While most of America was salivating over turkey and stuffing, many of us were drooling over a delicious helping of nostalgia and teaser-trailer-goodness.

Last week was a big week for trailer releases, but two stood out above the others.  We got not just one, but two trailers for the long-awaited sequels to two of the most successful film franchises: Jurassic World, and Star Wars VII.

Jurassic Park 4 is one of those movies that has been in development-hell since its conception.  With the death of Michael Crichton in 2008 – the author of the original “Jurassic Park” novel, chances of another sequel seemed unlikely.  But fresh hands and a fancy new title are finally making the movie a reality.

The Jurassic World trailer gives us a lot of information to work with.  It seems we can safely expect a lot of the same thing.  Which isn’t necessarily bad.  Unlike any of the other films, this one focuses on a Jurassic World that is fully functional, including safari tours and a Seaworld-like performance from a Mosasaurus.  The Mosasaur alone is worth noting because it marks the first appearance of an aquatic animal in a Jurassic Park movie.

But it wouldn’t be a Jurassic Park movie without dinosaurs chasing people, which the mother of the new kid-protagonists not-so-subtly foreshadows in the trailer’s opening.

The trailer also gives away another important detail about the film’s plot: genetic manipulation.  The scientists behind Jurassic World have gotten bored with bringing back extinct creatures so the next logical step would be to make their own.  This may seem a little far-fetched, but we already had gene splicing in the original movies when they used frog DNA to complete missing pieces of genetic code.  Thankfully, the trailer does not reveal the identity of this new dino-hybrid leaving us with at least some sort of surprise when the movie finally comes out.

The last bit of trailer goodness around Jurassic World is a hauntingly slow piano rendition of John Williams’ original Jurassic Park score.  This accompanies various shots of the park falling into chaos while simultaneously resparking cherished childhood memories of visiting the park for the first time.  And finally, the trailer ends with Chris Pratt dramatically riding through the jungle on a motorcycle with a pack of Velociraptors running along side him.  This could either make for a really good or really bad movie, but either way, I’m excited to see Jurassic Park open once more.

That brings us to Star Wars VII: The Force Awakens.  This trailer gives us a lot less to work with, but sometimes less is more.  Sprawling desert landscapes hint that the film is most likely taking us back to Luke and Anakin’s home-planet of Tatooine.  We’ve got some new land-speeders and what looks like a spinning astro-droid similar to R2-D2.  We also have lots of Stormtroopers.

And that is probably the only thing that we can really infer any plot from.  With the death of the Emperor and Vader at the end of Episode VI, we were left assuming that the Empire had died with them.  It seems the new instalment will explore what the Empire has become.  It would be strange for such a highly organized military force to be destroyed by taking out the figurehead.  It is more likely that someone else would step up.

And that brings us to the highlight of the trailer: a dark hooded figure wielding a very interesting red lightsaber.  This figure reveals that the Sith have not been wiped out as previously thought.  But that’s all we really know about this mysterious antagonist.

This trailer ends similarly to the Jurassic World trailer with a return of the original John Williams score and the now iconic Millenium Falcon flying over Tatooine dodging fire from TIE Fighters.

Both trailers are incredibly exciting and both rely highly on nostalgia to catch the attention of the audience.  Jurassic World premiers June 12 with Star Wars VII coming to theaters next December.

Which movie are you more excited for?  Let me know in the comments below!