The mad Jurassic Park 4 film that was never made

‘Jurassic Park 4’ took one step closer to becoming a reality on Thursday morning with ‘Rise of the Planet of the Apes’ duo Rick Jaffa and Amanda Silver signed up to pen the script.

Steven Spielberg, who directed the classic original and its sequel in the 90s, announced last summer that plans were afoot and was discussing ideas with Mark Protosevich, the writer behind 2007’s ‘I Am Legend’.


[Related story: What happened to the cast of Jurassic Park]

Thursday’s reports make the much-delayed project seem that bit more tangible, though we’re still waiting on news of a director and the cast.

Whatever direction Jaffa and Silver take the franchise though, it can’t be as barmy as the ‘Jurassic Park 4’ script written by ‘The Departed’ screenwriter William Monahan back in 2007. Simply put, it would have been the maddest Hollywood movie ever made.

Steven Spielberg himself came up with the initial story, which he apparently referred to as "the mother of all ideas".

According to AICN’s review of the script it begins with a pterosaur attack on a baseball game and soon finds its soldier of fortune lead character on the original film’s island Isla Nublar, searching for the shaving cream can Dennis Nedry (Wayne Knight) used to try and steal away DNA samples for a rival company in the first film.

It then takes a turn for the worse as Nick is captured by the company which took over Jurassic Park. He then wakes up in a medieval castle in the Alps, imprisoned by the corporation who are genetically engineering their own dinosaurs... to use as soldiers.

They are described as like a ‘miniature T-Rex’, with modified fore-arms, dextrous fingers, dog DNA for extra obedience but human DNA so they can solve problems. Yes, this was really in the script.

Nick is tasked with training the dinosaurs, who he names Achilles, Hector, Perseus, Orestes and Spartacus (after warriors from Ancient Greek myth and classical Rome) and taking them on missions involving them killing drug dealers. The review didn’t go into much detail for the final third of the story, but hinted at “set pieces that are much, much bigger than anything we’ve seen in the other films, and much crazier.”

This version never saw the light of day. Perhaps it would’ve been too expensive. Perhaps Universal saw sense and decided it was just too bonkers. Whatever the reason, plans to revive the franchise stalled in 2007 and stopped completely after original author Michael Crichton sadly passed away the following year.

A series as lucrative as ‘Jurassic Park’ was never likely to stay dead forever though, and the latest incarnation of the sequel probably won’t follow the same militarised dinosaur path. Jaffa and Silver helped make a movie about a monkey taking over the world seem fairly realistic, and we expect their ‘Jurassic Park 4’ to be a bit more grounded.

Our idea? We’d like to see it set in a new dino theme park, this time in full swing and open to the public before the dinosaurs naturally escape. When the army are called in to save the day they draft a knowledgeable scientist like Ian Malcolm or Alan Grant to head up a group of marine types tasked with saving the day. Think ‘Aliens’... but with dinosaurs. Hollywood, that one’s on us.

What would you like to see from ‘Jurassic Park 4’? Do you think our idea is terrible (it probably is)? Let us know in the comments section below...