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Description
In the wake of inaccurate dinosaur media, like Jurassic World: Dominion, and more recently, the 65 movie, many of the paleo nerds are discontent with the way dinosaurs are depicted in media (and with that also other prehistoric animals, naturally). However, the debate remains over whether accuracy should be respected to its most reliable extremes, or if it could be loosened to allow for more creative designs, for the sake of cinematic tension. Clearly recent media, such as Prehistoric Planet, demonstrates that ultra-accurate dinosaur depictions can capture the public, but given it was a paleo-documentary, that is the least it should do. In the contest of a fiction, dinosaurs are purposely subject to redesigns to appeal to a preconceptualized idea that the real animal is not scary or taken seriously on its own, and has to go through a few morphological changes to appeal to that idea. This is hardly something specific to prehistoric animals, even modern animals suffer some changes to lead to that appeal, but because we already know how a shark, a lion or a snake looks like, the creative liberty of dinosaur redesigns takes-off much higher... However the discontent often comes with a lack of compromise between that same creativity and a respect for what the real animal is.

In this case, I chose to redesign the Jurassic Park raptor, but not in the usual way of just transfering the coloration of a Jurassic Park raptor into an accurate reconstruction of an actual prehistoric dromaeosaur. Instead I precisely tried to redesign this animal in a way so that it preserves most of the features from the original design, but shaping it in a way that it feels at least superficially acceptable, in the eyes of scientific plausibility, in an attempt to show how such design approaches can acknowledge and conciliate both, seemingly opposing, design tendencies for prehistoric animals in media.

Here's the design processes I went through:
1 - Unlike other "accurate" redesigns, this isn't based on any actual raptor species. So, this isn't an accurate Deinonychus, Velociraptor, Utahraptor, etc. Its its own hypothetical dromaeosaur species. For reference, however, I was inspired by saurornitholestine skeletal features, from Saurornitholestes, Atrociraptor and Deinonychus (this last one could be a saurornitholestine, but we aren't sure, anyway).
2 - Skull shape was preserved from the original design, because it isn't unreasonable for an hypothetical dromaeosaur. The large eyebrows are here reconstructed as simply fleshy combs with neutral coloration that grow above the eyes.
3 - The eyes are reconstructed with circular pupils, instead of vertical slits (the Jurassic Park 3 raptors have a circular pupil, however). This seems far more likely for a predator like this, even though vertical slits is not entirely impossible, but admittedly less probable.
4 - The arms and hands have reduced to absent patagium, a choice made to delinate the musculature of the arms, which doesn't seem like an unreasonable speculation for a dromaeosaur that wouldn't be using its wings to fly or glide.
5 - Wings are reduced to simple filamentous coverings, like those of some modern ratites. This goes in stark contrast to evidence that overwhelmingly suggests dromaeosaurs had complex feathers forming proper wings resembling those of volant birds, vaguely. Even eudromaeosaurs, like Velociraptor, have evidence of quill knobs that supported such wings. Here the choice was made to counter that, perhaps because this dromaeosaur descended from an ancestor that no longer needed wings to balance, when capturing prey (it is admittedly the less scientifically plausible detail in this design, however)
6 - Hands are dexterous but cannot pronate like those in the movie. Tentative studies from the 2000s suggest that some dromaeosaurs may have had dexterous fingers, enough to clutch their hands to grab some objects, and such a mobility could also be useful to climb trees and latch onto prey. I don't know how much these studies hold up to modern scrutinity, but the presence of developed claws in the hands of many raptors imply they must have been used to some extent, so maybe opening a door (which isn't a very complicated mechanism) should be achievable even with limited hand flexibility.
7 - The feathered integument is restricted to the bare minimum that would be expected to be reasonable for a paravian. The filaments are more filamentous, again like some ratites, and restricted to the dorso, flanks, arms and tail. Quills were added at the back of neck for aesthetics.
8 - The legs are proportionally rather distinct from typical dromaeosaurs. The characteristic sickle claws are retained, but the foot is much more elongated than typical dromaeosaurs, to better justify a proper cursorial locomotion and allow it to attain fast speeds and increased endurance.
9 - The coloration of the raptor was chosen to be rather dull, with browns and greys mostly, specifically to go with the vibe of the original design. Some patterns were added for aesthetics, such as some patterns in the face and neck, as well as black fingertips, in an attempt to make this redesign stand on its own.

