Almost three decades after its initial release in theaters, Steven Spielberg's Jurassic Park continues to wow audiences. The film remains shockingly violent for its time (which makes sense, given the feral and unrelenting nature of the dinosaurs), but one of Jurassic Park's biggest deaths doesn't even occur on-screen. That's right, we're talking about the death of Samuel L. Jackson's John Arnold, which apparently couldn't be filmed because the weather kept Jackson from making it to Hawaii for the shoot. Hold onto your butts, because Jackson explained:
I was actually supposed to go to Hawaii, to shoot my death scene. But there was a hurricane that destroyed all the sets. So I didn't get to go to Hawaii.
If nothing else, this shows how good Steven Spielberg has become at rolling with the punches and working around problematic production issues -- which we should've expected, given the fact that he cut his teeth on the epic disaster of the Jaws shoot. Samuel L. Jackson was supposedly going to make a final appearance as John Arnold in Jurassic Park during his failed mission to restore power to the park, but according to Jackson's recent comments to The AV Club, his death had to be merely implied when they couldn't get him to Hawaii during a hurricane.
This change is a far cry from Michael Crichton's original Jurassic Park novel, in which John Arnold's death is detailed in much more graphic fashion. In the novel's version of events, he makes it to the shed to restore power to the park only for a raptor to pin him to the ground and kill him. There are a number of differences between the Jurassic Park book and movie, but no matter which way you cut it, John Arnold just couldn't catch a break, could he?
Despite the fact that John Arnold's death occurred off-screen in Jurassic Park, he still (in a manner of speaking) got to show up and literally lend a hand for Laura "Holdo Maneuver" Dern's Ellie Sattler in the maintenance shed.
John Arnold may now be dead in the Jurassic Park universe, but it seems likely that Samuel L. Jackson's character will have some company in the afterlife fairly soon when Jurassic World: _Fallen Kingdom_ hits theaters this summer on June 22. Here's everything that we here at CinemaBlend currently know about the upcoming Jurassic World sequel, and make sure to take a look at our movie premiere guide to get more information on the rest of the films set to premiere on the big screen in 2018!
