The Fallen and the Extinct
Issues of Ethics in “Jurassic Park” and “Jurassic World”
Jeff Goldblum’s most iconic movie quote (besides Must go faster) is: “Life finds a way” — which is the primary theme of Jurassic Park. His character Ian Malcolm, a “chaotician,” waxes philosophical throughout the film. The rich script and visual storytelling, as well as the semi-nonfiction prose of Michael Crichton’s novel, pose questions about the ethics of “God-playing” and the moral decisions of the characters who frequently must evaluate their own safety and selfish goals against others’ in the face of immense danger. In fact, the entire plot proceeds from the actions of a disgruntled employee who seeks to sell his employer’s secrets to a competitor.
The novel is a critique of science, with Malcolm providing the voice of the author, who is known for his right-wing politics and anti-science views. Of course, valid science is hardly the basis of a story that plays fast and loose with the realities of genetic science, and Crichton’s writing displays a rather dismissive and cynical attitude toward it.
The scientists, especially Dr. Henry Wu, are the antagonists in both the book and the films. Although Wu doesn’t have the malicious intent of many a mad scientist, he’s a geek gun-for-hire, only concerned about the effects of his work when something goes wrong. He’s portrayed as arrogant and flippant about his team’s control mechanisms, such as the hormone needed for male embryo development and a lysine dependency that will cause the dinosaurs to die outside the park (of course, neither of these things work). “We simply deny [the creatures] that,” he says proudly.
In the novel, Malcolm says,
I’ll tell you the problem with engineers and scientists. … [They] are actually preoccupied with accomplishment. So they are focused on whether they can do something. …Discovery, they believe, is inevitable. So they just try to do it first. … Discovery is always a rape of the natural world.
This dichotomy between nature and science plays out in several ways throughout the novel and films. John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) pleads conservation ethics, citing condors as an example of acceptable meddling by geneticists — or park developers. “This isn’t some species that was obliterated by deforestation, or the building of a dam,” responds Malcolm. His utterance that “life founds a way” is meant to be a vote for nature in what Crichton perceives to be a battle between a force of the universe and a human drive, endemic to scientists, to control this force. The films exploit this conflict, regularly using the breakdown of machines and systems to enable the primal forces embodied in violent creatures who hunt excessively. (Seriously, when do they stop eating?)
Yet the name of the park reveals the fallacy of human privilege. The resurrected creatures did not live only in the Jurassic era, and while the name might seem sexy for marketing purposes, the lumping of all prehistoric creatures into one era speaks to the human arrogance in privileging “our time” over theirs, a fact not lost on Malcolm. The Jurassic period lasted 56 million years; dinosaurs walked the Earth for 165 million years (not 65 million). The Quaternary period, in which humans live, has lasted only 2 million years. The horror of all Jurassic films stems from a simple question of fitness, in Darwinian terms: How could humans possibly compete with massive predators who are poised to become invasive species far more dangerous than Burmese pythons?
The films visually explore this arrogance by portraying the characters as relying upon human inventions, from bathrooms to vehicles to doors, to try to escape the predators. All of these barriers prove inconsequential to the creatures. Moreover, the destruction of accoutrements of human systems of protection, most notably fences, are a recur-ring trope. Humanity, for all its accomplishments, is suggested to have created such an artificial world, it bears no viability for self-defense. In two particularly entrancing scenes in Fallen Kingdom, claws are filmed in contrast with linen and hair; in Jurassic World, with metal and glass. Either way, human artifacts pale in comparison to the expression of pure predator tactics.
At the conclusion of the first 1993 film, Dr. Alan Grant looks out the window at several pterosaurs soaring gracefully over the sea with a tremendous sense of belonging, hardly different from a flock of pelicans. The film’s famous inspirational score plays. A subtle smile comes across Alan’s face. The scene resolves a movie of terror with a sense of right-ness: it matters not how the pterosaurs came to be there, but rather how their existence has gone since they reappeared on the planet, and to their evolutionary ad-vantage: they can fly across the sea.
Life finds a way.
Jurassic World imagines a park finally open to the public, and with it a mass of animal rights problems. Exploitative activities such as an orca show (with a mosasaur, of course) and pony-riding ring (with baby Triceratops) draw countless visitors per day, while park director Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) callously describes the dinosaurs as “assets” with a near-insistence that they not be referred to as “dinosaurs.” Considering that these creatures are genetically engineered and patched with other species’ DNA to resurrect them, she does have somewhat of a point. Meanwhile, Owen (Chris Pratt) attempts to wrangle the raptors, using a clicker as one might do with dogs, and is particularly attentive to the alpha female, Blue. Naturally, the thought of training raptors appeals to Hoskins (Vincent D’Onofrio), who views them as potential weapons. The creatures in Jurassic World are unquestionably being kept and groomed for human purposes, which makes their eventual rebellion seem almost an act of revenge.
The Jurassic films have danced around the animal rights questions at hand, and in the context of contemporary debate about zoos and animal entertainment, offer a perspective fairly sympathetic to animal rights advocates. In particular, Ellie (Laura Dern in the 1993 film) is concerned with the care of the dinosaurs, literally digging into feces to find evidence of improper keeping conditions. In the novel, Malcolm explains to Hammond why the park is unpredictable for its attempts to re-engineer nature yet provide a human-oriented experience of prehistoric life. Hammond, ever hateful to-ward Malcolm, retorts, “There are zoos.”
Says Malcolm: “zoos don’t recreate nature.”
In Fallen Kingdom, Claire seeks retribution for her sins in Jurassic World by leading a campaign to extract the dinosaurs from the island, where an impending volcanic eruption would destroy them. Owen feels quite differently, telling her he has no issue with Blue dying. Later in the film, Maisie watches footage of Owen and a puppy-like baby Blue, interacting with what seems like a powerful bond. Sloppy screenwriting or an ethical statement? Owen ultimately considers Blue an animal, and thus less deserving of protection.
Beyond the animal rights questions, Fallen Kingdom delves into one of the deepest taboos of the ever-more-scary genetic sciences, hyperbolized in the media while the general public feels increasingly nervous about genetic editing’s potential for eugenics and designer babies. Fallen Kingdom is the first film in the series to introduce a cloned human: the precocious Maisie. The film doesn’t take a lot of time to explore the nature of her existence, but the bit of dialogue about it suggests that her creation was, like the dinosaurs, done to serve a selfish goal, and therefore, as her grandfather’s business manager Eli Mills (played by Rafe Spall) implies, her existence is less morally correct than humans created through “natural” means.
The film concludes with the dinosaurs suffering from a gas leak. Claire weighs her options: open the emergency gate and release them into the wild, where they will certainly have a devastating impact on the ecosystem and public; or let them die, as these creatures not meant to live in this time.
Fallen Kingdom nicely circles back to the fundamental questions proposed in the first film: do the dinosaurs, only here by virtue of human innovation and greed, deserve to be here? Is their existence in this time morally right?
Yet Fallen Kingdom marks a departure from Crichton’s and the original film’s disdain for science and rather, portrays the products of this meddling as the morally right outcome. It is Maisie’s hand that pushes the button to release the dinosaurs, and resolves the plot (until the next film, of course), and she says it’s because she had to.
“They’re like me,” she says.
Who are we to deny the decision of a child who has had to grapple with the nature of her own existence? Like anyone, she did not ask to be born. Like the dinosaurs, she is not devoid of nature simply for having been created by scientists.
Life found a way.
Rachel Wayne is a writer and anthropologist based in Gainesville, Florida. She received her master’s degree in Visual Anthropology and Film Studies from the University of Florida, and writes regularly on science fiction, media studies, and the science of violence.
