The Ballad of Ray Arnold
In praise of <em>Jurassic Park</em>’s most unheralded hero, the technician played by Samuel L. Jackson, 25 years after the film’s release
“Hold on to your butts.” It’s the iconic catchphrase of Ray Arnold, the bespectacled, chain-smoking chief engineer of Jurassic Park, played by Samuel L. Jackson in Steven Spielberg’s classic 1993 film. Released 25 years ago, is filled with groundbreaking visual effects and memorable action sequences. But Ray Arnold doesn’t really witness any of the fun. The beleaguered middle manager sits in the park’s control room, hopelessly working to undo the total system hack executed by his traitorous subordinate Dennis Nedry (Wayne Knight), before dying off-screen when trying to turn the power back on. Ray
