Mosasaurus Lagoon retcon

Now that the movie is available on Digital HD, I decided to look at both JW movies to compare the layout of the lagoon to see if the so-called retcon is truly a retcon (spoiler: yes, it is).

Jurassic World:





Fallen Kingdom:





It's actually kind of impressive how blatant this retcon is. There are numerous moments in the first Jurassic World where we are shown sweeping shots of the lagoon, and it's clearly in the interior of the island, and with no connection to any other bodies of water. At one side, there are hotels and an artificial beach, and at the other, there's Main Street. In Fallen Kingdom, the lagoon is much, much larger, and the hotels are all gone, replaced by that monolithic fence with the automatic gate leading to the ocean.

This might be pushing it, but I do think there could be some logical explanation as to how the gate was included and can fit within the Lagoon. On the Jurassic World brochure, specifically the map of the Jurassic World Resort, there is a large grey facility simply labelled “Security” built along the southeastern section of the Lagoon. 



Perhaps it was intended to have been added to the lagoon from the beginning, but it does seem strange that there wasn’t a large establishing shot of the park in Fallen Kingdom mirroring Masrani’s arrival. There was concept art for this shot but seems to have been discarded, which is a shame because offers a decent shot of the resort in ruins and shows that the lagoon gate is in the same location as the security facility.

Spoiler:

Colin said somewheres that the lagoon is connected to the ocean with a series of canals. Also said that he didnt realise that they changed the location of the lagoon untill the movie was finished. Doesnt explain the gate though.

Trexbreakout wrote:

Colin said somewheres that the lagoon is connected to the ocean with a series of canals. Also said that he didnt realise that they changed the location of the lagoon untill the movie was finished. Doesnt explain the gate though.

The interesting thing is, he's actually 100% correct. Remember the satellite maps we have of Nublar from the first film. There's a series of rivers that stretch throughout the island. One of the main branches lead right into the heart of Isla Nublar, and terminates right where the lagoon is in the center of the island.

Nice find. Here's what Colin said;

"The lagoon is in the center of the island, connected to the ocean by a canal system. The digital maps in the film are incorrect, not a retcon. My fault for missing it, I had no idea the change was made until it was too late. Hope you guys can forgive it."

and the link https://twitter.com/colintrevorrow/status/1008658304841723906?lang=en

Trexbreakout wrote:

Nice find. Here's what Colin said;

"The lagoon is in the center of the island, connected to the ocean by a canal system. The digital maps in the film are incorrect, not a retcon. My fault for missing it, I had no idea the change was made until it was too late. Hope you guys can forgive it."

and the link https://twitter.com/colintrevorrow/status/1008658304841723906?lang=en

Look at the second screenshot in the post, or just watch the part of the movie when Masrani arrives in the helipad. You can clearly see that the lagoon isn't connected to any other bodies of water, it's just an (presumably) artificial lagoon on the center of the island.

That's just Trevorrow trying to hand-wave his lazy writing. He and Connolly basically wanted the Mosasaurus to break free and noticed they wrote themselves into a hole, so they just decided to retcon the entire layout of the lagoon and insert an automatic gate (God only knows what's the purpose of that in-universe) and hoped no one would notice/care.

Mr. Robustus wrote:

Trexbreakout wrote:

Nice find. Here's what Colin said;

"The lagoon is in the center of the island, connected to the ocean by a canal system. The digital maps in the film are incorrect, not a retcon. My fault for missing it, I had no idea the change was made until it was too late. Hope you guys can forgive it."

and the link https://twitter.com/colintrevorrow/status/1008658304841723906?lang=en

Look at the second screenshot in the post, or just watch the part of the movie when Masrani arrives in the helipad. You can clearly see that the lagoon isn't connected to any other bodies of water, it's just an (presumably) artificial lagoon on the center of the island.

That's just Trevorrow trying to hand-wave his lazy writing. He and Connolly basically wanted the Mosasaurus to break free and noticed they wrote themselves into a hole, so they just decided to retcon the entire layout of the lagoon and insert an automatic gate (God only knows what's the purpose of that in-universe) and hoped no one would notice/care.

Well, 95% of general audience didn't notice. Fans notice everything instead

Here’s a more detailed look of the Isla Nublar map from Fallen Kingdom, with locations of the airfield and shipping harbour.

