It’s almost impossible to imagine a classic like Jurassic Park (1993) ever being rebooted, but before January this year, we’d have said the same thing about Harry Potter. Now, the Wizarding World is set to go under the knife, as Warner Bros. has confirmed that a television series-style reboot is underway at HBO Max.
This has likely left many moviegoers wondering if other beloved and iconic franchises face the same fate. While Harry Potter is hardly the first, with the likes of Ghostbusters coming to mind, it proves that no film series is sacred and that pretty much anything is up for grabs if the studio deems it so.
With that said, this only tends to happen when there’s been a long period of inactivity in a franchise, like Ghostbusters, or due to poor success, like Harry Potter, whose spinoff series Fantastic Beasts failed to impress audiences, critics, and the box office.
Jurassic Park‘s latest sequel, Jurassic World Dominion (2022), only came out in theaters this time last year, and it grossed over $1 billion worldwide. So why on earth would Universal Pictures even entertain the idea of rebooting the original 1993 classic by Steven Spielberg? Well, they’re probably not, but if they are, a rebranding would likely find its way into Universal Studios too.
So then, if Jurassic Park is destined for the same treatment, whether in film or on television, what might become of the themed lands in Universal Studios Hollywood and Universal Studios Orlando, for example? Well, it’s an impossible question to answer without having any sort of idea what a reboot would even look like, but the fact is that this has already happened.
After Jurassic World (2015) was released in 2015, massive changes were made to Jurassic Park: The Ride, now known as Jurassic World: The Ride. It’s still a water ride but features new dinosaurs, such as the Indominus Rex and the Mosasaurus, and the more corporate Jurassic World aesthetic.
But how different can a Jurassic Park reboot be? Well, we’re still not sure what the Harry Potter reboot will look like, though it’s fair to say there won’t be much change from an aesthetic point of view. There is, however, the source material: the seven Harry Potter novels. Jurassic Park is no different – there are two novels by the late author Michael Crichton.
While the first two films in the series, Jurassic Park and The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), are based on those two novels, their differences are more significant than those between JK Rowling’s books and the films. The Jurassic Park novels are a lot darker than the films, with a lot more focus in the first on bio-engineering (cloning), which means it spends more time in laboratory settings.
However, changes in Universal Studios might not be necessary, primarily since it’s worked so well for so long. Still, it’s impossible to rule out a Jurassic Park reboot on either the big screen or the small screen.
