We all know the road to Jurassic World was a wild one, with Jurassic Park 4 taking many different shapes and stories over the years. Today we’ve been given another peak into just how crazy some of those ideas really were. Concept artist Carlos Huante took to his Instagram to share new unseen art of the abandoned version of Jurassic Park 4 which he was working on with Joe Johnston back in 2004.
Following Jurassic Park 3, the idea was to push the sequel into bold new territory. The same basic concepts of Jurassic World existed then: hybrids, ex-military protagonists, and dinosaurs created for military application. However, the shape these concepts took were drastically different. The militarized animals were quite literally dinosaur soldiers, hybridized with human and canine DNA. And from the latest art, it turns out there were cyborg human/raptor hybrids as well. Weird.
Little is known about the story concept for this version of Jurassic Park 4, other than it was a further evolution of the story John Sayles wrote in the 2004 script. If you haven’t already, you can download and read that script via our downloads sections! Word is that Steven Spielberg threw it all back to the drawing board a few weeks after this outlandish art was created.
Despite the art taking things a bit too far, the core concepts were never abandoned. In 2006, Universal Pictures and Art Asylum had a small Jurassic Park booth at New York Toy Fair. On display were small diorama statues of a very mean looking Tyrannosaurus, alongside a Triceratops. Years later, the full story was uncovered:
“They were part of a new proposed ‘Jurassic Park’ toy line (…) that would have had nastier dinosaurs, and soldiers with all kinds of dino-fighting gear and vehicles. The ‘R-Rex’ was the first. It’s not based on any [prior] JP design. I was told to simply come up with a Next-Gen T-Rex ‘on steroids’, with maybe a bit of raptor DNA thrown in (note the 3-digits on hands). I had a week to sculpt and paint it for display. Sadly, though Universal Studios was very impressed, the toy line didn’t get approved for production.”
While that toy line may have never came into fruition, its clear that it again has many similarities to the story of Jurassic World: a Tyrannosaurus and Velociraptor hybrid, alongside a soldiers vs dinosaurs focus. From 2006 onward, it was mostly radio silence, but one thing remains clear: the ever winding road to Jurassic World was paved many years ago.
Be sure to sound off in the comments below, and let us know what you think of the latest art! While the concept sounds straight out of a SyFy channel special that has nothing to do with Jurassic, I have to say on a artistic level I love the art Carlos created.
Stay tuned, and keep enjoying #JurassicJune 2016!
