User blog comment:BastionMonk/Jurassic Park is overrated/@comment-1791057-20130422164700

Jurassic Park wasn't just a pioneering film in the way pf connecting birds to dinosaurs in the public's eye, it was a major cinematic feat as well. Films like Avatar or 300 would be impossible today without Jurassic Park. Jurassic Park was the first time that CGI was used on a large scale, culminating more CGI than any movie before it. And not only was the CGI groundbreaking, but it looked real. When people first saw the CGI Brachiosaurus step out in front of the Jeeps in the Welcome Scene, Grant says the very line that everybody in the theater is thinking: it's a dinosaur. Jurassic Park was the first film to portray dinosaurs as animals, making that point across explicitly they "they're not monsters, they're just animals. They just do what they do." It was the first time in the media that people could look upon a T. rex with respect rather than fear.

JP had a promotional and merchandising campaign that completely enveloped the 1990's. It was everywhere. I cannot mention the 90's without mentioning JP. I recall telling a kid on YouTube who said he remembered JP///'s experience, but said that he didn't understand the "magic" that we fans always talk about. I told him that with the first two films, that when a Jurassic Park movie went into theaters, that was ALL that went into theaters. Everybody wanted in on the Jurassic Invasion, from fast food restaurants to back-to-school gear, to candy wrappers and bathing sundries. You literally could not walk into a room anywhere and not see something JP related. If there were ever a time to be a dinosaur fanatic, it was the Jurassic 90's. Everybody bathed in JP promotional merchandise, whether they loved dinosaurs or not. There eraser toppers, the pencil bags, the pins, T-shirts, the lenticular images, lunch boxes, Horizon models, watches, Koosh balls, pinball machines, video arcades, hand puppets, plush dolls, slippers, coffee mugs, eating utensils, and so much more.

Jurassic Park's popularity doesn't result solely from it's characters, acting, dialogue, writing, effects, story, cinematography, camera work, music, sound editing, setting, or directing, though that all helps immensely. Jurassic Park's popularity also originated from the environment and experience that it created. It was a prehistoric sensation on a dinosaur level. To believe Jurassic Park is overrated is to believe that Star Wars is overrated. They're both fantastical film that changed the way movies are made today. They also had the largest marketing campaigns of their time, and still are noted today for being the experience of a generation.