Weekend Events Planner

These are the 11 best things to do in Dallas this Thanksgiving weekend

Holiday event season always reaches its peak at Thanksgiving, and this year is no different, with seven different holiday-themed events starting or taking place this weekend. You can also get the weekend started early with a national theater production, an ice skating extravaganza, and two concerts.

Below are more best ways to spend your precious free time this Thanksgiving weekend. Want more options? Lucky for you, we have a much longer list of the city's best events.

Wednesday, November 22

Broadway Dallas presents MJ the Musical
The music. The moves. The icon. Now, the unparalleled artistry of the greatest entertainer of all time is featured in MJ, the Tony Award-winning new musical centered around the making of the 1992 Dangerous World Tour. The production goes beyond the singular moves and signature sound of the star, offering a rare look at the creative mind and collaborative spirit that catapulted Michael Jackson into legendary status. The production runs through December 3 at the Music Hall at Fair Park.

Disney On Ice presents Find Your Hero
Disney On Ice returns with a new magical adventure, Find Your Hero, where audiences will discover what it truly means to be a hero as Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, and friends from around the Disney Kingdom come together to take families on a journey through timeless tales. The show features Mirabel from Encanto; Moana and Maui from Moana; Anna, Elsa, and Olaf from Frozen; and more. The production has eight performances through Sunday at Credit Union of Texas Event Center in Allen.

Joshua Ray Walker and Vandoliers present Friendsgiving with Jaret Ray Reddick
Joshua Ray Walker and Vandoliers will present a special co-headlining Friendsgiving concert. Walker is touring in support of his new album, What Is It Even?, while Vandoliers are touring in support of their new album, The Vandoliers. They'll be joined by Jaret Ray Reddick at Longhorn Ballroom.

The Polyphonic Spree in concert
It may be the holiday season, but the real reason for celebration for fans of The Polyphonic Spree is the release of their eighth album, Salvage Enterprise. This special show at Granada Theater will celebrate that album's release, although lead singer Tim DeLaughter and the choral rock group will surely delve into their deep catalog, too.

Thursday, November 23

Grand Prairie Parks, Arts and Recreation presents Prairie Lights
Prairie Lights is a two-mile, drive-through holiday park experience that showcases a display of more than 4 million lights arranged in hundreds of festive holiday scenes throughout the park. At the halfway point, guests can exit their vehicle to enjoy carnival rides, concessions, photos with Santa, the magical walk-thru forest, and holiday shopping. The second half of the drive ends with the new and improved light tunnel. The event takes place at Lynn Creek Park at Joe Pool Lake in Grand Prairie. (For a long list of the best Christmas lights this year, check out this story.)

Friday, November 24

Texas Christkindl Market
The 13th Annual Texas Christkindl Market is a traditional European-style market that brings the charm of German Christmas markets. Visitors will be immersed in a world of twinkling lights, decorations, food, and musical performances. The event takes place in the North Plaza at Globe Life Field through December 23.

Galleria Dallas presents Grand Tree Lighting Celebration
Galleria Dallas will present its annual Grand Tree Lighting Celebrations. Every show features the Missile Toes, Galleria’s ice-skating, back-flipping, pyrotechnic Santa Claus, live performances by Olympic and National Champion-ranked skaters, and local children who introduce the lighting of the country’s tallest indoor tree. There will be performances on both Friday and Saturday.

Heritage Farmstead Museum presents Lights on the Farm
At Lights on the Farm, guests will walk along a quarter-mile trail showcasing holiday light creations, animated displays, a 20-foot Christmas tree, refreshments, and a chance for the youngest guests to visit with Santa. There will also be plenty of selfie photo opportunities throughout the farm property of the Heritage Farmstead Museum in Plano. The event runs on weekends through December 30.

Chamberlain Ballet presents The Nutcracker
Chamberlain Ballet's annual production of The Nutcracker will feature guest artists Tiler Peck and Roman Mejia from The New York City Ballet as The Sugar Plum Fairy and her Cavalier. Guests can immerse themselves in a world of waltzing snowflakes, marching toy soldiers, and the timeless tale of Clara and her Nutcracker Prince. There will be three performances through Sunday at Eisemann Center for Performing Arts in Richardson.

