Jurassic Park (1993) is a theme park hosting an array of non-animatronic entertainment that delights, excites, and horrifies its tourists. Despite their beauty and aggression, some of the animals represented are not where they belong. Under a geological lens, not a few but the majority of the reptilian cast represented are sorely misplace if not lost from their respective place in time. Though several of them are present for the sake an audience, it matters that such a blockbuster hit names its main event after the wrong era.
The species of Jurassic Park whose range of existence was within one of the three Jurassic Periods are not shown. These missing dinosaurs are the Segisaurus, Proceratosaurus, Metriacanthosaurus, and Stegosaursus and are the only reptiles that were true to the Jurassic Park name. Though they primarily exist at that time, they were not prime features of the film. But when they are presented, it’s a rather subtle acknowledgement as the group are given honorary mention shown as listed tubes of DNA (Jurassic Park).
As for the animals who did have larger parts in Jurassic Park, not enough of them were natives to that time period for the title to remain Jurassic. The Jurassic Period is “the Age of the Reptiles” (Hutchinson “Jurassic”) lasting 64 million years, and of that length of time, less than half of the featured dinosaurs were there. Though “the Jurassic period is known for an increase in the numbers and diversity of dinosaurs.” (Hutchinson “Jurassic”), the array to follow, were certainly not locals.
Though they had ancestors originating or arising in the Jurassic, it is unfair and undermining to label the later shape of dinosaur in the same category as its ancestor. In that manner, the mentioned but unseen is the Herrerasaurus from the Triassic, an earlier era, where dinosaurs certainly had a different set of shared characteristics from the four mentioned Jurassic species. Another oddity is the presence of the listed Baryonx who is from neither the Triassic nor Jurassic but a new development in general called the Cretaceous Period. Fortunately, the Baryonyx is not the only species from this later era of dinosaurs who are better-known if not impossible to not know.
For the casual viewer, there were both the esteemed carnivores and the spectacular herbivores. For the geologically-aware, the first and main contender to remove from the Jurassic List is the most anticipated one of all. The Tyrannosaurus Rex was the biggest stranger of this moderated environment because, in the Jurassic Period, the “carnivorous theropods were small and lightly boned” (Hutchinson “Jurassic”) whereas the Tyrannosaurus Rex is large and heavily built. The species would have to have been much smaller than his Cretaceous size to survive since the diet Jurassic carnivores diet was not solely smaller dinosaurs but insects as well (Hutchinson “Jurassic”). Given where first and following specimens were found, the Tyrannosaurs Rex was a definite resident of the Cretaceous Period (“Tyrannosaurus Rex”). The famed dinosaur shared this era of time with the Triceratops, who also frequented the Late Cretaceous in North America (“Tyrannosaurus Rex”; “Triceratops”).
The Cretaceous years were “the last period of the Mesozoic era” (“Creatceous” encyclopedia.com). Borrowed from that time was also the Parasaurolophus from the Americas (“Parasaurolophus”), but more significantly, the Velociraptor. The Velociraptor, a predator “which no doubt originated in the Late Jurassic” (“Velociraptor”) had not developed into the mature, formidable creature we recognise until sometime within the Late Cretaceous. Its territory included what is today’s Mongolia, where the Gallimimus also resided (“Velociraptor”; “Gallimimus”). A closer inspection on the Velociraptor within both the Jurassic Park novel and film emphasis where this dinosaur’s remains are being excavated, and technically reveal this pack hunter is possibly mistaken for another raptor. But this option doesn’t work out either. The fossils acknowledged are from the west of North America (“Jurassic Park; Crichton 108), and this would only identify the smaller, earlier raptor called Deinonychus (“Deinonychus”; Crichton 115)—who was also a member of the Cretaceous Party.
Of the handful of dinosaurs seen, there were only two who belonged. The “small and lightly boned” (Hutchinson “Jurassic”) therapod, Dilophosaurus, that existed in the Jurassic’s first 27.2 million years in China, Antartica, and Arizona (“Dilophosaurus”). The other creature was not as easily enclosed. Brachiosaurus, in particular Brachiosaurus nougaredi was the species in question (de Lapparent “Continental Intercalaire”). The animal could have been classified within the Early Cretaceous, but due to analysis, the reptile was mistaken for another sauropod of strong skeletal resemblance (de Lapparent “Continental Intercalaire”). Fortunately, with several sites as evidence, it can be safely said that the Brachiosaurus nougaredi resided in the bed of Africa's Late Jurassic Period.
For Jurassic Park to host a variety of species that are outside its window of time is merely a game of numbers. The film opened to variety of people who quite possibly wouldn’t be able name a dinosaur let alone know what era they existed. The result is a source of entertainment involving some very popular animals and there is nothing wrong with that. It provides moments like this where pop culture can become an informative discussion, and we become just a little more knowledgeable of the voluminous past we overlooked.
Works Cited
"Cretaceous period." The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed.. 2012. Encyclopedia.com. 12 May. 2013
Crichton, Michael. Jurassic Park. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1993. Print.
“Dilophosaurus.” Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs. 1997. Print.
“Gallimimus.” Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs. 1997. Print.
Hutchinson, Leslie. "Jurassic." Animal Sciences. 2002. Encyclopedia.com. 12 May. 2013
Jurassic Park. Dir. Steven Spielberg. Universal Pictures, 1993. Film.
de Lapparent, A.F. "The dinosaurs of the "continental intercalaire" of the central Sahara."Memoirs of the Geological Society of France. Trans. Matthew Carrano. 39: 88A. Polyglot Paleontologist.
“Parasaurolophus.” Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs. 1997. Print.
“Triceratops.” Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs. 1997. Print.
“Tyrannnosaurus Rex.” Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs. 1997. Print.
“Velociraptor.” Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs. 1997. Print.
