation. Ex-navy (I.E ex military). Claire had no control in the first place. She disregarded a Veteran's advice, dooming herself, the park and everyone else. Her response of "You are not in control here" despite her shaking like a jellyfish, shows that while she puts on an air of confidence, she's really not cut out for running the park. Had she listened to Owen, the movie would've ended far differently.
• Tame raptors:
  • Owen riding along side the raptors seems awesome, but may turn a few heads. However, it's a Call-Back from a line said by John Hammond in the first movie. "They imprint on the first creature they come into contact with. It helps them to trust me." Owen clearly ran with that and made sure that he was present for the birth of every raptor, which in turn means that technically he's their father-figure. (He even says as much to Claire.) Maybe more than that, the very act of riding with them like that may help to cement his status as part of the pack. It's said on this very site that he hunts with them, and riding a bike like that is probably the only way a human can keep up with raptors. He's integrated himself into their pack dynamic as best as a human can. It also brings to mind the point Ian Malcolm brought up in The Lost World novel that intelligent animals such as raptors need to raise their young for them to pick up non-instinctual habits; the reason the raptors portrayed in all previous Jurassic Park material have been so overwhelmingly vicious is because they had no proper upbringing to teach them to behave otherwise.
    • In fact, it was already foreshadowed in Jurassic Park III that raptors raised by parental figures can be relatively more docile, since the raptor pack in that film was only motivated by retrieving the eggs Billy Brennan stole from their nesting grounds and was possibly raised from birth by a preceding generation of raptors.
  • Owen's raptor training also provides extra enforcement for what the Jurassic Park films have been saying about the dinosaurs for three films. Instead of being shown as monsters, JP has tried to give them the presence of animals, if sometimes vicious predators. Owen shows that even the raptors can be tamed enough to interact with a human given time and care, just like most modern predatory animals. At the same time, the fact that they're dangerous is never downplayed. If you think about it, it's a brilliant balancing act.
  • Owen's raising of the raptors is also a Call-Back to the first book. A six-week-old Velociraptor is shown to Dr. Grant and Tim early on by Dr. Wu, who says that she's friendly, playful, and craves close body contact. The baby raptor's even shown to be capable of playing with toys and distinguishing between caretakers who are kind to her and those who are not, although the predatory instincts are definitely still there. Now, if you slot an imprinted, hands-on, and very dedicated caretaker like Owen into the picture, then it isn't quite so surprising that he'd be able to establish a strong, long-term bond with his own (far more avian) raptors.
  • It also works as a Fridge Brilliance case of Shown Their Work, as people who work with large predators tend to start shortly after birth, interact with them a lot, treat them with cautious respect, and, when the baby predator grows up, interact with each other through a barrier. Because, as they know, even if you believe you have this animal under control, it can still hurt or kill you with ease should it ever decide to or if it feels scared.
  • Proof that a fearsome bipedal-running therapod capable of killing humans with its deadly hind talons can be trained.

• T. rex:
  • The T. rex being the one from the first movie can also be seen as a form of Fridge Brilliance in regards to her age. In Real Life, Tyrannosaurus is believed to have only had an average lifespan of around 28 years. Now, if we assume she was cloned in 1993 (when the first movie came out), she would be around 21 years old (as of 2014) making her quite elderly as far as Tyrannosaurs go. OK, now take into consideration that she has been raised in captivity and (apart from the raptor attacks in the first movie) likely wouldn't have endured the harsh lifestyle a T. rex would normally go through. This means that it's likely that T. rex would possibly live longer in captivity than in the wild, something that is true of many Real Life animals.
  • Likewise, it seems that she is the only T. rex in the exhibit. Why? Well, let's think about it. At her age, she's probably no longer able to breed and therefore probably wouldn't have much interest in a mate. Likewise, even if she could produce young, it would likely be far too dangerous for the park staff to allow her to do so. After all, The Lost World: Jurassic Park showed that T. rex are very protective of their young.

• Names and feeding:
  • Since the codenames of the raptors are Blue, Charlie, Delta, and Echo, that seems to indicate there's an Alpha, which is revealed to be Owen himself. It's likely that Owen deliberately avoided using that name to prevent confusion when he documented their pack structure, which would also use the term "alpha" in its ethological sense.
  • When Owen feeds the raptors, he starts off with Charlie and then eventually works his way up to Blue. Why is Blue fed last? Because she is the pack's beta and most dominant member, so Owen needs to establish that as the alpha, he can feed them in whatever order he chooses and she needs to remember this. Charlie is the youngest and most subservient, so Owen starts with her and then continues up the ranks, which keeps the raptors from losing respect in his alpha position.
  • He also gives Blue the largest rat, rewarding her for being patient and still showing respect for her position in the pack. Another delicate balancing act masterfully handled.

• Despite being a former soldier, Hoskins is overweight. He keeps ranting about perfect predators, but he himself isn't one despite what he might think about himself, just another indication of how he doesn't get it.
  • Unfortunately, that's also potentially a case of reality appearing unrealistic. Lots of former soldiers do gain weight after returning to civilian life because they don't/can't keep up the high level of daily physical exertion that their bodies had grown used to while in the military. And similarly, their bodies are accustomed to a large amount of food with equally large amounts of activity to warrant it.

• A subtle bit of costuming is used to create some interesting characterization early on. In the very first scene with Hoskins and Owen, we see that both characters carry hunting knives on their backs. The difference, however, is that Hoskins has his strapped perpendicular to his belt, with the handle pointed upward. It would be rather difficult to draw the weapon effectively this way (and downright impossible if, say, his back were to a wall). By contrast, Owen has his strapped parallel to his belt, where he can draw the blade quickly from a myriad of positions. This illustrates the contrast between the two: Hoskins is an "armchair" badass, pretending to have a warrior's understanding, while Owen is the one with actual, practical experience.

• When Owen is called to the I. rex containment facility to aid in investigating her disappearance, he asks Claire what kind of DNA has been used in her creation. Her nonchalant response is simply "that's classified". In real life, having access to classified information requires: 1) the appropriate security clearance and 2) a need to know said classified information. If Owen is being asked to help look for the I. rex, that classified information would come in very handy, so why did Claire deny him that information? Remember that her job entails turning a profit and keeping shareholders happy — one doesn't necessarily need to know the genetic composition of an animal to do that. Claire simply didn't know, either, and her response was simply a poorly-strung PR effort.

