You Should Be Watching: Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous
Listen we take our job very seriously here at the You Should Be Watching desk. We understand there are simply not enough hours in the day to catch everything and while we could recommend obvious hits we try to find the things that go overlooked and under appreciated. Our choice today has the name value, has the exposure but may not be on your radar for one very big reason… It’s a kids show?
Yes, Netflix has debuted its Jurassic Park animated show Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous which appears to be for kids until you really start watching it. I know it’s aimed towards kids because it’s recommended on my kids account and McDonald’s has Camp Cretaceous themed Happy Meal toys. I honestly wasn’t going to give it the time of day till I watched a few minutes of it with my kids who are obsessed with it. This is no straight kids show, we got dinos straight eating people, kids being left for dead and some serious jump scares. Seriously for an adult it will be fine but what are they doing to these kids? Aesthetic wise, the animation is done by DreamWorks animation so it looks very similar to the How to Train Your Dragons show on Netflix. The dinosaurs look to be faithfully captured from similar models to their motion picture big brothers and the audio both in sound effects and score is movie quality. Maybe that’s why it’s so jarring. We’ve been trained to see animation and know it’s safe and tame. Then a T-Rex comes and chomps the whole thing to bits.
The show really captures the heart of Jurassic Park. It has the swelling music, the Dino obsessed kid who is in awe of the miracle that he’s seeing with his own eyes. Then the absolute disaster and crippling fear of being devoured by those very dinos. When you think about it a young kid in danger has always been at the heart of Jurassic Park this is just taking it to that next level. The story follows Darius who actually has a very sweet story. It was his dad and his dream to go to Jurassic World but it is crazy expensive. After his father passed away Darius became obsessed with winning a JP sponsored video game that if you can win you get a free golden ticket to the park. That’s right we got some Willy Wonka in here as well. Darius wins the game with his Dino knowledge and gets his bunk in a test run of the new kids adventure camp, Camp Cretaceous. Along for the ride are other various kids from different backgrounds including a vlogger with millions of followers, a rich kid whose father owns some condos on the island, an athletic champion and a loaner nervous kid. The different situations and experiences the various kids bring to the story make for some dynamic encounters once the you know what, hits the fan.
Oh and it hits the fan, the show has some pretty epic twists and ends on a cliffhanger that has big implications for the story of Jurassic World and Fallen Kingdom. And according to the show’s creators they consulted with Colin Treverow and Stephen Spielberg about almost everything and considered it to be canon. The best way to watch the show is to try to put your mind in that of a kid. As an adult you likely won’t be scared by the jump scares or phased by the deaths but if you think about a child who probably isn’t ready for this type of suspense or to see people get devoured by dinosaurs it’s crazy. They just don’t make kids shows like this these days. It’s a pretty easy watch with the first season only having 8 episodes but if you’re a Jurassic Park fan it’s actually a fun watch with a lot to offer an adult willing to give it a chance. IF you have kids and think they can handle it, it could be fun to watch it with them as well. So I know a kids Netflix show set in Jurassic Park where people get eaten was not even on your list of things you need in your life but it’s worth checking out.
