Complete summary

More than a year and half after the collapse of Jurassic World, its park director Claire Dearing, who became a pariah as she is considered responsible of the disaster, and the zookeeper Owen Grady, her boyfriend, are summoned by the former CEO of InGen, Benjamin Lockwood, to participate to the resuming of Operation Fallen Kingdom in the name of his foundation. Their task? Help with the transport of the last animals of Jurassic World, contained in a facility in Costa Rica, to his estate in California. In exchange, the Lockwood foundation promise to help Claire in her future legal battles.
But the situation of InGen, whose survival depends on the operation, is very precarious and its rivals knows that, waiting for the ideal moment to take over the corporation or, instead, destroy it by putting the operation in jeopardy. During their stay in Costa Rica, the couple will investigate InGen's secret research, whose outcomes might restart the Jurassic World nightmare elsewhere...

This story is the sequel to this one: s/12945239/1/Jurassic-World (if the link doesn't work, click on my profile and check for a story titled "Jurassic World")

Author's notes

Warning about the age limit

Just like my previous story, The Red Queen is a darker and more adult story than those of the films. Thus, if I have to give an age limit, I would advise against children under twelve reading it, due to the presence of the following elements:

— Scenes of violence.

— Coarse language.

— Horror scenes.

— Nudity and sex.

— Presence and use of drugs.

I'm aware that those elements might not be to everyone's taste but I wanted to write my story as it came in my mind, without censoring myself.

Soundtrack suggestions

In their notes in the upper part of the pages, a number of chapters will have soundtrack suggestions, which the readers can use to enliven their reading.

Hypothetical casting of original characters

The physical appearance of many of the original characters I introduced in the story are based upon those of real actors. You'll discover which in the notes of the chapters which will see their first appearance or at least their first notable scene.

However, those will be my inspirations, and the readers have the freedom of imagining other actors in those roles as long as their appearance is coherent with the descriptions of said characters. For example, the character of Jocelyn Hodgson, the manager of InGen's Site D and a rather important character of the story's first half, is based upon the actress Lili Mirojnick (Friends with benefits; Happy !) and thus described as a small thirty-four years old brunette. But using that description, a reader can totally imagine a younger version of Rashida Jones (The Office Parks and Recreations) in the role for example since this actress, who is currently in her forties, matched that description a few years ago.

FAQ

Can I read Jurassic World : The Red Queen without having read the Jurassic World rewrite which precedes it ?

Technically yes, if you don't mind spoilers. The different characters and elements are reintroduced in such a way that a reader who stumble by chance on this story can understand the essential, even if they haven't read the previous installment or even seen the films. However, I think that The Red Queen is more enjoyable if you've read the previous story, in order to note the evolution of certain characters among other things.

To the most impatient among you, I'll announce that a chapter at the beginning of the story, titled The Fall of Jurassic World, could be used as a "crash course" on the story depicted in my rewrite of the first Jurassic World.

I haven't read the Jurassic World rewrite but I wish to read The Red Queen. What are the notable differences between the alternate universe depicted in those stories and the universe shown in the films?

Lore differences:

— The Fall of Jurassic World occurred in 2017 and not 2015 like in the film. Two factors are behind it: The Indominus' rampage and a major eruption of Mount Sibo, Isla Nublar's volcano.

— Isla Sorna, and the rest of the Five Deaths archipelago, have still populations of dinosaurs and other de-extinct animals whereas the film Fallen Kingdom establish that Nublar's dinosaurs are the last on Earth, implying that the ecosystem last seen in Jurassic Park 3 no longer exists. In this AU, the Five Deaths became a zone of international cooperation where scientists studies the dinosaurs while the archipelago and its animals are protected from intruders by the Grey Guard, a paramilitary organization (mercenaries some would say) backed by the United Nations and Costa Rica. This organization also had troops on isla Nublar when Jurassic World collapsed.

— Way before Jurassic Park, Isla Nublar saw the fall of other human endeavours. The island once housed one of the most advanced civilizations in the area, a civilization which collapsed during a disastrous civil war, leaving behind only skeletons and the troglodyte ruins of a city and a necropolis, and in the 16th century, the Spaniards built a colony on the island but it was destroyed during a volcanic eruption, triggering the freeing of those who became the Tun-Si, the tribe who lived on Nublar when InGen arrived in the eighties.