• Why would visitors be allowed near ''Apatosaurus'' and why do they have a low aggression index? Like all creatures in Jurassic Park, they were genetically engineered to meet the expectations of the visitors and avert the violent territorial tendencies herbivores have.
  • They may also have been mildly sedated, or even genetically engineered to have hypothyroidism or another metabolic condition that keeps them sluggish.

• Indominus rex:
  • Also adds a bit of Fridge Horror — assuming that this is an animal with near-human intelligence and a complex psychology, it makes you wonder how much control she really has over her drive to kill. Is she truly a sadistic predator, or is she all just instinct? The idea that the Indominus is killing even when she doesn't want to potentially makes her whole situation a Tear Jerker.
  • The fact that she's highly intelligent also adds some Fridge Brilliance to some of her interactions with some of the park's other animals. At one point in the trailers, she's seen roaring at the pterosaurs in the aviary instead of attacking them, possibly with the intent of setting them on the rest of the park. When the boys are being attacked by two Ankylosaurus, she can be seen keeping up with their pace rather than actively trying to catch up with them, as if she was trying to deliberately frighten them off. It's very possible that she's using the other animals to aid her rampage. It even brings to mind the possibility that she had been planning some kind of attack long before her escape. We already know that she intentionally took out her tracker.
  • Her escape plan makes a lot more sense if you think about it. The claw marks are right next to the console that opens the big gate that she can fit through. There have been people in her paddock before and she probably saw them use the one next to the small door and made the connection. She waited until there were multiple people checking the wall to attack, probably hoping at least one of them would choose the closest exit to escape. As to why she hid her heat signature, she can sense thermal radiation and probably assumed that humans could do that too.
  • Comments and reviews have made mention of the fact that I. rex's camouflage ability basically occurs in one scene during her fight with the ACU team and is never shown again. This actually makes sense as most animals use camouflage to hide from predators and she uses it early in her escape, when being hunted by the ACU team while she is still learning about her surroundings. At one point, Owen comments how the I. rex is discovering her position in the food chain. After I. rex decimates the ACU team and works her way south, essentially slaughtering everything in her path, it would become apparent to her that she's at the top of the food chain, an apex predator, and has no need for camouflage anymore.
  • After escaping her paddock, I. rex clearly knows Owen is still present, even if he doused himself in gasoline to hide his scent. Why didn't she knock the vehicle he was hiding under out of the way to get at him, similar to the truck from just before? He was under the crane, which Owen pointed out as "the only positive relationship" the I. rex has, and she was reluctant to hurt/destroy it.
    • Alternatively, she couldn't sense him because of where they are: not the crane, but Central America in general. It's easy to forget watching the movie how blisteringly hot it's supposed to be on Isla Nublar, plus the fact that, unlike the other films, Jurassic World has clear skies throughout the entire story. That means the sun was shining down on all that gravel, probably just enough to hide Owen's body temperature compared to the rest of the environment.
  • Aside from her human-like intelligence and predatory instincts, the I. rex has one notable advantage over a regular T. rex... her arms. Unlike T. rex, dinosaurs that have very short arms, the I. rex's arms are much longer, allowing her to reach farther and even manipulate objects. The movie might have been over immediately if her arms had been short enough that she couldn't reach up to her mouth and tear off the net that the Asset Containment Unit team shot onto her, but she was able to get it off and thus wipe out the team, rather than just causing a few casualties while she thrashed around.
  • Owen finds out a little late that the I. Rex has raptor DNA, when the raptors accept her as a new Alpha. Why was the military so eager to see that raptors could be trained? Screw using those little girls as soldiers - they wanted to be able to breed and train some I. Rexes...

• In the novel, one of the scientists criticizes the park for making the kinds of dinosaurs people were expecting, because they were more concerned with spectacle than scientific accuracy. They could never confirm exactly what the original animals looked like. In fact, the entire reason they made dangerous carnivores instead of just sticking to docile herbivores is because the public expects a classic "T. rex" — and popular culture for decades didn't think dinosaurs had feathers. In-universe, the park itself may be so famous that ticket-buyers (just like the movie-going audience), have come to think of this as what dinosaurs "should" look like. This neatly ties into the film's explanation of why the dinosaurs look the way they do; the higher-ups believed that the public didn't want realistic dinosaurs, they wanted cool dinosaurs, so naturally, the geneticists went over-the-top and disregarded scientific accuracy. Dr. Wu even lampshades this.

• The petting zoo:
  • A petting zoo with baby dinosaurs is a case of Fridge Brilliance. Letting kids play with dinosaurs up-close and personal? Stupid, right? Actually, no — brilliant. Letting the guests play with the dinosaurs can help assure them that they're safe (of course, before that whole I. rex business ruins everything), and if the dinosaurs are playing with humans as babies, they're much less likely to be hostile towards them as adults.
  • This also helps explain why so many herbivores like the Apatosaurus are so docile around humans when many herbivores in real life are violently territorial, because they've been conditioned by regular interaction with humans from an early age to not consider humans as a threat to either themselves or their territory.
  • Even better than that, they've got multiple species sharing the petting paddock — baby sauropods, Gallimimus hatchlings, young ceratopsians with their stub-horns capped for safety — with the human children as just another species in the crowd. To the animals, it's a mixed herd, not a zoo attraction: a gathering of different herbivores that don't compete for the same plant parts, but can benefit from one another's respective keen senses on the alert for predators. It is no different from how giraffes, guinea fowl, zebras, and wildebeest all hang around together in real life. Having humans around may make the petting-zoo dinosaurs feel safer in humans' presence than in their absence, if they grow up herding together.
  • It's revealed that one of the reasons why the I. rex turned out to be a complete sociopath is because she was kept in isolation and had no contact with anyone or thing. Even her sibling, whom she later ate, was created quite some time after the I. rex's birth. Modern zoos are well-aware that raising any animal in total isolation will result in highly aggressive, anti-social behavior towards both humans and other animals. In contrast, Owen has intentionally averted this issue by raising his imprinted raptors as a Sibling Team and constantly interacting with them on a daily basis. So, a petting zoo of non-carnivorous baby dinosaurs? Pretty good idea, actually.
    • Actually, the two I. rexes are born at the same time; they're the dinosaurs shown hatching in the first scene. It's never said when the I. rex eats its sibling though, so it could have eaten it 30 seconds after the scene ended, meaning the I. rex spent its whole life in self-imposed isolation.

