Jurassic World, the media, the Nublar Six, and telling Palatable stories — a deep dive analysis
Part 2
Trigger warnings — discussions of media censorship and propaganda; light discussions of the Grenfell tower fire; discussions of the Palestinian genocide
To read this essay on AO3, click here
If it is not explicitly canon, it’s speculation. This is NOT hate on anyone IRL involved in the show. I love this show with all my heart.
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Word count: 2000+
In season 5, we see one of Daniel Kon’s investors talking about how Daniel told them Kenji “Conquered the worst of these dinos.” Conquered, not survived. Extremely interesting and intentional wording. It paints Kenji as a hero, and not the survivor he and his friends are. The reporter also says, “You actually faced down all those dinosaurs?” Faced down, not survived.
In the interview mentioned above, the kids themselves even talk more about the dinosaurs they conquered, and the more badass moments where they survived dinosaur attacks (Ben fighting Toro, Yaz saving them from the Mosasaurus, Sammy surviving being poisoned by a dinosaur). Even Darius saying ’survived’ versus the reporter saying ’faced down’ is such subtle, yet incredibly interesting wording. It’s possible the kids mentioned other things in this interview, but they were edited out of the final version (yes, it was reported live, but this clip was aired six years ago, so it could definitely have been altered).
Daniel also says it himself in Chaos Theory. He’s a “disgraced” criminal, brought down by “the famous Nublar Six,” but Kenji is a “survivor, a hero.” That’s how I think the world sees Kenji and the rest of the Nublar Six.
In the same interview, the kids are referred to as “improbable survivors.” Improbable literally means something unlikely to happen, but it also implies luck or chance, which is odd wording because, in reality, the camp fam were not fortunate at all. They were incredibly unlucky to be there in the first place. The camp fam survived because they had each other of course, but they also had important skills they honed and utilised on Nublar. Of course, there were many instances where they survived because of luck. But a large amount of their survival can be attributed to their skills, intelligence, and teamwork.
On that topic, I think the Nublar Six’s survival skills and resilience would’ve been downplayed to make them seem less competent and more naive and easily digestible by the public. If you think about it, the camp fam has a disturbing set of survival skills that implies a lot of questions behind how they got them in the first place. I could do a deep dive into this, but this essay is long enough lol.
I’m certain this interview is not the only interview of the Nublar Six there was. They were most likely hounded to death by reporters for at least the first few months after they got back. So there were probably multiple interviews online. Including ones where the camp fam told the whole bloody, gruesome story.
And of course, that is not palatable for the public. So those interviews were buried, highly censored, or just straight up didn’t air.
The difference between the scene with the live reporters and all their voices overlapping in Camp Cretaceous, versus the interview Darius still has six years later, interests me. I’m certain that interview, where the camp fam are all smiling and laughing and being optimistic, would’ve ’lasted longer’ on the internet and would’ve been pushed much harder by mainstream media, than interviews with the hard truth. @nickrocketrodriguez confirmed it was a narrative tool to refresh the audience on who the Nublar Six are and how much they mean to each other, but in universe, I personally think the use of this clip, implying it could’ve outlasted other interviews on the internet, is intentional. Good, wholesome viewing about the unlikely friendship between six kids is much more palatable than six kids spilling the ugly truth of how they were abandoned and hurt at the fault of Jurassic World, InGen, Masrani, Mantah Corp, and human failure time and time again.
All of this builds a narrative.
I was watching Grenfell: Uncovered on Netflix a few weeks ago, and something Peter Apps (a news editor) said stuck out to me: there’s a “desire among the media” to find “a simple scapegoat, a simple narrative.” Simplicity is way easier to discuss, talk about, think about, etc. So it makes sense the media would boil it down.
The Nublar Six’s narrative can be condensed to: capable, badass, innocent, loveable teenagers who had to survive on a dangerous island for six months. And we see this narrative hinted at in canon! But note how that’s only a fraction of what happened? Note how the more complicated details are not shown? Note how the dinosaurs are mostly left out of the narrative?
Note how the narrative is bent to paint Jurassic World in the best light possible?
This is very intentional propaganda.
There’s a quote I found in the comments section on a YouTube video: “governments have propaganda, companies have marketing, which is propaganda but rebranded so it doesn’t sound like manipulation. That was the first success of marketing.” And in the media, the camp fam’s branding would’ve likely been referred to as ’marketing’ within corporations and the general context of this issue. But it is definitely propaganda, so I will call it as such.
You may notice in pieces of media that spread propaganda, there is a specific semantic field of vocabulary they use for certain groups, situations, people, etcetera.
The mainstream media’s coverage of the currently occuring Palestinian genocide is a good example of how semantic fields are being used for spreading propaganda. Have you noticed how Palestinian hostages tend to be called “prisoners” whereas Israeli hostages are called hostages? Prisoners have a more negative connotation, because a prisoner makes you think of someone who has committed a crime, whereas a hostage makes you think of someone innocent.