Description
In the wake of inaccurate dinosaur media, like Jurassic World: Dominion, and more recently, the 65 movie, many of the paleo nerds are discontent with the way dinosaurs are depicted in media (and with that also other prehistoric animals, naturally). However, the debate remains over whether accuracy should be respected to its most reliable extremes, or if it could be loosened to allow for more creative designs, for the sake of cinematic tension. Clearly recent media, such as Prehistoric Planet, demonstrates that ultra-accurate dinosaur depictions can capture the public, but given it was a paleo-documentary, that is the least it should do. In the contest of a fiction, dinosaurs are purposely subject to redesigns to appeal to a preconceptualized idea that the real animal is not scary or taken seriously on its own, and has to go through a few morphological changes to appeal to that idea. This is hardly something specific to prehistoric animals, even modern animals suffer some changes to lead to that appeal, but because we already know how a shark, a lion or a snake looks like, the creative liberty of dinosaur redesigns takes-off much higher... However the discontent often comes with a lack of compromise between that same creativity and a respect for what the real animal is.

In this case, I chose to redesign the Jurassic Park raptor, but not in the usual way of just transfering the coloration of a Jurassic Park raptor into an accurate reconstruction of an actual prehistoric dromaeosaur. Instead I precisely tried to redesign this animal in a way so that it preserves most of the features from the original design, but shaping it in a way that it feels at least superficially acceptable, in the eyes of scientific plausibility, in an attempt to show how such design approaches can acknowledge and conciliate both, seemingly opposing, design tendencies for prehistoric animals in media.

Here's the design processes I went through:
1 - Unlike other "accurate" redesigns, this isn't based on any actual raptor species. So, this isn't an accurate Deinonychus, Velociraptor, Utahraptor, etc. Its its own hypothetical dromaeosaur species. For reference, however, I was inspired by saurornitholestine skeletal features, from Saurornitholestes, Atrociraptor and Deinonychus (this last one could be a saurornitholestine, but we aren't sure, anyway).
2 - Skull shape was preserved from the original design, because it isn't unreasonable for an hypothetical dromaeosaur. The large eyebrows are here reconstructed as simply fleshy combs with neutral coloration that grow above the eyes.
3 - The eyes are reconstructed with circular pupils, instead of vertical slits (the Jurassic Park 3 raptors have a circular pupil, however). This seems far more likely for a predator like this, even though vertical slits is not entirely impossible, but admittedly less probable.
4 - The arms and hands have reduced to absent patagium, a choice made to delinate the musculature of the arms, which doesn't seem like an unreasonable speculation for a dromaeosaur that wouldn't be using its wings to fly or glide.
5 - Wings are reduced to simple filamentous coverings, like those of some modern ratites. This goes in stark contrast to evidence that overwhelmingly suggests dromaeosaurs had complex feathers forming proper wings resembling those of volant birds, vaguely. Even eudromaeosaurs, like Velociraptor, have evidence of quill knobs that supported such wings. Here the choice was made to counter that, perhaps because this dromaeosaur descended from an ancestor that no longer needed wings to balance, when capturing prey (it is admittedly the less scientifically plausible detail in this design, however)
6 - Hands are dexterous but cannot pronate like those in the movie. Tentative studies from the 2000s suggest that some dromaeosaurs may have had dexterous fingers, enough to clutch their hands to grab some objects, and such a mobility could also be useful to climb trees and latch onto prey. I don't know how much these studies hold up to modern scrutinity, but the presence of developed claws in the hands of many raptors imply they must have been used to some extent, so maybe opening a door (which isn't a very complicated mechanism) should be achievable even with limited hand flexibility.
7 - The feathered integument is restricted to the bare minimum that would be expected to be reasonable for a paravian. The filaments are more filamentous, again like some ratites, and restricted to the dorso, flanks, arms and tail. Quills were added at the back of neck for aesthetics.
8 - The legs are proportionally rather distinct from typical dromaeosaurs. The characteristic sickle claws are retained, but the foot is much more elongated than typical dromaeosaurs, to better justify a proper cursorial locomotion and allow it to attain fast speeds and increased endurance.
9 - The coloration of the raptor was chosen to be rather dull, with browns and greys mostly, specifically to go with the vibe of the original design. Some patterns were added for aesthetics, such as some patterns in the face and neck, as well as black fingertips, in an attempt to make this redesign stand on its own.