• Jurassic World becoming outdated:
  • In the trailer, they revealed that the audience is tired of seeing the same old dinosaurs, so they created new dinosaurs. It's a perfect of description of the Jurassic Park films in a meta sense — in 1993, we were amazed by the breakthroughs in special effects, but now we're only impressed when something's bigger and louder. Not only that, but considering the latest two depictions of dinosaurs in media (one movie and one TV show, both featuring transforming robot dinosaurs), of course the audience would like to see something that would top those.
    • Jurassic Park actually foreshadows this in a Freeze-Frame Bonus moment. The driver who takes Alan, Ellie, and Ian to see the Brachiosaurus is the only one who doesn't react to the sight of it. One might argue he even looks bored. He must've seen the Brachiosaurus and other dinosaurs enough times that the wonder and novelty of it had worn off on him by that point.
  • The whole film could be seen as a Take That! towards animal-based fads and various attempts to cash in on them. Remember when penguins, wolves, or horses (just to name a few examples) were popular? There were all sorts of merchandise for one particular animal until the next fad came along. The same could be said for the in-universe park. People are losing interest in the "dino-fad" and so the developers of the park are attempting to Win Back the Crowd with a brand-new never-before-seen super predatory dinosaur. Rather than trying to renew interest in the creatures they have, Jurassic World scientists simply go on to create the "next big thing". Which, as one could guess, can be compared to how Hollywood and other companies move onto finding the next fad to cash in on once the old one has run its course.

• The website has a "review" implying why the dinosaurs lacked feathers.

• Some people wonder why the raptors still follow Owen in the end. Take note that despite the firefight happening early in the movie, Owen didn't once shoot the raptors directly. When Barry was being hunted in the log, instead of shooting the raptor, Owen chose to distract and lure her away instead. Papa Wolf, indeed.

• Barry was prepared to shoot Blue but didn't, first trying to get her to recognize him, which she did. Even if Blue didn't consider Barry part of the pack, she knew his voice and knew he was not only kind to them but also Owen's friend.

• Pronouns:
  • There is actually something clever about the characters varying pronouns about the Indominus rex. At the beginning, Claire (who is distant from the 'ground floor' of the park) and Wu (who considers his job done when the creature is out of the lab) call Indominus an 'it', Owen (who has field experience with many of the animals, and thus immediately sees flaws in the Indominus's solitary treatment) calls Indominus a 'her' and Hoskins (who just sees a monster to unleash for military purposes) calls Indominus a 'him', because the concept of warfare is inherently masculine, according to him. Almost all of them change to 'it' after it's clear that the I. rex is a malicious and sadistic monster.
  • In a similar vein, Hoskins also refers to the raptors as 'boys' or a 'he' on several occasions. When he does this to Delta, Barry informs him that the raptor is a 'she' and makes it clear that he should refer to her as such. Later, when Delta has Hoskins cornered and begging for his life in the Creation Laboratory, he calls her a 'Good boy' when she appears to be backing down. It doesn't end well for him. So, when all is said and done, the hyper-masculine Hoskins is killed by the female raptor who he's been misgendering for the whole film. Doubles as some Fridge Horror. Hoskins is an InGen Security big shot, and he isn't even familiar with the park's most basic security measure, population control?

• Hoskins mentions that the downside of drones is that the enemy could hack them. Indominus rex did the biological equivalent to the raptors.

• Owen says if anybody put 12 amps into the raptors, they'd never trust him again. He was wrong. Zach and Gray shock one of them when they're trying to escape during the raptors' Face–Heel Turn, but they come back around in the end. Though admittedly, Owen isn't present at that particular moment.
  • Zach and Gray shocked the raptor with a cattle prod, which usually has about 5 amps, give or take. Owen was referring to the taser rifles when he told the rangers not to put 12 amps into the raptors.
  • Owen may have specifically meant that if the raptors got tased (which hurts a lot) while they were already hesitating on his orders, they'd never trust him again. The pack would've seen it as betrayal, i.e. as Owen deliberately keeping them there so they could be shot. Getting tased when Owen's nowhere nearby would give them no cause to hold it against him, although I wouldn't want to be Zack or Gray if Blue should come across either one of them in a dark jungle...

