Dr. Grant, my dear Dr. Sattler… welcome to Jurassic Park: The Ultimate Visual History. Gizmodo is excited to reveal the official cover and multiple spreads from an upcoming behind-the-scenes tome which publisher Insight Editions is calling “the last word on the most epic saga in movie history — the definitive behind-the-scenes book that fans have been waiting for.” Written by James Mottram, the 250+ page book features a foreword by Sam Neill, an introduction by Laura Dern, and an afterword by Jeff Goldblum.
Jurassic Park: The Ultimate Visual History details the development, making of, and cultural impact of the original Jurassic Park trilogy: Jurassic Park, The Lost World: Jurassic Park, and, yes, even Jurassic Park III. In addition, it comes with 19 special inserts which include a Jurassic Park brochure, the cover of Alan Grant’s book, and a postcard from Jurassic Park itself. And though Amazon (where you can pre-order the book for its October 26 release date) previously had a placeholder image, here’s your first look at the actual cover.
Tim and Lex look very, very scared of what’s following them. But you shouldn’t be scared of what follows here because it’s a few exclusive snippets from the book. First up, pages on the person who created Jurassic Park, Michael Crichton.
Next up, a few pages on the design of the park itself. Here, specifically, the iconic gate, including an alternate piece of concept art of a wider version.
Here, a quick story on how cutting one of the dinosaurs (one that eventually ended up in Jurassic World) kind of saved the movie. Plus, a sketch of where everything was around the complex, at least in the minds of the designers.
Most people probably realise the sick triceratops was a live prop, and here the book goes into the designing, creating, and filming of it. A funny bonus is the photo of director Steven Spielberg and his producer, current Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy, with the prop. In the years, the set photo has become online meme fodder as “evidence” that the two of them killed the animal.
Beyond just a massive film series, Jurassic Park now exists throughout pop culture and the book gets into that. Here, a few pages on how the film about a theme park made it into an actual theme park.
And, of course, the book certainly has plenty on Stan Winston, the legend who designed the Jurassic dinosaurs, and everyone’s favourite, the T-Rex.
You can expect the same sort of details and insight into not just The Lost World and Jurassic Park III, but video games, toys, comics, and more. It truly seems like one of those must-have books for fans of the series.