Warning: SPOILERS for Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous Season 4.
Lovers of the Jurassic Park movies are familiar with the Five Deaths but Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous season 4 introduced a sixth island that the teenagers are now marooned on. Darius (Paul-Mikel Williams), Brooklynn (Jenna Ortega), Kenji (Ryan Potter), Sammy (Raini Rodriguez), Ben (Sean Giambrone), and Yasmina (Kausar Mohammed) finally escaped Isla Nublar in Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous season 3 but a fateful encounter with the Mosasaurus left the kids stranded on a strange, new island for the foreseeable future – breaking the long-established canon of the popular series.
Las Cinco Muertes Archipelago, known in English as the Five Deaths, was introduced in The Lost World: Jurassic Park, although more details are found in Michael Crichton’s novels. Aside from Isla Nublar, which was the location of the Jurassic Park/World theme parks until they were destroyed by the eruption of Mt. Sibo, the Five Deaths are an island chain off the coast of Costa Rica. The most important of the Five Deaths is Isla Sorna, which was also known as Site B and was used by InGen as the breeding facility for Jurassic Park’s cloned dinosaurs. The other islands in Jurassic Park‘s Five Deaths chain are Isla Matanceros, Isla Muerta, Isla Pena, and Isla Tacano, which haven’t yet factored into the Jurassic franchise.
When the Camp Cretaceous teens escaped Isla Sorna at the end of season 3, many fans believed that they wouldn’t make it to Costa Rica and would end up in one of the Five Deaths. Instead, they landed on a hitherto unknown island, which is a new addition to the Jurassic World canon. However, this yet-unnamed island is owned by Mantah Corp, which was created by Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous as a villainous substitute for InGen and BioSyn. Before Darius and his friends washed onto the island, the only people there were Dr. Mae Turner (Kirby Howell-Baptiste) and her sinister boss, Kash D. Langford (Haley Joel Osment). But Kash and Mantah Corp were up to no good and the Camp Cretaceous kids soon learned that the villains were breeding hybrid dinosaurs to fight each other as an amusement for Mantah Corp’s wealthy clientele. This marks a dramatic change for both the written and cinematic Jurassic Park franchise and could have major implications for the future.
Mantah Corp’s island also breaks the Jurassic World mold because they have no intention of building a theme park, unlike John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) and Simon Masrani (Irrfan Khan). Instead, Mantah Corp terraformed their island into four biomes with different environments: a jungle, a desert, the arctic, and a swamp. Connecting the biomes are a cloaked facility that has a med bay, living quarters, and a genetics lab where Mantah Corp bred hybrid dinosaurs like T-Rexes, the Spinosaurus, and other prehistoric creatures like a saber-tooth tiger for each biome’s specific environment. Keeping order on Mantah Corp’s island are robots called BRADs, which resemble large mechanized cats, and larger, dinosaur-shaped machines called BRAD-Xs.
Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous season 4 understandably didn’t want to repeat another theme park environment. Instead, Mantah Corp’s island is curiously reminiscent of Westworld. HBO’s sci-fi series was also set on an island with terraformed environments, primarily an Old West desert, which resembles the section of the island Camp Cretaceous’ teens first explored when they arrived. Like Westworld, Mantah Corp’s island also has robots, although the dinosaurs are hybrid clones and not machines like the creations of Delos Corporation. Of course, Westworld was also created by Michael Crichton, and his original 1973 Westworld film about a futuristic theme park predates the Jurassic Park novel and films by almost two decades.
The shocking cliffhanger ending of Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous season 4 revealed the head of Mantah Corp is Kenji’s father, but this could also mean that the kids will finally be rescued in Camp Cretaceous season 5. However, by moving away from the destroyed Isla Nublar and Jurassic Park‘s Five Deaths islands, Camp Cretaceous continues Jurassic World’s reset of where the events of the franchise take place before Jurassic World: Dominion closes the book on the saga of humans and dinosaurs.
Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous Season 4 is streaming on Netflix.
Key Release Dates
Jurassic World Dominion
Release Date:2022-06-10
