Does not live up to the first one but it has its strengths

Rating: 8/10 (16 August 2013)

Considered one of Steven Spielberg's worst films, "Jurassic Park: The Lost World" is also considered to be the worst film in the "Jurassic Park" trilogy. While the film does fail with some aspects of the film, it also has its strengths and brings new ideas to the "Jurassic Park" franchise.
"Jurassic Park" is one of the films that I see that does not need to have a main antagonist. There are some films I feel like that where it is done well like "Aliens" or "Platoon", but "The Lost World" does not do this. The main antagonist of Peter Ludlow (Arliss Howard) is a stereotypical businessman who has no idea of what to do. While John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) was like this in the first film, he was not a stereotype, let alone an antagonist. The only thing done right is that he is the opposite of Hammond, being in it for the money while Hammond was in it just to bring something new to people.
With the main antagonist comes the problem with the main character, Ian Malcolm. I have no problem with Jeff Goldblum and I loved the character in both the novelizations of "Jurassic Park" and "The Lost World" and the first film. This is still the case with this movie but I do not think that Malcolm is a good main character. In the first movie, he was more of a foil character to oppose Hammond instead of someone who was main character material. Also, he still seems to be the designated guy who brings the comic relief. While I was okay with that in the first film, he should not of been like that this much when he was a main character.
There were a lot of things I liked, though, as well. The characters are still somewhat interesting as opposed to the blank slates they are in "Jurassic Park III". Plus, the dinosaurs are fleshed out a little as shown being caring parents and not just giant monsters.
Along with the fleshing out of the dinosaurs, there is another aspect of the film that I like involving the dinosaurs. The herbivores are dangerous, like they would be in real life which is glossed over in the first and second film. Stegosaurus attack Sarah, a Pachycephalosaurus attacks the mercenaries cars, and the herbivores trash the mercenaries camp. Yes, it is more of a dinosaur attack film but it does show us more of how the animals really would be and not the simple herbivores are nice and safe while the carnivores are mean and dangerous like the other two films do.
Taking the pros with the cons, I liked this film and found that it was a good addition to the "Jurassic Park" trilogy. The effects were good, the story was interesting, and the action was superb and tense. While there are some pretty big flaws with the characters, they do not hurt the film a lot.