A new clip from Jurassic World Dominion verifies the canon status of The Lost World: Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III in the franchise. With the dinosaurs free by the ending of Fallen Kingdom, Dominion will mark the third entry in the Jurassic World series and will bring back the original Jurassic Park protagonists Dr. Alan Grant, Dr. Ellie Sattler, and Dr. Ian Malcolm. Sam Neill, Laura Dern, and Jeff Goldblum each reprise their roles, and a new clip from Jurassic World Dominion gives audiences a glimpse at Grant and Sattler’s first meeting in years.
In the clip (via YouTube), Grant asks Sattler about her family life, with Sattler confirming that her kids are in college. Grant also asks Sattler about her marriage with her husband Mark, with Sattler stating that “It’s over.” While seemingly a minor detail in the grand scheme of Dominion’s story, the explicit naming of Mark is a reference to Sattler’s husband in Jurassic Park III, where he was played by Taylor Nichols.
Ahead of the release of Jurassic World in 2015, the film was positioned as building principally on the first Jurassic Park based on Michael Crichton's novel. Director Colin Trevorrow indicated in an interview (via Yahoo! Entertainment) that The Lost World and Jurassic Park III weren’t being retconned outright, but as Yahoo! Entertainment described it, “placed to the side.” While that may have been the case when Jurassic World soft-rebooted the Jurassic Park franchise back to box office glory, Jurassic World Dominion seems to be making efforts to build bridges among the entire series ahead of its June release.
With Jurassic World Dominion making clear that The Lost World and Jurassic Park III happened within its timeline of events, that opens many possibilities for what the movie might have in store. The return of Grant, Sattler, and Malcolm, along with Lewis Dodgson (with Campbell Scott assuming the role), already shows Jurassic World 3 is a big legacy sequel. This opens the possibility of other surprise cameos, such as Julianne Moore's Dr. Sarah Harding from The Lost World and the Kirby family from Jurassic Park III. It also means that major events from the two films, such as the T-rex’s rampage through the streets of San Diego in The Lost World, could also play into Dominion.
The Lost World and Jurassic Park III aren’t generally the most loved Jurassic Park movies, with Jurassic Park III in particular often being cited as the weakest of the franchise. Each also made progressively less than the original Jurassic Park. That declining commercial success partially accounts for the series’ 14-year-long hibernation from 2001 to 2015 when Jurassic World finally arrived, though there were attempts to make Jurassic Park 4 in the interim. With Jurassic Park being as groundbreaking as it was and the franchise’s peak in both reception and box office success, Jurassic World linking itself to it the most directly isn’t difficult to understand from a business perspective.
With Jurassic World and Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom having reinvigorated the Jurassic Park franchise, there might have since been some second thoughts on that approach. It’s possible that the early efforts to distance them from The Lost World and Jurassic Park III might no longer be viewed as necessary and even appear counterproductive to the legacy theme of Dominion. However the decision was reached, the clip from Jurassic World Dominion sends the message that when the movie says it's building on the Jurassic Park legacy started by John Hammond (Sir Richard Attenborough), it indeed means the whole legacy. Now, that legacy officially includes The Lost World: Jurassic Park and Jurassic Park III.
