I have ranted quite a lot on the matter of how the movie is a complete insult to the book, but I think I will hit some key points. I will try not to give much away.
The movie hints at the book a lot, but rather than including anything from the book, it just hints at the things we are missing, as if to say, "Remember that awesome scene? Yeah, we want you to know that we know about it, but we're not going to include it. We are too good for that level of awesome, or we are not talented enough to figure out how to include it because we've already changed too much."
- Ian Malcolm as an intelligent and well-spoken character who does not have a nervous stutter or any kind of stutter.
- Ian Malcolm pretending that Isla Nublar never happened. Sarah Harding suspects that something happened, but does not know. Malcolm straight up tells Richard Levine (not in the movie) that the very notion of dinosaurs still living is preposterous. Both men are persistent in their views.
- RICHARD LEVINE: Paleontologist, spoiled rich kid, pretty much always right about everything, particularly when it comes to dinosaurs. Good-natured. Persistent, headstrong man. Did I mention brilliant? Everyone hates him because of his arrogant attitude and failure to really give one flip what other people think, even at the cost of his own health. Loves his job to a fault. Is not in the movie. Looks just like Hammond's nephew (the whiny little dumbnut with the glasses and is not in the book). Often has his lines spoken by Roland, that paleontolgist, and Nick van Owen (none of whom are in the book).
- Kelly and Arby. Neither affiliated with Malcolm. Met Levine at school(?) and help out Doc Thorne in their free time. Kelly is a Caucasian girl and pretty normal, aside from enjoying the company of a paleontologist and an engineer. Arby is an African American boy, and is a total computer genius.
- Doc Thorne. Engineer. Brilliant man, who is followed to Isla Sorna by his assistant, Eddie Carr. Known for giving his students the most impossible assignments, to make them think outside the box for a solution. Known for being able to think outside the box for a solution.
- Eddie Carr: also an interesting character. Intelligent, but a mechanic, not a scientist. Usually the one to point out practical things about their equipment that Thorne sometimes overlooks.
- LEWIS DODGSON. I hate this man. He was the background antagonist in the first movie who wanted the embryos and looked "like some kind of secret agent." He is back on the prowl again, this time looking for actual dinosaur eggs, since he didn't get his embryos. He wants to use them for testing, because he figures that animal rights groups won't raise a fuss over something genetically created to start with.
- "I was right and you were wrong." Thank you, Levine.
- Levine's awesome apartment.
- Levine's distressed sat phone call.
- Dinosaurs in Costa Rica.
- Sarah Harding. Kelly's idol (she tells Kelly not to follow idols and to think and do for herself, or something of that nature). Short black hair. Muscular powerhouse. Known for having walked alone in the African Savannah avoiding lion and hyena attack by being intelligent and awesome. Animal behavior expert.
- Explanation for wild, disorderly Velociraptor behavior.
- Explanation for off-balanced predator-prey ratio.
- Kelly and Arby hiding on the trailers and Arby hacking the island computers to use the cameras to watch different parts of the island.
- Full explanation of how there is energy on the island.
- Levine scaring the living crap out of Doc Thorne. Thorne returns the favor, unintentionally.
- THE HIGH HIDE. NOT A BOX. A sturdy, yet lightweight, shelter high above the trees with a spherical cage beneath it.
- Levine telling Malcolm that Grant's theory on T. rex eyesight is stupid, giving a logical scientific explanation. Malcolm asks what would cause a rex to not attack someone sitting right there. Levine says he should think it was obvious, "If the rex just fed." I don't pretend to remember what happened in the first book, but remember the lawyer in the movie? The famous toilet scene? And then the rex refuses Grant as a meal?
- Thorne in general. Just a great guy. Dislikes Levine's company immensely.
- Complex behaviors of rex parents.
- Dodgson's team of two people. Their royal brilliance [note dripping sarcasm].
- Dodgson and Sarah. Both scenes. Particularly the last one.
- The fluffy baby Tyrannosaurus' broken leg, thank you Team Dodgson.
- General agreement that chewing gum is a terrible organic binding agent for a cast. Thorne develops some awesome compound, instead. Yay Thorne!
- Extensive rex parent attack. Far more complicated than the movie. Involves real injury and some really cool stuff. Only half the trailer is lost into the valley off the cliff. The other half remains and Ian is put on morphine. Spends much of the book from that point lost in thoughts and theories.
- Rex attack being part of the last stretch of the book rather than the middle.
- Crichton's distinct, deliberate fractal pattern of chaos developing to a climax, reaching a high point near the end, where it maxes out, and then the remains begin to settle, and normalcy returns.
- Malcolm singing Dixie while under attack.
- Arby and the high hide. Getting rolled away in the cage.
- 'Raptor with a chocolate bar.
- Kelly and Sarah taking a bike and that rifle from the beginning of the movie (that no one ever mentions again) after the raptor with the key to the cage (which is on a band which is tangled around the raptor's jaw).
- Chameleon dinosaurs (Ceratosaurs, I think). They are in the Lost World arcade shooter.
- Michael Crichton's awesomeness at developing a world down to it's most fundamental levels. The man was brilliant. The movie made a total mockery out of his work. Doubly insulting, since he was apparently asked to write the book with a second movie in mind.
