I’ve got to tell you: I didn’t expect the first teaser trailer for Netflix’s to make my ovaries scream for a bunch of CGI children fleeing for their lives from carnivorous dinosaurs. And yet, here we are.
Netflix has released the first teaser for Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous, a DreamWorks animated series produced by Steven Speilberg and Colin Trevorrow, that takes place during the first Jurassic World movie. It turns out that on the opposite end of the island of Isla Nublar, a bunch of teenagers with very little adult supervision were attending a summer camp filled with dinosaurs. I’d ask what parents thought that was a good idea, but given everything going on in the United States right now, I’m not even gonna go there.
Camp Cretaceous stars Paul-Mikél Williams as Darius, Jenna Ortega as Brooklynn, Ryan Potter as Kenji, Raini Rodriguez as Sammy, Sean Giambrone as Ben, Kausar Mohammed as Yaz, Jameela Jamil as Roxie, Glen Powell as Dave. The show will focus on six teens struggling to survive the dinosaurs — again, where the hell are all the adults — as they uncover “hidden secrets so deep they threaten the world itself.” Hmm, I wonder if it’s a volcano that’s going to destroy the island, I don’t know, one movie from now. Or maybe it’s more dinosaur hybrids. This franchise is all about those for some reason.
As we see in the teaser trailer, this isn’t about a bunch of kids going all Monster Squad on the dinosaurs, making the velociraptors trip on marbles before giving them a good gymnastics kick in the face (one of those things actually happened in a Jurassic Park movie, so there’s precedent!). Instead, it’s one minute of watching children scream in terror as they’re chased by dinosaurs that could outrun them in an instant and tear their little legs off. Look, I grew up in the ‘90s, I know all about the righteousness of “kid power.” But nothing about what I saw in Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous made me think this is anything but cruel and unusual punishment. Yes they’re CGI kids, and yes they’re all going to survive (presumably). But like, at least give them some slingshots or something! This is ridiculous.
Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous comes out with its first eight-episode season on September 18. The third movie in the Jurassic World trilogy is currently on-and-off in production (the times we’re living in).
Correction: A previous version of this story stated the show’s debut as September 22. In fact, it’s September 18. We regret the error.