Whilst all of the sequels to Steven Spielberg's timeless classic, Jurassic Park, have had moderate to heavy criticism leveled against them, none stand out more like the black sheep of the entire franchise as Jurassic Park III does.
Joe Johnston's threequel is by far the shortest and most undeniably underwhelming of both the Jurassic Park and Jurassic World movies and it's been mostly forgotten from ongoing discussions about the franchise and its legacy. But should it be this way, or are there underrated qualities to the movie that make it worthy of reappraisal? Let's look at the best (and worst) qualities of Jurassic Park III to find out whether it really is as bad as people say it is.
Is: Forgettable Characters
This isn't to say that Jurassic Park III doesn't have a cast of great actors but the movie's characters never really seem worthy of them. Alan Grant was one of the best things about the original movie but quite consciously not the charismatic force of Jeff Goldblum's Ian Malcolm, who could carry his sequel a bit more easily.
Jurassic Park III remains the only Jurassic Park movie without some form of human villain and it's easy to see why it hasn't happened again. Without another dimension of danger for the main characters going on, the premise can easily seem monotonous.
Isn't: Great Effects
Whether they be practical or digital, the Jurassic Park franchise is famous for wowing audiences with its effects and Jurassic Park III definitely puts in the work in this department.
Both the digital and animatronic versions of the dinosaurs alone are enough to sell the movie really and the sequences stay in the realm of real-life stunts and sets more than most franchise action blockbusters, even for that time period.
Is: Rehashed Ideas
Alan Grant stagnates quite a lot in the time spent in between the events of the original movie and Jurassic Park III, meaning that he's pretty much in the same situation he was in at the beginning fo the first movie (only slightly worse off) and the motivation behind his character is stuck in the past therefore also.
With Alan being the only representative of the first two movies in the franchise showing up in the main story of Jurassic Park III, the entire premise of the franchise itself appears to stagnate along with him.
Isn't: Plenty of Dino Action
There are plenty of great qualities to a Jurassic Park movie but, if we're all being completely honest with ourselves, the audience is showing up for the dinosaur action and Jurassic Park III delivers on this front.
Aside from introducing more types of dinosaurs, the slimmed-down plot cuts straight to the chase once the main characters get to the island and it keeps the dinosaur sequences coming right until the end.
Is: A Low Stakes Story
Aside from feeling rehashed and underdeveloped, the stakes at play in Jurassic Park III's story feel shockingly low for the franchise or just an action/adventure/thriller movie in general.
Alan Grant's motivation for returning to the danger of the islands is once again mostly monetary with a tinge of fascination but, other than his survival, the stakes of the story are the rescuing of a child that neither Alan nor the audience really knows or gets to know and what little moral dilemma there is from Billy stealing the raptor eggs is introduced and resolved quite quickly.
Isn't: A Linear Adventure
The benefit to the lack of complexity in Jurassic Park III's story is that it's never even in danger of getting bogged down in subplots or needlessly complicated plans.
With the normality of huge superhero narratives in blockbusters today, it's kind of a welcomed blast from the past to see a high-budget, well-made, franchise action movie that gets directly to the point, no matter how simple that may be, and stick to it.
Is: An Unsatisfying Finale
So much of what works about Jurassic Park III would feel so much more memorable and complete if it only built to a satisfying conclusion of some kind.
It was almost certainly a result of the screenplay's numerous rewrites, and there are many stories surrounding it, but Jurassic Park III's ending feels markedly cobbled together.
Isn't: A Quick Pace
It's certainly not encouraging when one of the nicest things you have to say about something is that it's over relatively quickly but Jurassic Park III offers fans a comparatively easygoing and self-contained chapter in the franchise's history.
If you love the original movie, and want something slightly different but still overwhelmingly similar, then Jurassic Park III quite unashamedly delivers the core goods of the series without dressing it up in a needlessly elaborate plot.
Is: A Waste of Laura Dern
Laura Dern's performance as Dr. Ellie Sattler was one of the best seen in a blockbuster movie from the 1990s and to see her not only return in the movie to reinforce that she and Alan Grant were no longer together but effectively only fill the role of an extended cameo felt disheartening for fans, to say the least.
Her egregious sidelining in the movie is perhaps the strongest indicator that the creative team behind Jurassic Park III fundamentally misunderstood what made the original movie work so well.
Isn't: Sam Neill Is Still a Great Lead
Despite the story not having much new material for Dr. Alan Grant to do, he's still a great, and humorous, protagonist to spend a movie with.
He's not quite fully mature himself so his role as a babysitter to even more immature characters is a dynamic that still works and it allows him to shine as a hero who's able to convincingly use brains over brawns to resolve dangerous situations.