— Outside of InGen, other organizations managed to clone extinct species. In the previous story, a Russian safari park which houses mammoths and other species from the Ice Age is mentioned. For now, InGen has the monopoly of dinosaurs but things will change.

— Unlike the park depicted in Colin Trevorrow's and Juan Antonio Bayona's films, the Jurassic World of this AU, in addition of having a layout, an architecture and a collection of animals which differs from those of the films, housed several species of feathered dinosaurs and most of its animals were scientifically-accurate.

— The appearance of certain characters originally created by the writers of the Jurassic World saga differs more or less from those of the actors who portray them in the films. In Jurassic World : The Red Queen, the only notable case is Owen Grady (in the previous story, Katashi Hamada was concerned too, as he was ten to fifteen years older than his film counterpart). For me, the character as depicted in Colin Trevorrow's saga looks too much like your typical 2000s-2010s action blockbuster hero, and even fills the "ex special forces member" cliché. In the AU I created, Owen has a more modest past (he was just part of the US Navy marine mammal program and had never been in the special forces) and his character shines more through his knowledge on the animal kingdom or survival than action-man prowess. This influenced the way I portrayed the character and the Owen Grady portrayed by Chris Pratt seemed more and more out of place in my AU, pushing me to imagine another actor in the role, with a different appearance, closer to that of the "Barbarian" hero from those fantasy or historical dramas works than that of the modern American action hero. Elsewhere, I wrote that I imagined German actor Alexander Dreymon (Uthred of Bebbanburg in The Last Kingdom) but if you want to imagine a much more famous actor, Jason Momoa is your man as his appearance and his acting also inspired me for that alternative version of the Raptor Whisperer. On a physical standpoint, the Claire Dearing of that AU differs also from her film counterpart, portrayed by Bryce Dallas Howard, but those differences are actually more minor than those between the Owen of the films and the one of my writings as she remains a fair-skinned thirtyish redhead: She's a bit taller and while being still beautiful, she has more intimidating facial-features. As for the other characters created by Colin Trevorrow and Derek Connolly, they look like their actors from the films. Thus, for example, the version of Benjamin Lockwood, Zia Rodriguez and Ken Wheatley who appears in The Red Queen still look like James Cromwell, Daniella Pineda et Ted Levine respectively.

What's canon to this alternative universe, what isn't?

Are canons:

— The Jurassic Park trilogy.

— Some elements from Telltale's Jurassic Park: The Game.

— Some elements from the Masrani Global website.

Are not canons:

— The Dinosaur Protection Group website's content.

— Tess Sharpe's The Evolution of Claire.

— Netflix's Camp Cretaceous in its current form (some of its characters will be mentioned, or will even appear in The Red Queen but the events they experienced are different from those depicted in the show, and so is the fate of some of them).

I've read the Jurassic World rewrite. What do I have to expect from The Red Queen?

A story quite different from the first, less epic and more introspective and personal. Whereas my Jurassic World rewrite was a large epic fresco with influences drawn from historical (or pseudo-historical) dramas, mythological peplums or dark fantasy, The Red Queen is mainly a thriller which mixes espionage, horror elements and satire.

Surprisingly, the story proved to be less darker than its predecessor, and some dialogues might recall Kaamelott or some sketches from the Joueur du Grenier to french-speaking readers while some parts which actually happens in quite serious parts of the story have been partly inspired by humorous parts of the Indiana Jones saga and some adventure comedies like La Grande Vadrouille or the 7th Company trilogy.

By the way, though it's based on an American franchise and that a large number of the characters are from that country, I consider Jurassic World: The Red Queen (and also its predecessor in a lesser extent) as a French Sci-fi work, because of its type of humour but also its references and how it treat certain topics.

What are the main differences between it and Juan Antonio Bayona's film?

Aside from many additional subplots, characters and creatures, the main differences concern locations and genre. Like in Bayona's Fallen Kingdom, the prologue is set in Isla Nublar, in an abandoned Jurassic World, and the second half of its story in California. But unlike in that film, the first half will be set in mainland Costa Rica, mostly in the fictional canton of Burgo Nuevo, the home of InGen's Site D, the facility which houses the animals who survived the fall of Jurassic World. Whereas Bayona's film mixed the spectacular action of its first half to the suspense and the horror of the second, the tone and the genre are here more homogenous, with an investigation aspect present all along the story and action scenes which are rarer, and perhaps less spectacular for some, than those of my first story. I'll let you discover the other differences ;).