'Jurassic World Rebirth' Ending Explained: Is Duncan Dead or Alive? 

Jurassic World: Rebirth’s ending stays pretty true to the title of the film, because it seems like it’s only the beginning of something big that’s yet to come. The film opens with Martin Krebs (representing big pharma), owner of ParkerGenix, a pharmaceutical company, putting together a group of people to help him hunt down dinosaurs for their DNA in order to find a cure for heart disease. Sounds all noble and fun, but it’s obviously not, because while Krebs is offering this team tons of money, he’s going to end up selling said medication at such astronomical costs that barely a small percentage of the people will be able to access it. What’s the point, you may ask? Well, money, isn’t it? The team consists of Zora Bennett (who brings along a friend named Bobby Atwater), the leader; Duncan Kincaid (along with two of his crew members), the captain; and Dr. Henry Loomis, the civilian. Their mammoth task is to go to an island close to the equator, where the only remaining dinosaurs (the manmade kind) still live. But do they find the DNA they need? What happens to everybody on board? Let’s find out in the ending of the film.

Spoiler Alert

Jurassic World: Rebirth begins with a flashback from 17 years earlier, where scientists are experimenting on dino-mutants in a lab in the middle of nowhere. A “Snickers” packet ends up getting sucked into the electronic door system, messing with security, and sending the entire lab into a frenzy, “The D-Rex has escaped!” In the present day, 32 years since dinosaurs have shown up again, people aren’t interested in the parks or the monstrous beasts anymore at all. Where once you’d see people standing in lines to get a peek, now, they’re only selling a dozen tickets a week. Plus, new ecological conditions are proving too harsh even on these manmade creatures, leading to them dying everywhere, except near the equator, where conditions are still the same as millions of years ago. Naturally, going there is forbidden, so our team has to sneak in there to find DNA from living dinosaurs to save the world, no? On the other hand is a family of 3 (dad and two daughters) and the elder daughter’s boyfriend. These people are trying to cross the ocean on a family adventure before the girl heads off to NYU, but they end up (almost) in the mouth of a Mosasaurus. Duncan decides to rescue these people because he’s a morally upright man and it’s his ship, leaving Krebs weary. 

Despite Zora being the most kind-hearted mercenary you may have ever seen, she does bring along Bobby, who seems not to care much about these creatures. Of course, the question he poses is, “When it’s between us or them, what would you do?” Anyway, that leaves him as the first target in this massive group of people because he’s unlikable, and he wants to paralyze the dinosaurs with his little toy. He’s the first to go, eaten by the Mosasaurus. But the team continues in hot pursuit because they need that DNA for humanity’s sake. Zora nearly falls off the ship, but Henry helps her back up, and they manage to get the blood of the Mosasaurus before wrecking the ship on the rocks. Fortunately, nobody else dies in this sequence. 

Next to go is, unfortunately, Nina from Kincaid’s crew. She gets pulled up by the Spinosaurus, dinosaurs that help the Mosasaurus hunt prey, hence the whole ship sequence. The gang get split up when they reach the island, and the ship is wrecked. The Delgados end up on one end and the crew on the other. Next up on the mission is the Titanosaurus, a humble herbivore, but of an unimaginable size. Fortunately, no harm is done when Zora and Loomis get the blood of these giant beasts. Well, I mean, Loomis does end up crying, if that counts. 

The Quetzalcoatlus (bit of a mouthful, but fun fact: it’s named after a Mayan god) is the 3rd and final dinosaur on the DNA list to save humanity. Now, the thing is that the DNA has to be collected from live creatures, so there’s no way you can kill it and then take its blood, which gives Loomis the idea to take the final DNA from the egg of the massive flying creature. Oh yeah, convenient—it was one from the water, one from land, and one from the air, no? While Loomis manages to get the DNA calmly, the dinosaur finds them in its cave. While Loomis and Zora survive, the Quetzalcoatlus gets his prey in Leclerc, the second member of Kincaid’s crew (sad). 

The Delgados and the DNA gang find each other again at the same lab we saw 17 years ago. There’s a helipad at this facility, and a security helicopter shows up at night to patrol the place and see if anybody needs help. The lab somehow powers on every night, making escaping much harder, because the noise and light attract all the creatures of the night. Additionally, Teresa is furious because Krebs purposely let her fall into the water because she was trying to radio for help back on the ship with the Mosasaurus. But hey, it’s all good now, because Krebs has the DNA in a briefcase handcuffed onto his arm and a gun in his hand, showing everybody that all he cares about really is making money off the DNA. Krebs ends up taking a truck with the briefcase, whereas the rest find themselves in the tunnels heading towards a boat that can get them out of there. Little girl Isabella worries that they won’t be able to make it out alive, despite having befriended a little dinosaur of her own, but Duncan promises her that he won’t let anything happen to her. 

Loomis manages to catch the attention of the helicopter pilot, but the mutant D-rex ends up crushing it. This same D-rex later ends up eating Krebs (ha!) when he shows up in the blaring truck. Zora gets the briefcase, but the D-rex is still around, and with all the light, Isabella is the only thing on its mind. But Duncan promised he’d keep her safe, so he uses the flares to distract the dinosaur and take it far away, telling the rest of them to leave and not look back. The gang think they’ve lost Duncan, but soon enough, they find more flares, making their way to him and saving him too. 

In Jurassic World: Rebirth’s ending, Zora poses the question to Loomis, “What do we do with the DNA now?” Since Loomis came on board, he’s been hinting to Zora that they can do better for humanity by open-sourcing the material they’ve got, rather than handing it over to a corporation. While Krebs is the reason they all end up there, they’re now free to do whatever they like with the lifesaving substance in their possession. Loomis tells Zora it’s up to her, and she claims they will give it to everybody. But how will this work? Well, I’m not entirely sure, because this is dinosaur DNA, which means it could create more monsters or more mutants. Additionally, it seems like this universe works a lot like ours, so obviously, the highest bidder can monopolize this stuff, which would lead to more people like Krebs fighting over the DNA. It could mean war. But hey, we could be optimistic and hope that the good scientists find a cure for heart disease through DNA, giving humanity more time. Also, there is mention of Alan Grant as Loomis’ teacher, so I wonder if we’ll see a comeback if there is a second film led by Loomis, Zora, and Duncan. I can imagine we’ll see Teresa or Isabella returning as researchers of some sort of their own. 

I can’t really say the movie has a happy ending, because we don’t even know what happens after the gang escapes, but we do know that they managed to get out, so all we can hope for is some good to come of it.