Spoiler:

I wish there was an accurate map that has all events and locations from all the nublar movies

Funny enough early JW concept art had the lagoon connected to the ocean, but so much for long term planning huh?

Sobek wrote:

Funny enough early JW concept art had the lagoon connected to the ocean, but so much for long term planning huh?

Other then foreshadowing Indoraptor, did they make any long term plans for this new trilogy?

Rhedosaurus wrote:

Sobek wrote:

Funny enough early JW concept art had the lagoon connected to the ocean, but so much for long term planning huh?

Other then foreshadowing Indoraptor, did they make any long term plans for this new trilogy?

They pretty much new they had to destroy Nublar and get the dinos to the mainland. Everything else they're making up as they go.

I don't think it's that bad. It can still be worked in-universe. We never got a good look at the northeastern bit of the lagoon, even in that helicopter shot. The canal system can still be implemented.

Sobek wrote:

Rhedosaurus wrote:

Sobek wrote:

Funny enough early JW concept art had the lagoon connected to the ocean, but so much for long term planning huh?

Other then foreshadowing Indoraptor, did they make any long term plans for this new trilogy?

They pretty much new they had to destroy Nublar and get the dinos to the mainland. Everything else they're making up as they go.

If Spielberg is so overprotective of this franchise, then how in the world can he let Colin get away with this?

I've never been one of the fans to try to take the geography of Isla Nublar very seriously -- from what I recall, early maps didn't seem fully in line with some of what was seen onscreen, and obviously those maps did not leave out a massive chunk for the future films to build on, either. We saw Sorna look obviously different between two films and we all know the 'region' thing is a retcon and an excuse. Jurassic World was also not entirely thorough about making sure the geographic stream of events made complete sense. I honestly didn't even realize on my first showing that the Mosasaurus tank was necessarily the lagoon from the first film anyway.

Consequently, I haven't felt too worried about the supposed retcon related to the lagoon. I honestly made the same connection in my own head as soon as I saw the scene in the theater as Trevorrow is touting now. I don't see why it seems like such a lazy stretch to people.

Rhedosaurus wrote:

If Spielberg is so overprotective of this franchise, then how in the world can he let Colin get away with this?

It seems clear to me that Spielberg and presumably Marshall have had ideas they wanted to bring into the franchise - hybrids, escaped dinosaurs, trained raptors, further exploration of genetics, a new park - and they're letting Trevorrow and crew fill in the gaps in that genetic code. A lot of those elements date back to the Sayles script, and those that don't have been substantiated from before Trevorrow as well.

I believe the problem with Fallen Kingdom was that Trevorrow knew what story he wanted to tell in the third film, but that they hadn't plotted out how to get from the first point to the third point - and indeed, Bayona mentioned that Trevorrow wanted Fallen Kingdom's story to go "further" and they had to dial it back to what's depicted in the final film. Keeping in mind the film has a firm division between the Nublar rescue mission and the Lockwood Manor elements, I think these story components were mostly there to facilitate movement between the beginning and end of the trilogy, and that, yes, facilitated drawing some things out and making up as we went along.

In short, I firmly believe Fallen Kingdom suffered in the hope for a better Jurassic World 3. Only time will tell if it was worthwhile.

JVM wrote:

Rhedosaurus wrote:

If Spielberg is so overprotective of this franchise, then how in the world can he let Colin get away with this?

It seems clear to me that Spielberg and presumably Marshall have had ideas they wanted to bring into the franchise -  hybrids, escaped dinosaurs, trained raptors, further exploration of genetics, a new park - and they're letting Trevorrow and crew fill in the gaps in that genetic code. A lot of those elements date back to the Sayles script, and those that don't have been substantiated from before Trevorrow as well.

I believe the problem with Fallen Kingdom was that Trevorrow knew what story he wanted to tell in the third film, but that they hadn't plotted out how to get from the first point to the third point - and indeed, Bayona mentioned that Trevorrow wanted Fallen Kingdom's story to go "further" and they had to dial it back to what's depicted in the final film. Keeping in mind the film has a firm division between the Nublar rescue mission and the Lockwood Manor elements, I think these story components were mostly there to facilitate movement between the beginning and end of the trilogy, and that, yes, facilitated drawing some things out and making up as we went along.