• Rexes:
  • Of course, Rexy was going to take a beating from the I. rex initially — but not simply because it was engineered to be superior; the old girl might still have her tenacity — but as noted before, she's also had it relatively easy. Depending on how much hunting she's actually allowed when she's not being fed goats for show means she may well be out of practice. The lifestyle that allowed her get to her older age in relative safety also means a lifestyle without the constant danger and combat that would keep her in top form, the I. rex is probably the first theropod at her level (so to speak) that she's probably ever seen. Once she's forced into honest combat again, she'd naturally need some time to get back into the game. Notice that when she gets her second wind, she fights in far better form than she did initially. Oh, and having a raptor buddy as a constant distraction helps, too.
  • In conjunction, Rexy and many other dinosaurs are shown to be formidable against I. rex at least at the outset because they have practiced fighting in actual survival situations or playing. Indominus has no idea what any creature she is attacking is actually capable of and relies on her intelligence and strength to win. Subtly foreshadowed when I. rex attacks the Ankylosaurus. She tries biting its well armored back a few times, realizes "okay, that doesn't work" then starts clawing at. Then I. rex basically gets lucky, clawing a huge gash on one leg which lets her flip the Ankylosaur over. But then, instead of going for the completely unprotected underbelly, I. rex just bites the Ankylosaur's head off. I. rex doesn't have any real idea what it's doing, it's just figuring things out as it goes.
  • Also, Rexy didn't spend her whole life in a cage. After the original park shut down, the animals were left to fend for themselves for quite some time. Not only did Rexy kill the raptors, but she must have spent a few years on the island hunting other dinosaurs and some of them like the Triceratops could fight back. Therefore, she had far more fighting experience than the Indominus rex, which only spent a day out of its paddock.
  • It's clear from her behavior that Rexy changed tactics midway through the fight. At first, her intent was simply to just drive the I. rex away from her territory, so her actions were more showboating and threat displays, not actual defense. Once the I. rex makes it clear that it's actively trying to kill her (and almost does), Rexy switches to alpha predator mode, and her subsequent tactics demonstrate this; she fully goes on the offensive, relentlessly grabbing the I.rex's head with her strong jaws (in essence using the I.rex's earlier strategy against it) and throwing it around, giving it no time to recover and use its larger front claws, and constantly rams the I.rex to throw it off balance and disorient it. This along with help from Blue catch the predator off guard and weaken it considerably; by the time the Mosasaurus grabs it, the I.rex is bloodied and injured, giving one last defiant roar before being snatched up and dragged into the depths.
  • Once Rexy goes full attack, a glaring flaw in the I.rex is also revealed; while she was intimidating and powerful, she was used to attacking creatures that had little chance of stopping her (essentially being an offensive powerhouse) and had no actual combat tactics, while Rexy did. Once the advantage was opened up by Blue (which served to distract the I.rex) Rexy went all in and overpowered the I.rex, putting it on the defensive and leaving it unable to adapt to being on the backfoot, which ultimately led to its demise.
  • Another thing to note, for all of everyone stating that the Indominus had all of Rexy's strength on top of her other enhancements it should be noted that her skull is sleeker and overall less solidly built than a T. rex's which would most likely translate into the Indominus actually having a weaker bite force and not being able to use her skull in a battering ram like fashion as we've seen the T. rex's in the previous movies and Rexy after Blue joins the battle. Notice how during the opening fight when both Rexie and the Indominus try the same lunge and bite move Rexy actually overpowers the Indominus and draws First Blood. Likewise, during the initial stages of the fight the Indominus was actually losing due to her fighting in a similar to fashion to Rexy (e.g. trying to bite and ram her opponent using her head) and it wasn't until she began actively using her longer arms to claw and physically hold Rexy's jaws away from her that she gets the advantage.
• Rexy is pretty beaten up by the end of the fight with the I. rex, and probably tired since she isn't as young as she once was and this is the first time she's had to fight with another dino in a long time. She doesn't want another fight just then if she doesn't need to, so it makes sense that she would leave to go lick her wounds and recuperate rather than try to engage Blue, who likewise is not stupid enough to pick a fight with a larger predator for no reason.
• Blue comes to after being knocked out by the I. rex to find her pack sisters, who she has known all her life and who are under her protection as beta, killed by the I. rex. The raptors' relationship with Owen already shows that they're empathic enough to bond with and respect an individual of another species that would usually be seen as prey, so the emotional bond between the raptors themselves is likely to be even stronger. With her sisters dead and Owen in immediate danger, it's not surprising that Blue would go against her own survival instincts to launch a potentially suicidal attack on the I. rex, which coincidentally comes at just the right moment to save Rexy. This is also a Continuity Nod, as the Big One in the first film launched a similar attack on Rexy when she killed one of the other raptors. Could also be an indication that raptors are ferociously, even suicidally, loyal to their packmembers. No one takes down a raptor in a pack and gets away with it, if the other raptors have anything to say about it.
• When Hoskins uses finger-snapping to (poorly) imitate Owen's clicker-commands, he doesn't give the "I am your alpha" sign. He gives the "prepare to be fed" sign.
• When it's revealed that the I. rex has raptor genes, Hoskins' borderline obsession with Owen's raptor-taming program makes even more sense. If a person could successfully tame a raptor, then the same techniques could possibly be used to tame a miniature I. rex as well.
• The T. rex was already fed, which is why she didn't attack Claire. T. rex 's are extremely territorial, and the aggressive I. rex attacking first only made her more territorial.
• Hoskins' idea of breeding the raptors to use as weapons would probably have worked given InGen's understanding of genetics and the Velociraptors growth rate. They could have had a domesticated breed of raptors relatively quickly, easily within Hoskins' lifetime. His mistake was thinking he could take a pack of undomesticated raptors and use them in the same manner. The fridge? He only thought that because of the undomesticated wolf he raised, and it probably never occurred to him that grey wolf species evolved alongside humans long enough that they are more closely related to dogs than to any other wild cannid. Yes, they're still wild animals, but they're not really that difficult to tame, especially compared to a raptor.
• Betrayal:
  • From an animal behavior perspective, the supposedly blatant betrayal of the raptors is a bit more complex than the average viewer may realize. When the first betrayal happens, the control room shows that all the raptors looked back at Owen as soon as the I. rex started communicating with them. A strange newcomer has just shown up and is attempting to declare itself the new alpha, so the sisters were looking to their current alpha for guidance and to see what he'd do in response. Unfortunately, before Owen can do anything besides curse this sudden escalation, the InGen soldiers open fire, all but forcing the raptors to side with the alpha who's not hurting them: the I. rex. Earlier in the paddock, it's shown that Owen has never used violent means against the raptors before, so this was probably a huge shock and betrayal to them. He also doesn't shoot at them during the firefight or subsequent scenes, either; he just distracts and lures them away from other people. And later on, when Owen stands his ground against the I. rex and removes Blue's harness, the raptors side with their imprinted alpha, who has cared for them since birth and never hurt or threatened them like the I. rex has just done. All of this is typical and unsurprising pack behavior.
  • Two other things to add to this: 1) When the I. rex tries to assume control of the pack, they all turn to look at Owen, who does not react. Owen has been challenged for dominance and did not meet the challenge and as such, he has forfeited his place as Alpha to the I. rex. 2) After siding with the I. rex, the pack is then abandoned by her as soon as she's injured by a hit. Once the pack switches allegiance back to Owen, he fights alongside them. As intelligent pack hunters, they know that siding with a reliable, loyal leader is better for the pack than one who abandons them for her own convenience. I. rex proved herself unworthy.
  • The raptors attack the special ops guys but don't go after Owen, and they only attack after the ops guys have started firing weapons in their direction. They aren't really siding with the I. rex so much as reacting to a perceived attack by strange humans they don't really like. They still see Owen as their alpha but the situation is so confused with all the weapons fire and everyone, human and raptor alike, going on the defensive and Owen effectively separated from the pack they aren't able to look to him for direction. It's only at the end that the raptor pack sees Owen and I. rex interact and realise that their alpha and the big new raptor are not friends and they follow their alpha's example and become hostile to the I. rex.
  • Blue also stops attacking Barry when he calls her name. She recognizes him as a fellow member of Owen's pack and not one of the special ops group.
• Why did the Pteranodons start diving into the water and attacking Zara even more ferociously than they were already after dropping her in the Mosasaurus tank? Because she started moving around in the water and Pteranodons are fish-eaters, making it very possible that some of the ones flying over the tank may have mistaken her for a fish. Further implied by the way the Pteranodon was manipulating Zara in her beak when she got a hold of her. She dips Zara in the water repeatedly and appears to be trying to shake her around. Many fish-eating birds (like what this seagull is doing to an unfortunate duckling) employ similar tactics to incapacitate their prey before eating it.
• When it was shown that the Indominus had killed a small group of Apatosaurus, I was in disbelief because in reality taking on a large sauropod alone would have been suicide, but then I realized two things. One, these animals have never faced a predator before and likely wouldn't know how to react to one and two, the Indominus has both abelisaur and carnosaur DNA in it, two groups of predators that evolved specifically to hunt sauropods. This can also be seen in the way she killed them. If you look closely all of them have deep claw marks on them, but no bite marks. It's been theorized that the most effective way to kill sauropods was to cause deep cuts into their flanks and allow them to bleed out, so instead of using her crushing jaws like in her fight with the Ankylosaurus she used her sharp claws to cut deep gashes. This also explains why Owen and Claire find one still alive. It was bleeding out.
• Doubles as a Rewatch Bonus; during the Main Street attack, there's a blink-and-you-miss-it shot of Zach looking shocked and motioning for Gray to duck. Zara scolds him for it, only to be carried off by the Pteranodon immediately afterward. Zach saw the Pteranodon coming and ducked (taking his brother with him) to avoid getting captured while poor Zara Failed a Spot Check and paid dearly for it.
• At the same time there was a snapping Dimorphodon right next to where Zach And Gray were hunkering down and maybe Zara was trying to warn them about that; the only reason it didn't attack the boys was because the incoming Pteranodon distracted/startled it.
• On the subject of Dimorphodons, Claire's reaction to the one attacking Owen could be considered a bit over the top; she whacks it in the head and then empties a full clip from Owen's gun into it, where just the knock on the head and maybe 1-2 shots would have done the trick. Her relationship to Owen was close, but nowhere near the usual level that would warrant that kind of reaction. Why the overkill? The simplest answer is this; Claire doesn't know how to operate a gun. One of the things they discourage military trainees from doing is keeping the trigger on the gun pulled until it runs out of ammunition.
• There's an extra brilliant layer as to why the I. rex met her defeat at the hands of Rexy and Blue: Her entire life in solitary captivity meant she also didn't understand the importance of teamwork.
• There's been a lot said about Claire's heels, but there's something very appropriate (and probably unintended) about the manager of a dinosaur park wearing them. High heels elevate the wearer's ankle and leave the toes the only part of the foot in contact with the ground... the same kind of foot structure as a theropod.
• What's the memetic line from the first movie associated with raptors? "Clever girl." What does Hoskins do when confronted with a raptor? He tries calling it a "good boy". Parallels the first film and makes Hoskins look even lamer!
• I. rex and Big One conditions:
  • Combined with Fridge Horror, notice the Indominus rex's living conditions: paddock too small, fed only via crane because she attacked the feeders, killed her companion, and makes multiple attempts to escape or at least test her surroundings. Now, rewatch the first film. The Big One had the exact same conditions! Epic foreshadowing right there.
  • Even more troubling is that Hoskins and Dr. Wu likely knew all about The Big One and the psychological issues she had. Dr. Wu was behind her creation in the original park, so he would have been familiar with the first batch of raptors and personally read any reports that Muldoon filed on them. Now, contrast the original raptors' upbringing with Owen's four imprinted raptors, who have been hand-reared together since birth, given lots of enrichment and social interaction, a large and spacious enclosure, and constant attention from Owen, who functions both as a Parental Substitute and pack alpha.^note  It's speculated and pretty much confirmed by Grant in the first novel and by Malcolm in The Lost World that a significant portion of the original Isla Nublar and Isla Sorna raptors' psychopathic issues stem from them not having parents to teach them proper socialization and pack behavior, which resulted in them acting purely on instinct. Dr. Wu has witnessed the differences in upbringing that both sets of raptors have gone through, and yet he decided to raise the I. rex in the exact same manner as the originals. He knew exactly what he was doing through the whole process.
