In 1993, Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park dazzled audiences with digitally created dinosaurs like nothing that had ever been seen before. It was one of the first films to showcase the true potential of CGI in filmmaking with special effects that still hold up to this day. Since then, the movie has spawned two direct sequels as well as the new Jurassic World series. Later this year, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom will arrive in theatres to delight fans and dinosaur lovers once again. With such a rich history of movies, novels, toys, and video games that the series h😼as inspired, we have a massiv𝓀e amount of content to both analyze and enjoy.
For this list, we'll be taking a look at 20 of the weirdest and most awesome facts about the Jurassic Park series as a whole. We'll be diving into the depths of the story's official canon, pouring over the production of the films, and even taking a look at some projects that never saw the light of day. A lot of work has gone into this franchise, with creative minds from all areas of modern entertainment adding♈ their own twist to its success. With so many minds and so many years put into it, there are more than a few surprises from this series that you're likely not to know. Take a look and enjoy as we present 20 things you didn't know about the world of Jurassic Park.
20 The Roar Of The Tyrannosaurs Rex 🐼
The iconic roar of the Tyrannosaurus in Jurassic Park is one of the most recogn💦izable sound effects ever created. The original recordings have been used consistently throughout the film series and have also appeared many times in other forms of media. As with all the dinosaur sound effects created for the film, various🍬 noises from the natural world were mixed to make entirely new sounds.
The T-Rex needed to sound large, loud, and menacing.
To achieve this a combination of baby elephants grunts, tiger roars and alligator hisses were used. A whale's blow was used for the animal's breathing, and dog growls were also used as it took down a Gallimimus later in the film. These combinations of sound were intended to make the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park sound as close as possible to real living creatures while still beingꦐ unique.
19 ♈ The Original Rexy
According to the official canon, the Tyrannosaurus we see in the first Jurassic Park movie is the exact same creature we see in Jurassic World. That means that the same T-Rex 🐻we saw breaking out of its pen and chasing down Jeeps in the first film was also the one set 𝄹free by Claire to fight the Indominus.
You can even see scars along the creature's neck and midsection from where the raptors attacked her at the end of the first Jurassic Park.
The name Rexy comes from the Jurassic Park novel. In it, the game warden Robert Muldoon refers to her as Rexy as he's hunting her down to tranquillize her. The name stuck among fans of the series enough that the creators of Jurassic World thought it worthwhile to bring her back.
18 ও The Lost World's Lost Ending
One of the most famous moments in Jurassic Park history would be the San Diego incident at the climax of The Lost World. The male T-Rex is brought to the mainland and we finally get to see what it's like for a din൲osaur to terrorize a real city.
This ending is definitely a memorable one but it wasn't the ending written in the original script.
Originally, the film would have ended after all the humans 𝔉escaped from the island. The team would have radioed for help at the village like we see in the movie and would have left on helicopters after narrowly escaping from a group of raptors. The climax would consist of fending off flying pter🍸osaurs trying to attack the helicopters. While the movie was being filmed, Spielberg decided to change this ending in exchange for something bigger.
So that's how they ended up with the Tyra꧒nnosaur in San Diego.
17 🌞 Claymation Goes Extinct ﷽
During the early production stages of the original Jurassic Park movie, Steven Spielberg planned to use stop-motion clay figures made by Phil Tippet for all fullscreen shots of dinosaurs. These would have been intercut with the full-sized animatronic dinosaurs designed by ♔Stan Winston. Miniature clay models for every dinosaur had been made, along with several screen tests and real-time storyboards already filmed.
Luckily for us, Spielberg felt that these claymation dinosaurs wouldn't fulfill the expectations he had for the film.
After several tests with Dennis Muren at ILM studios, it was decided to go full steam ahead using CGI technology for all the dinosaurs. As they watched their first CGI test with 🍸a full-sized Tyrannosaur, Phil Tippet turned to Steven to say the words "I think I'm extin▨ct."
Those words꧋ would be spoken in the movie itself by Ian Malcolm.
16 ღ The Sick Triceratops
While touring the park for the first time, Alan Grant and the others happen upon the park v😼et tending to a sick Triceratops in the field. They're particularly concerned and goes to some pretty extreme len🌞gths to discover the cause of the illness. Eventually, the group has to move on and we never hear from the sick animal again through the rest of the film.