This article concluded that, in articles from two mainstream UK journalist organisations, 77% of the emotive language was used to describe violence against Israelis, but a disproportionate 23% of the emotive language was used to describe violence against Palestinians. It’s described as a “war,” which implies a fair fight where both sides have power and militaries, not the genocidal ethnic cleansing it is. Israelis are “massacred” or “slaughtered,” whereas Palestinians are just “killed.” See how ’massacred’ and ’slaughtered’ have much more aggressive and graphic connotations, and hit harder emotionally, than ’killed’? See how that will automatically make a person who has little to no context sympathise further with Israelis?
The same article found that three left leaning newspapers had more of a focus on violence against Israelis (58% versus 42% focusing on Palestinians), which is massively disproportionate to the much larger number of Palestinian victims of violence compared to Israelis. What the media focuses on is also a powerful tool of propaganda. On the subject of Palestine, note how there is so much talk and focus by the media about October 7th, but not the decades of violence against Palestinians before then? October 7th is what the media wants people to focus on because they are trying to present Israel as tragic victims of an attack by Hamas, who are only defending themselves, rather than committing ethnic cleansing. That is the story the mainstream media are telling people, because it fits with the West’s narrative.
I highly recommend reading the full article for learning more about how language is used to skew public perceptions one way or another. This is all a horrifying example of how semantic fields can distort our perceptions of reality without even realising. Note how emotive language on one side is used to skew the narrative one way in the public’s favour? Note how the media only shows what they want people to focus on?
That happened with the camp fam. It’s canon (see previous examples). Marxist criticism treats language as “not just a periphery consequence of power imbalance, but as an active force of that imbalance” [source]. That means language is such a powerful tool. It’s not just an accidental wording choice; it’s deliberate influence on the reader. And I think the language used to describe the Nublar Six is a deliberate weapon used against them to skew the public’s view of them.
And we know Jurassic World would cover up the truth, because they do canonically.
In the beginning of Jurassic Park II, Ian Malcom is revealed to have told the truth about what happened on Nublar, and the media made him look, in Ian’s words, “like a nut.” He directly mentions misinformation being shoved down the public’s throats that gave Ian a reputation of being a crazed liar. That’s a clear message on the power of propaganda, and I think the same would happen with the Nublar Six after Nublar, and again after Chaos Theory. If Jurassic World can get the public to see a respected professional such as Ian Malcom as a crazy liar, they could do the same about six traumatized young adults easily — but we’re straying off topic into Chaos Theory territory. (I mention the camp fam being traumatized because people can fall into the ableist attitudes of assuming people with mental illnesses are less reliable, and their symptoms can distort reality — which is sometimes but not always true! — and therefore don’t believe them.)
And if Ian is still recognised in a city subway four years later, the camp fam would probably be getting recognised in public for a long time after the events of Nublar and even Chaos Theory.
I also think the Nublar Six were definitely brought up in the events of Fallen Kingdom. The hype of Nublar is still ongoing three years later; the news reporter mentions the Jurassic World incident in 2015 “shocked the world” and the debate over Isla Nublar “rages on.” Clearly, the discussion of all this isn’t over, far from it. And considering how alarming it is that six teenagers were abandoned on an island full of dinosaurs, it’s absolutely possible they would’ve been talked about and involved.
The Nublar Six were probably asked to speak at a court case similar to the one Ian Malcom spoke at in Fallen Kingdom. They’re public figures heavily involved with dinosaurs, and Darius especially does motivational speaking about dinosaurs (I think? I’m not entirely sure what he does) so he’d definitely get asked to give a statement. Like everything else the camp fam says, it gets dissected to pieces by the media and their fans.
There’s a moment in Fallen Kingdom, where Ian Malcom casually mentions God, and the judge brings up the “Almighty,” and tries to distract Ian from his point by bringing in something pretty irrelevant to the question (which has less of a scientific basis) which is another subtle example of propaganda twisting the narrative a little bit towards presenting Ian Malcom as someone whose judgement is flawed, unscientific, and therefore untrustworthy.
Here are two more canon things which could be expanded on; thank you @dearinglovebot on tumblr for the additions!
First, there’s the Dinosaur Protection Group (DPG) which aims to evacuate the dinosaurs off Nublar before mount Sibo erupts (in Fallen Kingdom), but there is also a rival group called Extinction Now! who think humans and dinosaurs should be completely separate, and dearinglovebot suggested Extinction Now would use the Nublar Six’s story to further prove their point. This is also touched on in the first scene of Chaos Theory season 1, where the guys on the podcast are discussing how they think those “Nublar kids” would feel about this, assuming they feel negatively about it — which is a fair assumption, given all the trauma they inevitably have around dinosaurs and the island. But even then, it’s a good and interesting example of how the Nublar Six’s narrative could’ve been used and bent for more negative purposes without actually asking them.
Dearinglovebot also mentioned the Camp Cretaceous creator Zach Stentz said people did try to locate other survivors who hadn’t made it to the ferry with a radar system, but the system didn’t detect the kids because they were in the tunnels. This could result in people assuming Jurassic World was incompetent because their security system didn’t work, or as a way of proving they tried their best to rescue people. There’s even an insidious way they could spin the narrative (on the legal side of things) in a way that makes it the kids’ fault for getting left behind because they were in the tunnels — technically, a restricted area. That removes even more of the blame from Jurassic World, and can be used as a tool of retaliation when the Nublar Six try to speak up against the narrative that paints Jurassic World as blameless.