• Raptors mirroring Owen:
  • Blue's hostility to Hoskins isn't just motivated by how he acts towards her. She's picking up on Owen's, her Alpha, and Hoskins' mutual dislike for one another. The same likely applies to Delta, who has an obvious vendetta against Hoskins from the moment she first spots him near Owen. If the raptors learned to read Owen's body language (practically necessary for them to follow his commands as alpha), they can likely see that he interacts with Hoskins much differently than with the "friendly" handlers working with them. His body language essentially cues them to think of this person as a stranger and threat, not as a new "friend." It could also be possible that they would pick up on changes in Owen's mood through scent, as they're shown to have a great sense of smell (enough to track I. rex by scent.) On that note, maybe Delta takes such an extreme dislike to Hoskins because she wants to improve her pack standing in the eyes of her Alpha. "He doesn't like this guy? I'll not like him MORE!"
  • For similar reasons, when Owen manages to make the raptors back off from attacking Claire and the boys at the end, Owen's body language toward Claire and how his scent reacts to her? (Not sure how else to describe that) would indicate that the alpha sees Claire as part of the pack, possibly his mate, which is probably why they backed down so quickly. Claire has spent most the film up til them in Owens close company so his scent is probably all over her and vice versa and the boys being related to Claire might make them smell enough like Claire for the raptors to think they are her offspring and therefore Owen's. Also, they had just dined on the InGen team, so they probably weren't hungry right then.
    • There is more: it was brief, while raptors were in cages before the I. rex hunt, but raptors had seen Owen interact with the boys - he spent some (short) time talking to Zach and Gray right in front of the raptors. His interaction with them had no hostility, unlike interactions with Hoskins. The fact remained that it was a brief impression, and so had no impact once raptors turned on humans, but might have played a role later in raptors "connecting the dot" in the above example, so to speak.
  • When Hoskins arrives it is clear from his body language that he's trying to take over from Owen as their new Alpha. Owen continually stands up against him, then eventually punches this strange wannabe in the face and frees them from the paddock, cheering them all up. So when the I. rex turns up and tries taking over, of course they check to see if their Alpha is going to do something about it. And while he doesn't order the firing, he hesitates to see off this fifty foot wannabe just long enough for them to realise that he's afraid of her and isn't going to protect them this time. In the lab near the end, Delta realises that Hoskins is nothing to be afraid of - he's clearly afraid - so she kills him for trying.
• Owen has established himself as the raptor pack's alpha, and they obey his commands. So why do they attack him when he flees through the gate after rescuing the inept handler? Well, we know from previous films that raptors have an insanely high prey drive. Owen, by turning and running, kicked off that instinct, and the raptors had no choice but to chase him. Luckily for him, he was close enough to the gate to make it through in time. But still, he really should have known better than to run away from a raptor. The thing about prey drive is that it's an instinctive, reflexive reaction, with no "higher thought" involved. It's where the cliche of "dogs chasing cars" comes from. An animal with a high prey drive sees something running they have to chase it. If Owen has backed slowly out of the enclosure, the raptors wouldn't have chased him. Then again, raptors may have such a high prey drive that something doesn't even need to run for them to want to eat it, and Owen knew he could only keep that instinct under control for so long.
• The near-opening scene of the scaled clawed feet slamming down and then zooming out revealing it belongs to a perfectly ordinary bird works on several levels — it is a bit of misdirection to inject some levity after the more ominous egg-hatching scene, it alludes to the 'raptors much like birds' thing we first heard from Dr. Grant, and it foreshadows Dr. Wu's 'what is a monster depends on your perspective' argument later on in the film by starting at the perspective of a small insect (to whom the bird would look like a monster) and zooming out to the human level (where it doesn't). There is also the fact that birds are dinosaurs. Showing it on the first scene is not just a Cat Scare, they are showing the dinosaurs you are already used to seeing.
  • The bird in question, while most likely a generic blackbird, bears at least a passing resemblance to a crow, which are known for their intelligence. The I. rex and the raptors aren't the only intelligent dinosaurs in this movie...
  • It also foreshadows where the World revival of the franchise is going, with dinosaurs and the technology to create them spreading into the outside world. Guess what? They've been here all along, folks.
• The old night-vision goggles apparently kept a charge for twenty years, and the jeep is repairable. Clearly, they spared no expense. That, or they're somehow solar-charged, which is still impressive.
• When Hoskins' mercs are flying in, one takes a shot at a Dimorphodon from their chopper, and is pleased when he brings it down. This is used to imply that they're kind of unprofessional, but nothing in the rest of the film indicates that. He wasn't killing for sport, he was securing the perimeter. Also, that was a hard shot to make from a chopper.
• In the Tyrannosaurus's first appearance, we see a goat with a flare next to it, which it happily eats. One of the problems the park had in the original was that the dinosaurs wouldn't come out at feeding time. This is shown when the T. rex wouldn't come out to eat its goat until later. This particular Call-Back shows just how much more organized Jurassic World is but also sets up a Fridge Horror, detailed below.
• Claire wants central control to track the Indominus rex. Despite having a cell phone, she runs off, gets into her car, and drives off. It's established later that reception in the park is poor. Zach attributes his phone's crummy reception to them being in the gyrosphere, but instead it seems to have to do with distance from the main area of the park because crummy reception apparently also applies to radios: notice how Nick's radio isn't functioning properly at first when Vivian tries to warn them just before the first Indominus attack? Her voice doesn't come through at first. It's all garbled. So when Claire drives away from Paddock 11 she isn't going to the control room. No, she's driving to where she knows (or thinks) she can get good reception: closer to it than Paddock 11. Also, a lot of the poor cell and radio reception occurs in the vicinity of I. rex. Maybe one of the abilities Wu engineered into it was a way to disrupt electronic communications, which would be very handy for a military Attack Animal.
  • Alternately, maybe it's sensitive to the very soft humming that electrical devices generate, and has been trashing the island's cell towers to try and "kill" the annoying hum.
• Indominus rex attacks the Gyrosphere Zach and Gray are in. This could be attributed to its sadistic tendencies, or wanting to get the boys. However, what gets its attention to the Gyrosphere is a cellphone in silent (vibration) mode — vibrating on the glass. It sounds like a dinosaur call. Of course it would get the I. rex interested in attacking the Gyrosphere.
