Sometimes, the call of nostalgia and influential blockbusters is too tempting to ignore. Despite his intended desire to stay away from blockbusters and big-brand I.P., and try and stick to original films, filmmaker Gareth Edwards is stepping in to direct the new “Jurassic World” film from writer David Koepp, the original screenwriter of Steven Spielberg’s “Jurassic Park.”
Edwards is “replacing” “Deadpool 2” and “Bullet Train” filmmaker David Leitch, who was briefly engaged in negotiations to direct the film but fell out over creative differences. Perhaps speed had something to do with it, too.
Universal and Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Partners have already set a July 2, 2025 release date, meaning the film has to go into production fast and likely no later than this summer (and June is the intended start date).
Edwards has directed franchise films like “Godzilla” and “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.” Last year, he directed “The Creator,” an original sci-fi film in the vein of “Blade Runner” and Francis Ford Coppola’s “Apocalypse Now” that he conceived himself and co-wrote with Chris Weitz. When asked around the time of the film’s release about “Thor 5” rumors, which he confirmed were just that, rumors, and what other I.P. interested him, Edwards said the taste of freedom he got on “The Creator” was something he wanted to keep chasing in the future.
“I’m very excited about the future of cinema, personally. I feel like everything we did differently on “The Creator” is probably the strongest part of the film,” he explained when asked what other blockbuster properties he would want to tackle. “And I just want to push that even further, so having the freedom and being able to take risks, being allowed to fail. I think that’s all an important part of any creativity.”
“I don’t want to go back to the other way of making films,” he said in another interview at the time, echoing the idea of sticking with original films. “[‘The Creator’] was such an eye-opener with everything we took a gamble on sort of paid off. So I just want to make films in the same style and keep pushing it further if I can.”
But Edwards seems like a boy at heart, and sometimes a boy can’t say no to the seminal myths that inspired him to be a filmmaker in the first place. And that’s hard to argue with.
This new “Jurassic World” is intended to be a fresh take on the material and will not feature Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard, nor the original trilogy’s actors Jeff Goldblum, Laura Dern, and Sam Neill. Whether that means a start-from-scratch reboot or not remains unclear, but honestly, starting anew sounds like a breath of fresh air in the world of legacy sequels, continuations, and all that business.