Maybe the most realistic way to “bring dinosaurs back” is through robotic engineering. I currently live in Tokyo, the land of robotics, and could see this happening. Has anyone read “Prey” by Michael Crichton? Imagine tiny nanobots which can connect together to create objects out of thin air. Now imagine that being used to create dinosaurs.

Another fun idea might be dinosaurs let lose in a virtual world.

Third idea… scientists find a way to speed up evolution in a controlled environment…maybe they are testing ways to clean up our environment. They realize everything is cyclical, including evolution. We not only evolve, but also devolve. Dinosaurs naturally come back into our eco-system given enough time.

I saw Jurassic Park when I was 13 and what excited me the most was REALLY believing humans could bring dinosaurs to life. That’s what I think needs to be captured again to have a new successful film.

I’m a small time director, but if there’s any millionaires commenting here, let’s make something happen! We need more dinosaurs in our lives!!!

In a Dec, 2011 interview with ShockTillYouDrop.com, Spielberg said, “I haven’t been active in the last year because I’ve been so busy obviously on ‘War Horse,’ ‘Tintin’ and now I’m currently shooting ‘Lincoln,’ but right now, it’s on the schedule to bring out another ‘Jurassic Park.’”

In an interview with BoxOffice.com, Johnston stated, “It’s going to be unlike anything you’ve seen. It breaks away from the first three—it’s essentially the beginning of the second Jurassic Park trilogy. It’s going to be done in a completely different way”.

Shame!

As for good dinosaur movie, there is one, Brian. You told us about this movie in fact. You Are Umasou while an anime, is one amazing movie. If you only saw the trailer, I recommend you pick up the movie and get the fansub online to enjoy it.

In regard to your question, Brian, I think this sentence pretty much answers it. Unless someone creates a new revolutionary way to bring back dinosaurs like Michael Crichton did, more than 20 years ago, I seriously don’t believe another great dinosaur-related movie will actually happen.

Contrary to you although I think the fourth Jurassic Park has all the potential to become that movie. Evo-devo is the way to go!

Rant aside, I’d argue TV has picked up some of the slack from Hollywood when it comes to dinosaurs on film. You have Walking With Dinosaurs and its many clones, then shows like Primeval and (the now canceled) Terra Nova. The less said about the dino movies regularly featured on the SyFy Channel, the better. Perhaps one of the reasons Hollywood hasn’t returned to dinosaurs is they have become so ubiquitous on TV? Then again, that doesn’t explain why it keeps cranking out essentially the same superhero movies every summer.

I should point out dinosaurs haven’t just disappeared from movies. There has been very little in the way of fiction aimed at mature readers since the spurt around the time of the first movie. You get a few dozen novels every year about dragons and vampires and whatnot, but novels and anthologies about dinosaurs are pretty much non-existent at the moment. (Except for the Destroyermen series of novels, which admittedly I haven’t gotten around to reading yet.) We may not have another dinosaur movie coming anytime soon because we don’t have Jurassic Park to sell it to studio execs.

Of course, there is very little in terms of comics or video games as well. I know at one point Dinosaurs vs. Aliens was in the works, but I’m guessing the flop that was Cowboys and Aliens killed that. (Not that I’m sorry about that, to tell you the truth.) A film based on the Primeval TV series also was optioned, but I don’t know what’s become of that. And there’s the Pixar film, which is being made but apparently is targeted at kids.

King Kong 2005 in my mind is Jurassic Park’s opposite, the Dinosaurs there were not animals, they were just mindless movie monsters there to kill a few people (The Sauropod stampede scene comes to mind), and be killed by Kong himself.

Then there’s Phil Tippett’s ‘Prehistoric Beast’, a short film where an Albertosaurus hunts a Centrosaurus after it strays too far from the herd. Aged as the film may be, it still manages to make you believe that the Dinosaurs are not just mindless monsters but living animals.

Stem-humans have actually fared a bit better here. I’d say Quest for Fire qualifies as “great”. (And 2001: A Space Odyssey certainly does, although stem-humans are only featured in the first act.)