'Jurassic World 2': New Feathered Dinosaur Discovery Further Embarrasses The Series

More and more evidence is mounting to support the claims that dinosaurs were feathered. Or, at least the small ones. On Thursday National Geographic announced the discovery of a feathered dinosaur tail preserved in amber, dating back 99 million years, to the middle of the Cretaceous era. The incredible find includes perfectly preserved bones, soft tissue and yes, lots of fine feathers. The researchers, led by paleontologist Lida Xing, believe the tail belongs to a juvenile coelurosaur: a broad slice of suborder Theropoda that includes dinosaur species familiar to Jurassic Park viewers: compsognathus, gallimimus and Tyrannosaurus rex. While impressions of dinosaur feathers have been found before, National Geographic describes this discovery as “the first time that scientists are able to clearly associate well-preserved feathers with a dinosaur.”

The dinosaurs of Jurassic World and the Jurassic Park series are going to look very silly in a few years.

By now it’s widely known that Jurassic Park series dinosaurs are not exactly accurate. Every new feathered dinosaur discovery is a major event on social media. Nevertheless, several sites have released Jurassic World of any obligation to scientific accuracy.

Screw that. Give us our feathered dinosaurs! Stop being scientifically inaccurate if you can help it! Be bold!

It may seem piddling. Movies (and every other medium) has always abused science for the sake of a good story. But Jurassic World 2 has a unique opportunity to establish an aesthetic tradition for a whole new century, subtly improving the map of reality we’re drawing in our minds. as paleoartist John Conway points out, “ Of course we realise it’s a film – but we also recognise the power it will have to shape people’s ideas about prehistoric animals.”

And if it’s just plain inaccurate, why defend it? iO9 argues (in a post outlining a defense of Jurassic World’s dinosaurs mounted by several commenters), “people complaining about (currently) scientifically inaccurate representations of dinosaurs are missing a larger point about the limits of empiricism and evidence, versus the drive for spectacle, witness, and representation.”

While the reality of a “drive for spectacle” is unquestionable, it’s not clear why critiquing this drive, as Jurassic World does, excuses the movie from same. And while there are limits to empiricism and evidence, why nudge their borders inward? Dinosaurs with feathers are not some scientific edge case, probing the limits of a human’s capacity to understand — we’ve found the damn things.

It’s even prudent future-proofing. Here are two books about dinosaurs I, child of the 80s, owned:

Any child could point out the glaring inaccuracies. Inaccuracies, like the dragging tail, that Jurassic Park helped to clear up! No one imagines dinosaurs like that anymore, because the original Jurassic Park gave them a more accurate picture to replace the old one.

Now there’s an opportunity to do that again. So let’s see some feathers on the dinosaurs in Jurassic World 2. Put some feathers on those raptors! It would be more true, more daring, more influential, more in the spirit of Jurassic Park … what’s the downside?