  • The sphere itself may be designed to emit a subsonic tone to attract the large herbivores for ease of viewing. The guests can't hear it, but larger animals like sauropods and I. rex can detect deeper pitches than humans.
• Colin Trevorrow refers to Rexy's appearance in this film as her Unforgiven where a retired outlaw takes one last job before retiring for good. This analogy makes even more sense when you realise how the film ends and compare it Rexy's final fate in the movie. Mainly, rather than retiring Rexy is once more free to reclaim her island much like the end of the first film.
  • Notice that the spot where Rexy stands for her concluding roar of triumph isn't just any old park facility: it's the helicopter landing pad for the operations center. Meaning it's the place where the last ruler of the isle - Masrani - would've boarded the chopper for his last, fatal flight. The Queen of Jurassic World is staking her claim on the last piece of it where her predecessor set foot.
• This one speaks for itself. In the first film, Ian Malcolm strutted sexily towards a pile of dinosaur droppings. Here, there's a scene wherein Owen walks the exact same way... towards Hoskins.
• Masrani's faith in ACU's ability to handle any threat posed by an escaped animal, I. rex included, seems wholly misguided... until you flash back to the The Lost World: Jurassic Park. In that film, Roland Tembo and Sarah Harding were both, on separate occasions, able to single-handedly subdue an angry bull T. rex on the rampage with naught but 1-2 tranquilizer darts. In light of this fact, it's more than reasonable to assume a well-trained and well-armed Asset Containment Unit team would be able to bring down and recapture any loose dinosaurs with non-lethal weaponry.
• Many people are under the idea that the raptors almost ate Owen after he ran away even if he asserted himself as the Alpha of the pack, but think about, Barry escaped and Owen ran after him, they were not going to attack Owen, they thought he was leading them towards the prey.
• The I. rex and the T. rexes from The Lost World mirror each other in many of the ways they killed (or nearly killed) people. Both were responsible for tearing someone in half (the paddock worker and Eddie Carr), both have stepped on someone (Carter and Hamada), both dragged someone offscreen only to end with a shower of blood (Burke and an unfortunate ACU trooper), and both were advancing on someone who was firing at them. For added irony, Roland Tembo survived and was the only one of his team using non-lethals while Miller was killed blasting away with live ammunition. Rexy and the I. rex mirror each other too, in that both have killed two Velociraptors onscreen and both have had two children at their mercy in an overturned vehicle (the Tour Vehicle in 1 and the Gyrosphere in World). The I Rex and T Rex from the third film die in a similar fashion, being grabbed by the neck by an aquatic predator (Mosasaurus in World and the Spinosaurus in 3).
• One of the earliest pieces of advice that Owen gives to a new handler? "Never turn your back on the cage." Similarly, he establishes that the I. rex is killing other dinosaurs simply because, lacking the normal knowledge that animals living in the wild or raised with others of their kind, it wants to see if it can. Then, in the film's climax, the I. rex is dashed against the fence of the Mosasaurus... and it turns its back on the lagoon. Neither Rexy nor Blue make a move toward the I. rex when the latter is near the hole in the fence. At that point in the film, the I. rex has encountered literally nothing that it couldn't kill by raw strength or guile after becoming aware of it. The existence of a creature that could kill it before it even really knew what was happening was a completely alien concept.
• For all the flack given to Owen's line about mutual respect, he was completely right: he and Claire don't respect each other. He thinks she's a control freak, she thinks he's too goofy and laid-back. However, that line sums up the source of the "I. rex" issue. There are three major sections in Jurassic World— business, scientists, and handlers— and none of them have an ounce of respect for the others.
  • Business- represented by Claire, they are all about the profit. The truth is, the business personnel have no real concept of what it takes to run the park from a practical, hands-on perspective. They demand the scientists build them Frankenstein's dinosaur without any thought of the dangers that animal might present, and give so little reference to the handlers and trainers that it appears they think of trained animal behaviorists as glorified pet sitters, rather than realizing that the people who work with the dinosaurs day in and day out would know how to raise her far better than the scientists.
  • Scientists- represented by Dr. Wu, the scientists are devoted to knowledges and experimentation without regard for consequences. They resent the business managers for failing to understand just how difficult their work is, and look down on them for failing to grasp what they do. They also appear to mirror the view of handlers as pet sitters, and don't consult with them at all. Anyone with rudimentary animal behavior knowledge would have warned them about the dangers of raising the "I. rex" in isolation, and could have helped counter the issues of her being the only one of her kind, but the scientists shut them out, believing they had nothing to contribute.
  • Handlers- represented by Owen, the people who provide the day-to-day care for the animals of Jurassic World are aware of how much the business and science personnel look down on them, and repay that dislike in kind. They sneer at both for thinking of the animals as assets or experiments, without the understanding that the only reason they can do what they do is because the scientists made them and the businessmen pay for it.
  • If these three collaborated as equals, much of the "I. rex" drama could have been avoided. If the scientists had been able to communicate the limitations and risks of building a creature wholesale, if the the business managers had been more specific about what they were looking for, and especially if experienced handlers were brought in to raise her— because they clearly did not bring in her carers from the other exhibits, too many dumb mistakes for that to be a possibility— the "I. rex" might not have been the crazy monster she became. But instead, everyone believed they were the only group that mattered, no one talked to anyone else, and a rampaging dinosaur got loose.
• We know from how it kills the I. rex we know that the Mosasaurus can eat things that come near the edge of it's enclosure, so why has it never done so before? I suspect that it is smart enough to know that if it does that then the people feeding it, and any nearby interlopers it could eat, would stop, and it would be left to starve, if not killed itself. It only killed Zara because she was inside it's domain. By the time it comes to the I. rex the Mosasaurus may have realised things were falling apart anyway, and may have realized it already killed a human so it just stopped caring.
  • The Indominus is smashed into a fence bordering the lagoon by Rexy. In addition to that fence (which was presumably designed to hold up better to ramming from within), a roughly human height barrier of some sort can be seen outside the fence. This would prevent the Mosasaurus from seeing the humans walking by the area, which would keep its hunting instincts from kicking in.