In short, I firmly believe Fallen Kingdom suffered in the hope for a better Jurassic World 3. Only time will tell if it was worthwhile.

Here's the problem, most bridge movies don't do well. If anything else, they wind up harming the upcoming product they are heavily foreshadowing. Just look at how the fallout from BvS winded up causing Justice League to bomb hard.

Spielberg doesn't care as much about the franchise as people think. Even during JP his mind was set elsewhere.

They have ideas they want and Colin is somewhat forced to make them work. Problem is they keep changing their minds all the time and they don't know how to map it out very well.

but Universal is also to blame. They don't even want us to know about past drafts and unused ideas (wonder why the alternate Indoraptor concepts and the destruction of Nublar were taken down?)

Sobek wrote:

Spielberg doesn't care as much about the franchise as people think. Even during JP his mind was set elsewhere.

They have ideas they want and Colin is somewhat forced to make them work. Problem is they keep changing their minds all the time and they don't know how to map it out very well.

but Universal is also to blame. They don't even want us to know about past drafts and unused ideas (wonder why the alternate Indoraptor concepts and the destruction of Nublar were taken down?)

what do you mean taken down?

JVM wrote:

I've never been one of the fans to try to take the geography of Isla Nublar very seriously -- from what I recall, early maps didn't seem fully in line with some of what was seen onscreen, and obviously those maps did not leave out a massive chunk for the future films to build on, either. We saw Sorna look obviously different between two films and we all know the 'region' thing is a retcon and an excuse. Jurassic World was also not entirely thorough about making sure the geographic stream of events made complete sense. I honestly didn't even realize on my first showing that the Mosasaurus tank was necessarily the lagoon from the first film anyway.

Consequently, I haven't felt too worried about the supposed retcon related to the lagoon. I honestly made the same connection in my own head as soon as I saw the scene in the theater as Trevorrow is touting now. I don't see why it seems like such a lazy stretch to people.

The difference between this and other retcons in this series is that this isn't a soft-canon map contradicting other soft-canon maps, it's a well established landmark from the previous movie whose entire layout was changed, and the writer/exec. producer can't even admit that. In JW there were several sweeping shots of the lagoon scattered across the movie that gave the viewer a good idea of its relative size and layout, and then, in the very opening scene of the sequel, it's completely changed. Also, the existence of an automatic gate on that lagoon is just lazy writing.

What makes it worse is that it was 100% unnecessary and didn't amount to anything. The Mosasaurus didn't factor into any of the events of Fallen Kingdom, it was just setup for the next movie. It even presents a huge plot hole because, according to Trevorrow, it was swimming free in the Pacific attacking swimmers for two and a half years, and no one noticed or did a thing about it that whole time. If they wanted to have a sea reptile roaming free on the oceans for the third movie, they could've just let the Mosasaurus die during the eruption (or just starve to death), and introduce another Mosasaurus in the next movie, created by a company that bought its genetic code and couldn't contain it.

Sobek wrote:

Spielberg doesn't care as much about the franchise as people think. Even during JP his mind was set elsewhere.

They have ideas they want and Colin is somewhat forced to make them work. Problem is they keep changing their minds all the time and they don't know how to map it out very well.

but Universal is also to blame. They don't even want us to know about past drafts and unused ideas (wonder why the alternate Indoraptor concepts and the destruction of Nublar were taken down?)

If Spielberg never cared about this franchis, then why doesn't he just leave it outright or Universal just fire him?

Mr. Robustus wrote:

JVM wrote:

I've never been one of the fans to try to take the geography of Isla Nublar very seriously -- from what I recall, early maps didn't seem fully in line with some of what was seen onscreen, and obviously those maps did not leave out a massive chunk for the future films to build on, either. We saw Sorna look obviously different between two films and we all know the 'region' thing is a retcon and an excuse. Jurassic World was also not entirely thorough about making sure the geographic stream of events made complete sense. I honestly didn't even realize on my first showing that the Mosasaurus tank was necessarily the lagoon from the first film anyway.

