Jurᴀssic World Rebirth is one of 2025’s most anticipated releases, thanks to its major cast overhaul from previous installments of the Jurᴀssic World saga, and its apparent nods in the direction of the original Jurᴀssic Park. What’s more, the movie will revive the premise of another Jurᴀssic franchise sequel, hopefully with the aim of making up for how disappointing it was. Back in 1997, The Lost World: Jurᴀssic Park was the subject of enormous hype thanks to the groundbreaking success of the franchise’s landmark first movie. Unfortunately, the sequel simply couldn’t live up to its forerunner.

However, with the likes of Scarlett Johansson and Mahershala Ali leading the cast of Jurᴀssic World Rebirth, and the movie’s trailer showing signs of promise, this upcoming Jurᴀssic release is set to be a very different affair from The Lost World’s arrival in cinemas 28 years ago. On the other hand, the plot of this new release shares major similarities with the first Jurᴀssic Park sequel, with Jurᴀssic World Rebirth’s story set on an island a lot like the setting for The Lost World: Jurᴀssic Park.

Jurᴀssic World Rebirth Mirrors The Plot Of The Lost World: Jurᴀssic Park

Both Movies Involve An Island Where A Research Facility For Jurᴀssic Park Was Based

Jurᴀssic World Rebirth slots into the timeline of the Jurᴀssic franchise after its last movie, Jurᴀssic World Dominion. Rebirth takes place five years after the events of Dominion, with most of the global dinosaur population now wiped out due to their unsuitability for most of the planet’s climates and ecosystems. The story of the movie centers on a mysterious island that was once the base for a scientific research facility used to create Jurᴀssic Park. If this story sounds familiar, that’s because it’s the basic premise of The Lost World: Jurᴀssic Park.

The mystery island which featured in The Lost World was Isla Sorna, otherwise known as Site B, the second island to appear in the Jurᴀssic franchise after the site of Jurᴀssic Park, Isla Nubar. It was on Isla Sorna that the destruction of a dinosaur cloning center used to produce the dinosaurs housed in Jurᴀssic Park led to dinosaurs running wild across the island. Although Jurᴀssic World Rebirth is apparently not set on Isla Sorna, instead taking place on a third island previously unexplored in the Jurᴀssic franchise, this island will undoubtedly share many similarities with the one we see in The Lost World.

The resemblance between the plots of the two movies shouldn’t come as a surprise, given that they’re both written by the same screenwriter, David Koepp, who also wrote the script for the original Jurᴀssic Park movie. In fact, Jurᴀssic World Rebirth is the first Jurᴀssic franchise script that Koepp has penned since 1997’s The Lost World: Jurᴀssic Park.

The Lost World Was A Disappointing Sequel To The Original Jurᴀssic Park

It Failed To Live Up To The Hype And Didn’t Know What To Do With Its Dinosaurs

Despite being the work of the same screenwriter who wrote Jurᴀssic Park itself, The Lost World: Jurᴀssic Park was an underwhelming follow-up to say the least. Firstly, the sequel had more exposition in its first half an hour than was in the entirety of Jurᴀssic Park, even though our familiarity with the universe of the first movie should have dictated that even less exposition was needed. Secondly, the movie’s plot is a bungled mess, which doesn’t allow its dinosaurs to shine nearly as much as they do in Jurᴀssic Park.

The Lost World’s mishandling of its dinosaurs is even more of a shame considering how brilliant the movie’s highly-praised CGI rendering of the Jurᴀssic franchise’s real stars actually is. Its depiction of the T. Rex, in particular, is far superior to Jurᴀssic Park’s, as the game-changing technology used in the first movie had advanced even further by 1997. Sadly, it often feels as though The Lost World simply doesn’t know what to do with its dinosaurs, or how to build a story around them. But almost three decades later, Koepp has finally been given the chance to correct the movie’s plot mistakes.

Jurᴀssic World Rebirth Could Be The Sequel That Jurᴀssic Park Always Deserved

David Koepp Is Openly Referencing The Birth Of The Franchise With Rebirth

As actor Jonathan Bailey puts it in a featurette released by Universal Pictures to preview Jurᴀssic World Rebirth, “For anyone who loves the original Jurᴀssic films, this is the movie for you.” It appears that the similarity of this new movie’s premise to The Lost World: Jurᴀssic Park is no accident. Rebirth is specifically intended to return to the filmmaking style of the first Jurᴀssic Park, while the film’s director, Gareth Edwards, describes its script as a “love-letter to Spielberg.”

There’s even a scene in Jurᴀssic World Rebirth that’s lifted straight from the novel that launched the Jurᴀssic franchise. Michael Crichton’s novel Jurᴀssic Park laid the groundwork for Steven Spielberg’s movie, which inevitably left out certain scenes and plotlines from the original story when adapting it.

The fact that Jurᴀssic World Rebirth is including one of the scenes which were left out demonstrates David Koepp’s commitment to making a sequel worthy of following in the footsteps of Spielberg’s first film. This time, it feels as though the movie really can live up to the hype.