Dallas Symphony Orchestra presents "Stravinsky The Firebird"
The Dallas Symphony Orchestra's Thanksgiving concert, "Stravinsky The Firebird," features conductor Gustavo Gimeno and violinist Alexander Kerr. The program will include Tchaikovsky's Selections from The Nutcracker, Mozart's Concerto No. 5 for Violin and Orchestra, “Turkish,” and Stravinsky's Suite from The Firebird (1945 Revision). There will be three performances through Sunday at Meyerson Symphony Center.

Texas Ballet Theater presents The Nutcracker
Featuring dazzling choreography and exquisite sets, The Nutcracker celebrates the season with enchantment, snowflakes, and sweets. Audiences can experience the most magical Christmas tradition of the season as Clara and her Nutcracker Prince battle an army of mice and travel through a winter wonderland to meet the Sugar Plum Fairy in the Kingdom of Sweets. The production runs through December 3 at Winspear Opera House.

Photo by Matthew Murphy

The national tour of MJ the Musical will be at the Music Hall at Fair Park through December 3.

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Movie Review

Film sequel Jurassic World Rebirth: stillborn is more like it

Photo by Jasin Boland/Universal Pictures and Amblin Entertainment

Scarlett Johannson in Jurassic World Rebirth.

Given how successful the Jurassic Park / Jurassic World franchise has been at the box office, it’s no surprise that Universal Pictures will find any excuse to keep the gravy train rolling. So here comes Jurassic World Rebirth, a film with all new characters that only has a tangential relationship to the stories that have come before.

And, man, does it have a lot of characters. Leading the way is Zora Bennett (Scarlett Johannson), a woman who is known for being able to procure hard-to-get things. She’s hired by Martin Krebs (Rupert Friend), who works for a medical company looking to get blood samples from giant dinosaurs to make a life-saving heart medicine. Naturally, they need a dinosaur expert, which they find in Dr. Henry Loomis (Jonathan Bailey), whose work at a natural history museum is coming to an end as the public seems to be growing tired of dinosaurs, five years after the events of Jurassic World Dominion.

The dinosaurs they need can be found off the coast of Suriname, a subtropical environment that is one of the only hospitable areas left for the creatures. There Zora recruits boat captain Duncan Kincaid (Mahershala Ali), who comes with a crew of three mostly anonymous people. And for good measure, Reuben Delgado (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo) happens to be sailing nearby in the middle of an ocean voyage with his two daughters and his older daughter’s extremely lazy boyfriend.

Given the recent pedigree of director Gareth Edwards (The Creator, Rogue One) and original Jurassic Park writer David Koepp (returning to the franchise for the first time since 1997’s The Lost World), the film should be an unmitigated success. Instead, the filmmakers and their team stumble blindly through any kind of character development. The fact that they’re trying to introduce no fewer than 11 different people should be a big flashing red light, but still they persist.

Instead of making us care whether the people in the film live or die (spoiler alert: A lot of them die), Edwards and Koepp seem to lay all of their hopes on audiences being satisfied with yet-more dino mayhem. But dinosaurs rampaging or chomping people in half only works if the human component is compelling, which it is not. They try to gloss over this by having the characters encounter experimental cross-bred creatures, a story device that makes an impact with a monstrous one in the final act, but otherwise fails to land.

The film also yada-yadas a lot of the plot points, including how Krebs’ company knows they need the blood of these particular dinosaurs when they’ve never had it before. They reference events from previous films in oblique ways, but they run into the same issue every Jurassic World film has had: Not being able to properly explain the main premise of their story, given that previous events should have stopped them from ever happening.

Any film with an Oscar winner (Ali) and nominee (Johannson) at the top should be one worth watching, but it almost feels like neither actor knew what kind of film they were actually making. They each get by on charm, but even they can’t sell the nonsense they’re asked to say. Bailey, who played Fiyero in Wicked, is given a weird nothing part, while Friend plays the villain with little verve. We hardly get to know anyone else, but Audrina Miranda, who plays the youngest daughter on the sailboat, is super-cute and gets a couple of decent emotional moments.

As with the Marvel movies, there is bound to come a time when the general moviegoing public gets tired of being served mediocre Jurassic movies. If any of the franchise’s movies deserves to be the stopping point, it’s this one, with a non-starter of a story and little to get excited about when it comes to the dinosaurs.

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Jurassic World Rebirth opens in theaters on July 2.

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