Fridge Horror:

• The whole idea of "De-extinction" and species invention technology being commonplace by the events of Jurassic World opens a massive can of worms for the world in and of itself. With that kind of technology, why stop with just Dinosaurs? The military was showing clear interest in militarizing raptors, but honestly, if dinosaurs could be made in a lab on a remote island that is effectively an amusement park, a government lab, with sufficient funding, could produce so much worse.
• While Hoskins is killed by a Velociraptor, his cohort Dr. Wu, the park's geneticist, is put on a helicopter and escapes with the dinosaur embryos, the Indominus rex presumably among them. What if he becomes a full-blown Mad Scientist, a Misanthrope Supreme, the embryos fall into the wrong hands, or his colleagues taking the cloning of dinos even further? At the very worst, humanity is looking at the world turning into a Post Apocalyptic dinosaur planet once more, only the dinosaurs THINK like humans, and display the same emotions, too. Sweet dreams.
  • Well, any actual military could depose even thousands of dinosaurs in mere second. Modern cannons can go through 30 cm of steel. There wouldn't be even left enough I. rex to bury it.
• Also, the film's title might be a sign of the world turning into just that in the future, Jurassic World.
  • As of the next movie, there are dinosaurs running loose on mainland North America, with several others sold to unscrupulous fellows. It really is a "Jurassic World".
• Here's one that doubles as a dark Call-Back. Hoskins' men mount cameras to the heads of the Velociraptors so they can see the hunt from their point of view. Shortly after, the I. rex turns them against the humans. Audiences now know what the final moments of every single raptor victim in the previous movies from Jophery onward must have been like...from the raptor's point of view, no less.
  • Another bit is when Hoskins asks, "Are you recording this?" about the raptor chase. Now, what could those recordings be used for?
• Let's face it: Claire and everyone else who worked at the park are so going to have thousands upon thousands of lawsuits weighed down upon them.
  • That's not how lawsuits work. Even if you could sue the individuals, why would you want to do that? Masrani Global, owner of Jurassic World, and Ingen, creator of the dinosaurs, have so much more in assets that would be worth suing for. The worst the JW crew is looking at is unemployment (and possibly never getting a career in animal care again).
• How do you think Zara's fiancee is going to react when he finds out that his bride-to-be has been devoured?
• If the Mosasaurus hadn't shown up when she did, the Indominus rex would likely have adapted to the Blue/Rexy team-up and been able to win. Also, that she had been running all day and withstood several attacks that day, while fighting an uninjured and well rested Rexy and still barely had any trouble until Blue joined in gives a horrifying indication of how tough the Indominus truly is.
• Depending on how one views it, the events of Jurassic World could've been avoided had the events of Jurassic Park III not happened or if at least Amanda Kirby had closed the Aviary, as according to the tie in websites for Jurassic World, Vic Hoskins was promoted and hired to work on Isla Nublar because Masrani liked how he and his team took care of the Pteranodons after they reached the mainland, which led to Hoskins and his team making a deal with Henry Wu to create weaponized Dinosaurs such as the Indominus rex. So if Amanda Kirby had closed the Aviary, Hoskins would've likely not been hired to work on the island, he would've likely not met Wu, the I. rex could've been made less dangerous and thousands of people would be still alive. On the flip side however, Hoskins was the one who hired Owen to take care of the raptors. Hoskins was also the reason the raptors were re-bred in the first place. It was part of his research program, just like the I. rex.
• Given what we now know about Dr. Wu, do we still believe the original Jurassic Park incident was an accident? He could have been doing the same thing back then, creating hybrids (frog/dinosaur) for an outside source, intentionally designed to escape and bring down the park.
• It's a known fact that disasters and other mass panic-inducing situations can result in numerous small-scale brawls and altercations, if not all-out riots. There is also the inherent danger of being trampled, shoved aside, knocked down, and even outright killed on accident in such situations. One wonders how many human deaths and how many injuries on the survivors of the pterosaur attack were actually caused by their fellow tourists in their desperation to get to safety.
• The I. rex is stated to have been altered to grow much faster than the T. rex base she was developed from, ostensibly so that the park can get her attraction opened faster. However, knowing that she was created as a bio-weapon means that the enhanced growth rate is likely so that when they "miniaturize" her, she can be mass produced extremely fast, allowing an entire army of mini I. rexes to be bred in a matter of months rather than years.
• One of the tourists recovering from the pterosaur attack has a bandage over his eye. The Pteranodons have long sharp beaks. The implications this connection produces aren't pretty...
• Let's get this out of the way: There were lots of children running around with their parents in Jurassic World before things went to hell. Chances are, a good many of them are dead or horribly injured by the end of the film. Not to mention traumatized.
• During the pterosaur attack, several people in the control room are getting up and running out. Barring the raptors getting loose (which happens long after Hoskins has sent the control staff away via ferry), they're sheltered and safe from anything going on out in the park so what would possess them to leave...unless Claire wasn't the only Jurassic World employee to invite her relatives over for a holiday visit...
• Given the fact that the Pteranodons can dive/swim and likely attacked Zara in the water because they thought she was a fish, any visitors to the Aquatic Park were probably having a bad time during the Main Street attack. This could also count as Fridge Horror for the Pteranodons, in fact. Such a large animal diving into a shallow pool with concrete at the bottom is likely going to suffer a traumatic or even fatal head injury. Not to mention what's waiting for them in the lagoon itself.
• In Henry Wu's lab, we can see some of the previously mentioned components to the Indominus, including tanks that contain snakes, cuttlefish and treefrogs. But there's one other one that seems out of place...a human spinal cord. Could it be that the I. rex's intelligence stems from...oh God!
• Regarding that spinal cord,where and how did he obtain it? At best he got it from a John or Jane Doe cadaver. At worst, it's from a Death Row inmate. Which could mean that whatever animal ends up with its DNA is going to be a complete bastard as bad as or maybe even worse than the I. rex.
• A blink and you'll miss it moment: to draw the T. rex in for feeding time, the park drops a red flare next to her food. This is also how Claire lures her out of her paddock to fight the I. rex. They don't do this for any of the other dinosaurs that we see, so why the association? In the original Jurassic Park Grant and Malcolm used the same flares to catch her attention leading her to Gennaro who is promptly eaten. That one event was apparently enough for Rexy to associate red flares (a common safety tool) with food.
• Just one final detail to make everything worse — the background music early in the film establishes that it takes place over Christmas, of all times. Just one more gut-punch for everyone who lost someone in this debacle. Merry Christmas.
• When Zach and Gray are in the Gyrosphere Valley and decide they'll stay out for a bit longer, the dinosaurs all start running just as they speed up. A few scenes later, it's established that Indominus is close by. The herd could tell she was there and were starting to stampede. And the only ones not stampeding? The apatosaurs, right at the back: either they were too slow to get away or, as the biggest animals in the herd, were trying to defend the rest of them.
• The Stegosaurus in this film have rather droopy tails, which conflicts with not only real life but also the ones seen in the previous films as they had elevated tails. However, it should be noted the tail-raised Stegos were all shown living in the wild. The droopy tails are just a result of living in captivity, similar to how captive orcas tend to have droopy dorsal fins.

Fridge Logic:

On the headscratchers page.