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Geek Tyrant
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Geek Tyrant
JURASSIC WORLD: REBIRTH Almost Had a Much Darker Ending — GeekTyrant
Big-budget blockbusters are often built on shifting sand. Scripts are tweaked on the fly, storylines morph during post, and entire endings get rewritten just before the final cut. Jurassic World Rebirth was no exception. According to director Gareth Edwards, this dinosaur-packed chapter almost ended with a gut punch fans weren't expecting. Spoiler warning if you haven't seen the film yet. One of the most crowd-pleasing moments in Jurassic World: Rebirth is the surprise return of Mahershala Ali's Duncan Kincaid, the grizzled mercenary who buys time for a group of trapped kids by luring the terrifying new mutated dinosaur, Distortus Rex, away with a flare. For a few tense minutes, it looks like that's the end of Kincaid, making a noble sacrifice to save others from being eaten. Then, just when you think he's being digested in the stomach of the monsterous dino, he stumbles back onto the scene alive. Cue applause. But that wasn't always the plan. Edwards told /Film: 'I'll tell you, the bit we did shoot two versions of is Kincaid living and dying. Basically, the version where he dies, you just don't have the other bit [where he reappears]. But because that was how it was written to start with and we filmed it and did everything as if he was going to die, everything felt correct. 'As an audience you go, 'Oh my God, he's going to actually die, of course he is,' and then he does. Then when he's brought back, I think it is a surprise. Then I felt like, 'Oh no, what if the audience thinks we copped out?' 'I would remind myself of E.T. , which is the masterpiece version of this, where I never felt that at all in E.T. I felt really sad [laughs] that he had gone, and then euphoric when he was back. It was kind of like a little version of that, where you sort of pray: 'Is the audience going to ...?' 'And then watching it the other night [at the New York premiere], it got the best reaction in that moment and I was really like, 'Oh my God, thank God we shot that version where he lived because it could have been quite a downer [laughs].'' It's a rare case where a reshoot didn't just fix a problem, it elevated the entire ending. But that wasn't the only thing on the chopping block. You know that moment in every Jurassic movie where the T-Rex swoops in like a prehistoric deus ex machina to save the day? Edwards nearly gave in to that tradition. But this time, cooler heads prevailed. 'I thought about — that came up. It didn't come up on the shoot, it came up in post-production where I just suddenly, I guess, I woke up in a cold sweat one night and was like, 'Should we, should we have the T-rex turn up?' [laughs] I went in the next day and brought this up with everybody and I expected everyone to go, 'Yeahhh' [enthusiastically], and it was just a reaction like, 'Really? But all the other ones did that.' It slightly kind of reassured me like, 'Okay, I think that we did the right thing.' 'But there's this storytelling thing called [deus] ex machina and it's like Latin, I think, for God basically coming and saving your characters at the end of a story. I think 'Jurassic' has this thing called 'Rex Machina,' where it's like the T-rex comes and saves everyone. 'I remember David Vickery, the visual effects supervisor, he was like, 'But that's one of the things I loved about this film, is that it didn't do what the other ones did,' and all this sort of stuff. Yeah, you do juggle these — there's like, what's the right thing here? You try and choose the right path.' Instead of yet another dino-vs-dino finale, the Distortus Rex remains a looming threat, Kincaid survives, and we're left with the kind of open-ended finale leaving the door open for a sequel.
Gizmodo
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Gizmodo
‘Jurassic World Rebirth' Didn't Always End That Way
Jurassic World Rebirth is now in theaters, and if you've seen it, you probably felt a little manipulated by the end. Not in a bad way necessarily, but in a way that felt somehow satisfying and also disappointing. You guessed what was going to happen but also kind of hoped it didn't. Well, it turns out there's a very, very good reason and story behind that. So, we asked the film's director, Gareth Edwards, about it. Major spoilers belowIn Jurassic World Rebirth, as the group is getting ready to make their big escape, Duncan Kincaid (Mahershala Ali) seemingly sacrifices himself to the D-Rex to allow everyone else to live. It's a triumphant, heroic moment, but we don't see him die. We just assume it. A few minutes later, when a red flare flies up into the sky, we know that Duncan has actually survived, and all is right with the world. Watching the film, it seemed set up for Duncan to die, especially because we know he's giving his life for the Delgado children, a link to past regrets with his own kids. It would've been a fair, character-driven sacrifice. But when the film doesn't actually show him actually being eaten or mauled, anyone who has ever watched a movie figures he could be back. All of which makes sense when you know what happened behind the scenes. 'There was a draft where he died,' Edwards told io9 about Duncan's fate. 'And then as we pursued Mahershala, I think they felt like, 'Well, this is a big deal actor. We would want him to hang around.' So then it got changed to him living. And then, when I spoke to Mahershala, he actually brought up himself, like, 'I think he should die.' And I saw an opportunity, and I went, 'I totally agree.' Me and him sort of fought for that, and we got our way. So it flipped back to him dying.' So Duncan died in the original script and was resurrected before shooting because they cast a two-time Oscar winner, but then, at the urging of Edwards and that Oscar winner, it got changed back. So how is it that the character ends up living in the movie? 'Then Universal, in their wisdom, kind of said, 'Look, we haven't got time for a pickup shoot or any reshoots or anything like this,' Edwards said. 'Just get something while you're out in Thailand that can cover for the fact if he lived. Just do it.'' Yes, we are all on the same page here. 'Now I was thinking, 'I know how this works,'' Edwards continued. 'If I shoot something, it's going to end up in the movie. And so then I was like, 'I've got to think of the really good version of him living and how that would work.' And I tried to picture something, and then I started to fall in love with it and go, 'Actually, I quite like that.' And then we shot it, and I really liked everyone's performance in it.' However, Edwards later realized why the swerve worked so well. 'I think why it works, if it does, and I wasn't expecting this at all, but because everything is happening and has been put in there because we thought he would die—even like the final farewells and things like this—you go, 'They only do this in movies when someone's going to die.' And we kept them all in,' he said. 'I think the audience subconsciously has learned he's a goner. And then, and then when he comes back, it's actually surprising. The first time I watched it with an American audience was the other night at the premiere, and my favorite reaction in the whole film was when that flare went up behind Scarlett [Johansson's character]. It was this big cheer and clap. And they already knew what was about to happen. And it was really lovely. I kind of nearly teared up. It was, Yeah, okay, I'm happy to be wrong there. I'm glad the studio told us to shoot that little extra piece.'' So there you have the death, life, death, and life of Duncan Kincaid, played by Mahershala Ali, in Jurassic World Rebirth. It's now in theaters. Want more io9 news? Check out when to expect the latest Marvel, Star Wars, and Star Trek releases, what's next for the DC Universe on film and TV, and everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.