Consequently, I haven't felt too worried about the supposed retcon related to the lagoon. I honestly made the same connection in my own head as soon as I saw the scene in the theater as Trevorrow is touting now. I don't see why it seems like such a lazy stretch to people.

The difference between this and other retcons in this series is that this isn't a soft-canon map contradicting other soft-canon maps, it's a well established landmark from the previous movie whose entire layout was changed, and the writer/exec. producer can't even admit that. In JW there were several sweeping shots of the lagoon scattered across the movie that gave the viewer a good idea of its relative size and layout, and then, in the very opening scene of the sequel, it's completely changed. Also, the existence of an automatic gate on that lagoon is just lazy writing.

What makes it worse is that it was 100% unnecessary and didn't amount to anything. The Mosasaurus didn't factor into any of the events of Fallen Kingdom, it was just setup for the next movie. It even presents a huge plot hole because, according to Trevorrow, it was swimming free in the Pacific attacking swimmers for two and a half years, and no one noticed or did a thing about it that whole time. If they wanted to have a sea reptile roaming free on the oceans for the third movie, they could've just let the Mosasaurus die during the eruption (or just starve to death), and introduce another Mosasaurus in the next movie, created by a company that bought its genetic code and couldn't contain it.

Does ANYBODY care about canon and good writing anymore?! I mean seriously. The more I hear and read, the more I'm convinced that The Lost World is the last JP movie that Universal cared about and thus, the last good JP movie and the best JP sequel by default.

[quote="Rhedosaurus"]

Sobek wrote:

Spielberg doesn't care as much about the franchise as people think. Even during JP his mind was set elsewhere.

They have ideas they want and Colin is somewhat forced to make them work. Problem is they keep changing their minds all the time and they don't know how to map it out very well.

but Universal is also to blame. They don't even want us to know about past drafts and unused ideas (wonder why the alternate Indoraptor concepts and the destruction of Nublar were taken down?)

If Spielberg never cared about this franchis, then why doesn't he just leave it outright or Universal just fire him?

Well.. he likes the franchise, but he is not as deeply involved with it as people think he is. He is not like Peter Jackson. Universal would never fire him, he is Spielberg after all.

He has ideas he wants to see implemented (like the motorcycles in JW, the trained raptors and all) and that's about it.

Mr. Robustus wrote:

JVM wrote:

I've never been one of the fans to try to take the geography of Isla Nublar very seriously -- from what I recall, early maps didn't seem fully in line with some of what was seen onscreen, and obviously those maps did not leave out a massive chunk for the future films to build on, either. We saw Sorna look obviously different between two films and we all know the 'region' thing is a retcon and an excuse. Jurassic World was also not entirely thorough about making sure the geographic stream of events made complete sense. I honestly didn't even realize on my first showing that the Mosasaurus tank was necessarily the lagoon from the first film anyway.

Consequently, I haven't felt too worried about the supposed retcon related to the lagoon. I honestly made the same connection in my own head as soon as I saw the scene in the theater as Trevorrow is touting now. I don't see why it seems like such a lazy stretch to people.

The difference between this and other retcons in this series is that this isn't a soft-canon map contradicting other soft-canon maps, it's a well established landmark from the previous movie whose entire layout was changed, and the writer/exec. producer can't even admit that. In JW there were several sweeping shots of the lagoon scattered across the movie that gave the viewer a good idea of its relative size and layout, and then, in the very opening scene of the sequel, it's completely changed. Also, the existence of an automatic gate on that lagoon is just lazy writing.

What makes it worse is that it was 100% unnecessary and didn't amount to anything. The Mosasaurus didn't factor into any of the events of Fallen Kingdom, it was just setup for the next movie. It even presents a huge plot hole because, according to Trevorrow, it was swimming free in the Pacific attacking swimmers for two and a half years, and no one noticed or did a thing about it that whole time. If they wanted to have a sea reptile roaming free on the oceans for the third movie, they could've just let the Mosasaurus die during the eruption (or just starve to death), and introduce another Mosasaurus in the next movie, created by a company that bought its genetic code and couldn't contain it.

The lagoon and gate in Fallen Kingdom are retcons no doubt but I've seen way worse so it doesn't seem like a big deal to me. The Mosasaurus might have simply ate whales for two and a half years and just appeared to humans at end of Fallen Kingdom.

