Last week, Universal Studios kicked off the Jurassic World: Rebirth promotional campaign with a proud roar with the first full-length trailer and then a TV spot during one of the sleepiest Super Bowls in recent memory. With this launch comes a host of potential and pitfalls that will speak volumes about the state of Hollywood franchise management today.
The quick three-year turnaround between Rebirth and 2022’s Jurassic World: Dominion stands in stark contrast to the 14-year gap between Jurassic Park III (2001) and Jurassic World (2015). Now, 32 years after Steven Spielberg’s original blockbuster showed us how “life, uh, finds a way,” the franchise faces new challenges and opportunities. While Jurassic World revived the DNA of the series with $1.67 billion at the worldwide box office, and all three recent films crossed the vaunted $1 billion mark, each successive release saw declining ticket sales both domestically and globally, suggesting at least some degree of audience fatigue. (I found the last three movies to be about as fresh as a fossil and instantly forgettable, but Rebirth is bringing back Jurassic Park screenwriter David Koepp, sparking hope). Meanwhile, competitors such as Legendary’s Godzilla/King Kong Monsterverse and new upstarts like Jason Statham’s The Meg franchise thrive, while family-friendly animation and Japanese anime provide ample kaiju monster action across big and small screens.
The elapsed time, crowded marketplace and diminishing returns of the recent trilogy raise the question of whether or not the Jurassic Park franchise is still relevant in its seventh big screen outing, especially when most film series are considered lucky to deliver three. The short answer is yes. But the longer answer reflects how Hollywood can, does and should approach long-term franchise and intellectual property (IP) development.
“There are long-running franchises where if you keep the momentum going just enough, they can survive for decades and provide annuity for studios,” Paul Dergarabedian, Senior Media Analyst at Comscore, told Observer. “But you can kill the golden goose quickly if you provide a really inferior product or don’t keep it as a theatrical play that maintains a blockbuster prestige factor.”
Returning to Jurassic World
Jurassic Park/World has remained top of mind in part thanks to popular branded attractions in Universal theme parks, video games, select animated TV fare and robust merchandise campaigns. But similar to Disney’s Star Wars trilogy, the dropoff in ticket sales for each recent sequel is concerning even if every other studio would still happily take those results in a heartbeat. As often happens with franchises becoming long in the tooth, domestic interest waned while the international box office remained strong. Rebirth’s success will largely depend on its ability to reconnect with U.S. audiences, who represent the world’s largest movie-going market.
Since 2015, three of the six Jurassic movies rank among the top 3 percent most in-demand movie titles in the U.S., according to Parrot Analytics, where I work as Senior Entertainment Industry Strategist. But creative quality remains crucial, with the most successful entries following a proven formula: protagonists (and a few key villains) trapped in a park trying desperately to escape man-eating dinos. Stray too far from this template and quality can suffer, as we saw with Dominion.
Simon Pulman, an entertainment lawyer specializing in intellectual property rights at Pryor Cashman, notes, “Jurassic Park is a classic example of an IP that needs to take intermittent breaks between movies so that a new generation of kids can be ready to experience the core concept, and adults can become excited to see dinosaurs again. If you look at the new movie, it’s basically a back-to-basics soft reboot—people go to the parks to look for a Macguffin. Things, doubtless, go wrong,” Structurally, this is a wise reset. But time will tell if enough time has passed to stoke the fires of fan anticipation, at least here in the U.S.
Franchise that cross multiple genres
Viewing the franchise through this back-to-basics lens under closer inspection reveals other fundamental truths about the IP. Mainly, this franchise deliberately encompasses multiple genres, which has been integral to its enduring broad appeal success across the last three decades.
“In many ways, it’s the most kid- and family-appropriate version of a massive horror franchise,” Shawn Robbins, Fandango Director of Analytics and founder of Box Office Theory, told Observer. “There are adventure, humor, philosophical, educational and thriller elements to these movies. It’s incredibly accessible.”
This cross-appeal strategy has proven successful elsewhere recently, such as family-friendly horror like Netflix’s Wednesday and Warner Bros.’ Beetlejuice Beetlejuice. Modern superhero films similarly incorporate elements from numerous genres to become amalgamations of familiar storytelling beats. What’s clear from Jurassic and others is that there are core tenets to long-running franchise storytelling beyond these that are needed for sustained success today.
A successful franchise in 2025 needs to have four components, according to Pulman: gaming, film/TV, merchandising, and live or experiential products. “The ‘cornerstone’ may vary, but few multi-billion dollar franchises are not in all four,” he said. “Jurassic has been in all four since the 90s. Being in various media increases potential touch points, allows for emotional connection for kids and so on.”
Interestingly, as the Jurassic World trilogy progressed, its core audience got older, per Parrot Analytics Audience Demographics data. Any IP in a similar age range to Jurassic must carefully balance appealing to the primary audience while creating in-roads for a new generation of fans. Easier said than done.
Can dinosaurs live forever?
Plenty of digital ink has been spilt in recent years bemoaning Hollywood’s perceived lack of originality and the need for new multimedia franchises. There remains a question about just how infinite any given multi-decade IP can truly be. (If the dinosaurs went extinct, surely movies about them would eventually follow?) Tentpole titles support a studio’s entire movie slate. Failure can derail plans for the next original story or adaptation that might become tomorrow’s pop culture craze. But audiences and studio executives alike may overcomplicate the formula occasionally.
“It’s still important to develop new stories and new IP, ultimately, but sometimes the wheel doesn’t have to be reinvented as much as we often think it might,” Robbins said.
How long can we keep rebooting the same brands? It depends on how effectively rights holders can leverage properties across those four key components from before. Other important considerations for franchise sustainability include concept strength, world-building flexibility, independence from legacy characters, generational nostalgia, and rights ownership. Pulman predicts “new Jurassic movies every 10 to 15 years virtually in perpetuity,” with Dergarabedian adding, “This T-Rex still has more bite in it.” Not all IP is so lucky.