A week after an abysmal start to Jurassic World’s motion comic series, Universal released the second entry in the series, Dinosaur Crossing. The second episode takes a huge step in the right direction and is certainly a breath of fresh air. Let’s get into it.
Right from the start, Dinosaur Crossing actually feels like a comic book in motion. One of the biggest changes in the second entry, was the change of pace between panels. This time around, it really felt like you were hastily reading through a comic, as the action unfolds from page to page. This entry really centers on action beats, so it was refreshing to see them cut through the story instead of lingering on sequences, as A Rising Tide did. All sequences sped by, so there really wasn’t much to critique in terms of visual style.
One element that did stick out visually was the placement of some of the dinosaurs. At two points, the dinosaurs in Dinosaur Crossing were not really anchored to any earth and the dinosaurs basically floated around. This isn’t so much of a critique, as it doesn’t matter all that much, but just an observation. Most of the visual representation of the Dinosaurs on screen was fantastic, so it just stood out when a few short sequences had dinosaurs floating around, seemingly untethered from gravity.
So many of the issues from the last episode were corrected, as the faces were much more pleasant, editing blended seamlessly and the script and acting issues were non-existent. The latter issue from A Rising Tide was glaring, but in Dinosaur Crossing, the script offering is minimal, but held impact in the wake of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom. They used the model of the Jurassic World short film, Battle At Big Rock, to expand the world and showcase dinosaur encounters across the country. We see nation-wide security alerts, multiple dino-entanglements and a full on battle in this short motion comic. There is a clear sense of direction.
The story is the best part of Dinosaur Crossing. The creators found a fun, viral way to reveal the dinosaur encounters (via cell phone) and give the family quick interactions to learn exactly how they feel about the chaos. It’s interesting to think about who would be excited to see a dinosaur up close in the wild, versus those who would be very afraid. The latter are probably smarter. It also seems like the gods are listening, as we mentioned in the last review, someone seems to have gotten wind of our Battle At Big Rock expanded story ideas. We learned in Dinosaur Crossing, that the husband in the story is a wildlife ranger, so he is bound to come across dinosaurs sooner or later. Well, sooner.
The dinosaur action in this short was exactly the kind of thing you’d want from a series like this. You get to see two dinosaurs interacting, that have never interacted before on screen together. We get our first Herbivore battle, which is FANTASTIC! While the battle and sound effects may be slightly repetitive, it’s still a great feature that has a bit of tension mixed into it. The territorial dispute disrupted the ranger’s drive to work, before finding a way out and ending with another “To be continued,” so who knows where we go next!
Dinosaur Crossing has reinvigorated the short run series and hopefully it gives new life to the next installment! Stay tuned and keep your eyes out for another review of the ongoing Jurassic World motion comic series!
Written by:
Brad Jost