The movie may not explain why the Triceratops was so sick, but the original novel by Michael Crichton has an explanation of its own.
In the book, several Stegosauruses have gotten sick due to eating West Indian lilac berries. The dinosaurs were already afflicted with gall stones when they had been swallowing the berries, which made them more ill. That expla꧂ins why tജhe investigations we see from on film were unsuccessful.
15 Jurassic Park Surviva🌊l
The history of Jurassic Park has included a number of video games over the years. To correspond with the release of Jurassic Park 3, Universal Interactive planned to release a video game called Jurassic Park: Survival. The project was eventually scrapped due to budget problems, but not without giving awꦯay a few screenshots such as the one above.
According to the developers, this game was not going to tie into the story of Jurassic Park 3 in any significant way. Instead, there would have been a completely new and oﷺriginal story involving a scientist sent to study the dinosaurs on the island, along with government agents and shadowy corporate espionage groups trying to steal the dinosaurs from their homes.
The game would have had a focus on puzzle solving and avoiding dinos♉aurs rather than fighting. Sadly, it lo🧔oks like this one is unlikely to see the light of day.
14 🧜 Troubled Production 🔥
Considered a low point by many fans of the series, Jurassic Park 3 was beset with troubles from almost day one. According to numerous interviews with the cast and crew, the production moved on continuously without any clear🃏 vision. Director Joe Johnston even me𒀰ntioned that it was an on-set joke that the film's wrap would be the gift of a completed script.
Essentially the entire film had been cast with set-pieces, costumes, dinosaurs, and other special effects specifically designed for one script.
This scr🎀ipt involved the character Alan Grant returning to the island to investigate whether or 🦩not dinosaurs had been escaping to pursue citizens on the mainland. Just five weeks before filming was set to begin, this script was thrown out after $18 million had already been invested in the project.
The film we got to see was written on the fly using the available pieces meant for an entirely d♛ifferent story.
13 A Mutated Super Predato🌄r?
One of the things about Jurassic Park 3 that did stand out was the Spinosaurus. It was a memorable and menacing creature that stalked the humans trying to escape Isla Sorna throu🔯ghout the lengt💧h of the film. The origins of this creature were mysterious, given that it never appeared in the previous movies.
Dr Grant and Billy briefly mention that the Spinosaurus was never on InGen's list.
New developments in the franchise have shed some light on this dinosaur's strange appearance. In promotion of the new Jurassic World film, the web♍site was created. This real website features a🐭 lot of information and clues about the series canon and the next film.
One document on the site mentions that after InGen was bought by , the company secretly bred new animals 🎐on Isla Sorna and experimented with genetic mutations. One of the dinosaurs specifically mentioned was the Spinosaurus.
12 Jurassic Park Extinction 🐼
One aspect of the Jurassic Park novels that never made it to the film was the deadly DX disease. In the Lost World book, Ian Malcolm discovers that the dinosaurs on Isla Sorna had all become infected with the same iꦐllness.
This illness caused all the animals to live shorter lives and would presumably lead to the ultimate end of Site B.
While we haven't seen this idea used in any of the films so far, it was one of several ideas discussed for a Jurassic Park 4 film. After the release of Jurassic Park 3 in 2001, years were spent writing and re-writing different scripts before we ended up with the Jurassic World series. It was rumoured at one time that the DX disease would be surfacing in the 4th instalment of the series and that the title would be Jurassic Park IV: Extinction.
Fan versions are available online, however!
11 The O🐠rigins Of Roland Tembo
Possibly the most memorable character from The Lost World: Jurassic Park, Roland is an experienced hunter whose only goal is to successfully hunt a male Tyrannosaurus. In the film, we clearly see what hi🌌𒅌s personality and ambitions are, but there are quite a few things we don't get to see.
Several scenes about the hunter were written in the original script though many were either cut or deleted from the finished film.
For example in one of the deleted scenes, we see Roland getting into a fight just as he's being invited to join the expedition to Site B. In another part of the script that was never filmed, it was revealed that the Nick Van Owen character had previously run into Roland in South America huntin𝕴g jaguars with only a spear. Clearly, the man has a history of danger, making him one of the most ruthless antagonists the Jurassic Park series has seen so far.