Jurassic World Rebirth goes back to what Gareth Edwards loved about the original Jurassic Park

There’s a new entry in the Jurassic Park / Jurassic World franchise heading our way, with Jurassic World Rebirth set to reach theatres on July 2, 2025 – and during an interview with Empire, director Gareth Edwards said that the new movie goes back to what he loved about the original Jurassic Park.

News of the new Jurassic World movie first hit back in January, when it was revealed that the screenplay – by original Jurassic Park screenwriter David Koepp, returning to the franchise for the first time since The Lost World: Jurassic Park – had already been written. The project was assembled in a mad scramble after that, with Godzilla and Rogue One: A Star Wars Story director Gareth Edwards ending up at the helm. This new Jurassic World movie won’t be featuring any returning lead characters from the previous Jurassic Park / Jurassic World movies, so describing it as a “Rebirth” could be accurate. The characters played by Sam Neill, Jeff Goldblum, and Laura Dern are out, as are the ones played by Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard. The new characters are played by the likes of Scarlett Johansson (Black Widow), Jonathan Bailey (Bridgerton), Mahershala Ali (Green Book), Rupert Friend (Obi-Wan Kenobi), and Manuel Garcia-Rulfo (The Lincoln Lawyer) – all of whom had their roles directly offered to them. Luna Blaise (Manifest), on the other hand, had to (according to Deadline) “beat out a number of actors” to land her role. David Iacono of The Summer I Turned Pretty, child actress Audrina Miranda, Philippine Velge (Station Eleven), Ed Skrein (Deadpool), and Béchir Sylvain (Diarra from Detroit) are also in the cast… along with a bunch of hungry dinosaurs.

Glen Powell (Top Gun: Maverick) was also offered a role, but he turned it down because he felt his presence in the movie wouldn’t help it. He did say that the script is great, though.

Frank Marshall and Patrick Crowley are producing the film for Kennedy/Marshall. Steven Spielberg is executive producing through Amblin Entertainment. Universal’s executive vp of production development Sara Scott and creative executive Jacqueline Garell are overseeing the project for the studio. 

Here’s what we know about the plot now: Jurassic World Rebirth sees an intrepid team racing to secure DNA samples from the three most colossal creatures across land, sea and air. Five years after the events of Jurassic World Dominion, the planet’s ecology has proven largely inhospitable to dinosaurs. Those remaining exist in isolated equatorial environments with climates resembling the one in which they once thrived. The three most colossal creatures within that tropical biosphere hold the key to a drug that will bring miraculous life-saving benefits to humankind.

Johansson’s character is Zora Bennett, “a skilled covert operations expert contracted to lead a team on a top-secret mission to secure genetic material from the world’s three most massive dinosaurs. When Zora’s operation intersects with a civilian family whose boating expedition was capsized by marauding aquatic dinos, they all find themselves stranded on an island where they come face-to-face with a sinister, shocking discovery that’s been hidden from the world for decades.” Bailey is playing paleontologist Dr. Henry Loomis, with Ali as Zora’s most trusted team leader, Duncan Kincaid. 

Edwards told Empire, “It goes back to what I loved about the original, with an embarrassment of riches of different set-piece-type scenarios and tense, fun action moments. There were a lot of opportunities as a filmmaker to have a lot of fun and try and play games with the audience.” The movie will be packed with the dinosaurs movie-goers are hoping to see, as “there are certain dinosaurs it would be a crime against cinema not to include.” And the director also took the opportunity to build up Johansson’s character, saying, “She’s looking for meaning in her life after leaving the military, and this opportunity comes along where [after it] basically she’d never have to work again. But through that journey, she starts to question the ethical rights and wrongs of what they’re doing.“

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