Top Gun Maverick’s Glen Powell turned down Jurassic World 4 despite his love for the series, but it’s not for the reason you think

Glen Powell, star of films like Top Gun: Maverick and Anyone But You, was offered a role in Jurassic World 4, but he turned it down.

While he’s been in a number of projects over the years, with his debut being the age-old classic Spy Kids 3: Game Over, it wasn’t until 2022’s Top Gun: Maverick that he became something of a household name. Now, he’s been in films like Hit Man and Anyone But You, and he’s starring in the upcoming Twisters reboot, as well as Edgar Wright’s remake of The Running Man. But as he shared in a recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter, it seems that he passed on quite a big role: Jurassic World 4, or, the Jurassic World reboot to be a bit more precise.

“Jurassic is one of my favourite movies,” Powell said of the original film, explaining why he declined starring in the upcoming Jurassic World film. “It’s one of the things I’ve wanted to do my whole life. I’m not doing that movie because I read the script and I immediately was like, my presence in this movie doesn’t help it.” That obviously rings some alarm bells, especially considering original Jurassic Park writer David Koepp has been brought back on to pen the screenplay. But, Powell seemingly didn’t turn the film down because of a lack of quality.

“The script’s great,” he continued. “The movie’s going to f**king kill. It’s not about that. It’s about choosing where you’re going to make an audience happy and where you’re going to make yourself happy.” Essentially, it sounds like an actor making the right call for himself, even if he loves something a lot. Don’t be too sad for Powell, though, as he has actually appeared in the world of Jurassic World before, specifically in Netflix’s animated series, Camp Cretaceous.

Who knows what role Powell might have been offered, but last month there were reports that Wicked actor Jonathon Bailey would be joining the sequel in a lead role alongside Scarlet Johansson. The film also has a director in place, with Star Wars: Rogue One’s Gareth Edwards now at the helm, so at the very least there’ll be plenty of big names to put on the posters for it before it arrives next year, July 2.