Watched "Grenfell Uncovered" on Netflix, about the Grenfell fire in London in 2017, where 72 people died.
In short, you could summarize this as "Capitalism kills", because the main cause for the disaster was a highly flammable cladding of the high rise building. Though the producer of this knew of its dangers because of tests, they still kept selling it, for profit. And there were several other mistakes made, as the documentary discusses.
And a disaster like this could happen again, because there are thousands of buildings all over the world with such highly inflammable claddings.
Fire hazards similar to those found at Grenfell Tower have been discovered at a block bought by the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea to house survivors of the disaster that killed 72 people.
To the horror of residents, round the clock “waking watch” patrols started on Friday at Doveberry Place in north-west London after a risk assessment uncovered problems with fire protection between floors, doors and ventilation.
The residents include Hermine Harris, 81, who escaped from the seventh floor of Grenfell Tower on 14 June 2017 and moved into the brand-new block in May 2019. Of the nine flats, four are occupied by former Grenfell residents and the rest from Grenfell’s neighbouring walkways.
The block was bought by RBKC to house traumatised residents, some of whom had spent long periods living in hotels.
“They have put us in a building deemed fit for people to live in and now they are telling us it’s a fire hazard,” said Yvonne Harris, Hermine’s daughter. “Mum is in shock and doesn’t know what to do. She feels, how can they do this to me again? We have been going through trauma for the last three and a half years and now we’re adding further trauma.”
Some of the many graffiti murals seen around the UK since the Grenfell Tower fire on the 14th of June 2017, which killed at least 72 residents of the social housing block.
The blaze exposed deep corruption and indifference among Britain's richest people and the millionaire politicians who do their bidding in Parliament, from the fact that the highly flammable cladding responsible for the blaze was added so that the building would be more attractive to rich people in nearby luxury tower blocks, to the fact that Tory politicians (overwhelming landlords themselves) had voted down a bill to require landlords to ensure that the properties they rented were "fit for human habitation", to the fact that local Tory councillors had deliberately chosen a more fire-prone cladding to save money -- the same local government that forced Grenfell survivors to bid against each other for new homes and then paid the same company that installed the flammable cladding to replace it.
“Grenfell Tower inquiry: Refurbish companies 'killed residents as surely as if they'd pulled a trigger.’ "
On the third anniversary of the Grenfell tragedy that killed 72 people, Boris Johnson vowed to ensure the Grenfell Tower fire would “never be repeated.”
Like so many Johnson promises, this was empty rhetoric.
28.01.21. Open Democracy:
“ UK government accused of covering up 'national scandal' over Grenfell-style cladding.”
Johnson’s housing ministry has advised local authorities to block Freedom of Information requests that could identify building with similar cladding to that used on Grenfell.
Why would they do that?
The answer is simple: to save money.
Back in 2018 Mrs May's Tory administration promised to "fully fund the removal and replacement of dangerous cladding...” Since then the extent of the problem has escalated with the recognition that far more tower blocks are clad in dangerously flammable material than was at first realised. So Johnson, like so many Tory Leaders before him, has decided to put money before people.
It's been two years since the Grenfell tower block in north Kensington burned, killing at least 72 people: the blaze revealed deep corruption and indifference among Britain's richest people and the millionaire Conservative politicians who do their business in Parliament, from the fact that the highly flammable cladding responsible for the blaze was added so that the building would be more attractive to rich people in nearby luxury tower blocks, to the fact that the fire came five years after Tory PM David Cameron declared war on "safety culture" to the fact that Tory politicians (overwhelming landlords themselves) had voted down a bill to require landlords to ensure that the properties they rented were safe and "fit for human habitation", to the fact that local Tory councillors had deliberately chosen a more fire-prone cladding to save 5.7% on the cost of materials -- the same local government that forced Grenfell survivors to bid against each other for new homes and then paid the same company that installed the flammable cladding to replace it.
We may never know exactly how many other towers are at risk: the Tories say that "IP rights" prevent them from disclosing which blocks failed their housing safety tests, and refuse to disclose which towers are clad in the same materials in Grenfell because otherwise, the terrorists will win (no, seriously).
Meanwhile, the companies involved have paid no meaningful consequences for their role in the Grenfell deaths: Rydon, the contractor had a banner year and handed out whopping pay rises for its execs, and the company that made the cladding continues to insist that the problem could have been solved with a kitchen fire-extinguisher.
People who live in dangerous housing have been in limbo for two years, with no end in sight. After the Tories refused to promise to help (a statement that resulted in Theresa May mobbed by protestors), residents found themselves paying millions to safeguard their homes.
Now, two years later, there are still 24,800 homes across the UK clad in the same dangerous materials that made Grenfell a firetrap -- 16,400 of them privately owned, 8,400 are social housing -- with an estimated 60,000 people living in them.