They shoulda gone with canals. Not even for canon's sake but cos it could've been a fun chase with the submersible, bit of levity with mosa getting stuck in the tight channel, but eventually slithering out and chomping them before they reached the ocean. Later claire and screamer could've sunk near the canal exit/submersible wreckage, throw in a nice jaws reference of a skeleton popping out lol. making him scream again, i guess. bit of humor in the sinking dinosaurs scene. was it written by rian j? universal get in touch i'll write you a decent JW3 without retcons but with total locational canon. esp if you do sorna again (unlikely tho right?) and before you give that snowy mountains or a desert or something. pff.

Mr. Robustus wrote:

JVM wrote:

I've never been one of the fans to try to take the geography of Isla Nublar very seriously -- from what I recall, early maps didn't seem fully in line with some of what was seen onscreen, and obviously those maps did not leave out a massive chunk for the future films to build on, either. We saw Sorna look obviously different between two films and we all know the 'region' thing is a retcon and an excuse. Jurassic World was also not entirely thorough about making sure the geographic stream of events made complete sense. I honestly didn't even realize on my first showing that the Mosasaurus tank was necessarily the lagoon from the first film anyway.

Consequently, I haven't felt too worried about the supposed retcon related to the lagoon. I honestly made the same connection in my own head as soon as I saw the scene in the theater as Trevorrow is touting now. I don't see why it seems like such a lazy stretch to people.

The difference between this and other retcons in this series is that this isn't a soft-canon map contradicting other soft-canon maps, it's a well established landmark from the previous movie whose entire layout was changed, and the writer/exec. producer can't even admit that. In JW there were several sweeping shots of the lagoon scattered across the movie that gave the viewer a good idea of its relative size and layout, and then, in the very opening scene of the sequel, it's completely changed. Also, the existence of an automatic gate on that lagoon is just lazy writing.

What makes it worse is that it was 100% unnecessary and didn't amount to anything. The Mosasaurus didn't factor into any of the events of Fallen Kingdom, it was just setup for the next movie. It even presents a huge plot hole because, according to Trevorrow, it was swimming free in the Pacific attacking swimmers for two and a half years, and no one noticed or did a thing about it that whole time. If they wanted to have a sea reptile roaming free on the oceans for the third movie, they could've just let the Mosasaurus die during the eruption (or just starve to death), and introduce another Mosasaurus in the next movie, created by a company that bought its genetic code and couldn't contain it.

I like you man, and you raise a lot of valid points, but it really doesn't feel a dramatic layout change to me. There's no shot that shows the entire lagoon edge to edge that's been brought to my attention, and there's still two years of time for the change on the island. The hotels could've been knocked down, something could be wrong with the filters, so on and so forth. It feels to me on the same level as Sorna's drastic visual change from a redwood, boreal forest look to a tropical rainforest, which is something we've been handwaving for a decade and a half over an excuse that makes even less scientific sense than the 'canals' reasoning. I'm not saying we should be more mad about the other thing, but to me, it set a clear precedent the island's geographies are subject to dramatic change.

I mean, let me be real for a second - I don't think the Mosasaurus and aquatic reptiles were never a smart choice for this franchise because they inherently opened up a lot of plot holes, such as the exact ones we're dealing with right now, that would have opened up sooner or later. It's a significantly larger biological stretch and they're more difficult to contain -- but they were cool and scary, so people wanted them, and they're here to stay now. There were never going to be clear ways to reconcile these questions. FK followed on this trend by setting up scenes that were cool and scary, but not logical - and my experience is those are the scenes people are praising from the film, not the ones they're angry about.

Now, let me be clear -- I think it'd be a lot, lot better if the people involved in the film came out and said 'This is a retcon, and we made a mistake, but we're going to work with it this way for the future'. I think filmmakers need to be transparent about their creative process, and I feel Universal has been particularly reluctant to acknowledge these films as longer, ongoing projects with multiple stages of production, in favor of focusing solely on the final product. (Which makes sense in film criticism, but can be frustrating for studying the long-term history and franchise development.)

I'm not trying to argue that this isn't a retcon or that it's very well-executed, it's not, but it doesn't break my suspension of disbelief or strike me as lazier than usual.