Anghus Houvouras is getting a sense of deja vu from Jurassic World…
1999 was a great year for blockbusters. Everyone was talking about game changing cinema like The Matrix and The Blair Witch Project. The Sixth Sense was a monster hit. It was almost enough to make you forget about just how terrible The Phantom Menace was. For my money, the most entertaining film of that summer was Deep Blue Sea. Renny Harlin’s insane, over the top survival thriller about genetically altered sharks trying to escape the oceanic facility that houses them.
I’m sure I don’t need to recount the plot points of this classic. A young, determined Scientist played by Saffron Burrows tries to develop a cure for Alzheimer’s using smart sharks. Thomas Jane is the bad ass with a checkered past charged with keeping these hyper-intelligent killing machines in check. Samuel Jackson is the investor caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. And LL Cool J is the most super fly chef and provides the now-famous theme song where he declares ‘My hat is like shark’s fin’.
A classic in every sense of the word. I didn’t initially see the correlation between Deep Blue Sea (or DBS as we superfans call it) and Jurassic World. But damn if the marketing team isn’t working overtime to connect those dots. First there was this awful, awful scene released featuring Bryce Dallas Howard and Chris Pratt. There was something… familiar. The rhythms. The characters. The entire interaction felt like a scene right out of Deep Blue Sea.
Bryce Dallas Howard’s character seems cold and rigid, balanced by Chris Pratt’s anti-authoritarian where every sentence drips with cynicism. He outright mocks her, righteously so, for trying to create mutant, super-dinosaurs and rattles off some typical alpha male platitudes about instinct and animal urges. This scene feels a lot like a similar exchange from DBS, where our hunky hunter played by Thomas Jane gives scientist Saffron Burrows the business about the dangers of creating smarter versions of the nature’s fiercest predators.
In Deep Blue Sea, I can understand the fictional movie science at play. An obsessed scientist wants to cure Alzheimer’s because it impacted a family member. There are personal stakes at play. Much in the same way Rise of the Planet of the Apes stole the same basic dynamic, making it even more dramatic by letting us see the ravages of the disease rather than just be told about it. I’m not exactly sure why scientists need to develop super-dinosaurs. I would have thought just bringing dinosaurs back from extinction would have been enough to put asses in seats at the world’s most perilous theme park. But it seems like people got bored with seeing regular old dinosaurs and required something newer and more disastrous to compete with Shamu at SeaWorld.
So there is already plenty of exculpatory evidence linking Jurassic World to Deep Blue Sea. The kind of familiar trappings that one can find in almost any modern, brain free franchise. Then they release this new poster teasing the next trailer…
It’s like the producers are daring us to connect these dots. A giant aquatic dinosaur about to swallow up a Great White Shark. Come on. This is slowly creeping from ‘marginally amusing connections’ to a bold-faced declaration of just how unoriginal Jurassic World might be.
Anghus Houvouras is a North Carolina based writer and filmmaker. His latest work, the novel My Career Suicide Note, is available from Amazon. Follow him on Twitter.
Missouri_Jack says
Umm… more like DBS was a rip off of the original JP. Hubris of geneticists creating life despite the warnings of the more grounded but ultimately ignored scientists. “Life finds a way” “They’re testing the fences for weakness” Sam Jackson is hired just to be eaten? Hello? More like JW is daring DBS to say something when Renny copied Crichton first.
anghus says
touche
show me the money says
I’m telling you, this movie is going to impress people.
rubyangel says
I’m getting a sense of deja vu from all these online articles that are already proclaiming that Fantastic Four will be a dud, that Batman versus Superman will tank at the box office, and now Jurassic World is just a rip-off of Deep Blue Sea, so the implication is, then why bother to go see it? Sorry, Anghus, I’ll be there when JW opens. I recall the same online articles that claimed that Captain America: The Winter Solider was destined to be a box office failure; “Guardians of the Galaxy” received the same treatment. You’re entitled to your own opinion, but that’s all this article is. Bet you’ll be there when Jurassic World opens too.
anghus says
i never try to predict what will be a hit and what won’t. If you told me 5 years ago the 7th Fast and Furious movie would make a billion dollars, i would have sprained my sternum from laughter. I am far the arbiter of taste or the prognosticator of popularity. I just try and write entertaining columns that make people laugh and/or think. And of course i’ll be there. I write about movies. If i went to see TMNT and Transformers 4, i’ll see Jurassic World.
SweetdickWilly says
Blood in the Water is the name of the song by LL Cool J in DBS.
anghus says
i never knew that. True story: every time i go to the beach (which is often because i live in a beach town), i jump into the water and declare DEEPEST…. BLUEST…. MY HAT IS LIKE A SHARk’S FIN. 99% of the people i hang out with have no idea what i’m talking about. Also, i’m bummed there was never a sequel, because they already had the perfect name: DEEPEST BLUEST SEA
Cash money says
This article gave me an aneurysm. Since this article is all about opinion. I’ll give mine. Deep Blue Sea was terrible.
Guest says
Unoriginal, you got that right. It’s not DBS though. There is a series of books, the first of which is entitled Meg, by Steve Alten. This movie is a massive rip off of those books, especially the second and third books in the series.
Jack Ryan says
I think the analogy is basically valid. It does appear that this film will have basically the same premise as DBS. Although, the poster is showing a Great White Shark. And this could just be a riff on Spielberg topping himself from Jaws. After all, the sharks in Deep Blue Sea were not Great Whites…
Kyle Nelson Roberts says
Isn’t every movie just a rip off of some other movie? Great logic you have going there.
anghus says
Response to question #1: Yes.
Response to statement: Thank You.
Dave Montey says
Silly fag-dicks are for chicks!!! Be seeing you around boy!!! Lmfao
Gunsuit says
when a friend showed me the first teaser and plot for Jurassic world the first thing i said was. “Wait, so there making a deep blue sea with dinosaurs… Sure, id see a deep blue sea sequel!”
Kurt Franklin says
Jurassic World is very similar to Deep Blue Sea. I was curious if anyone else though this. If you recall what happened to Sam Jackson in DBS, something shockingly similar happens in this film as well. I feel like this article is right on.