There’s no denying the lasting impact of Jurassic Park or how much we loved (almost) every film that followed. However, none of this would have happened if not for the actions of one greedy character: Denis Nedry. Wayne Knight’s oafish malcontent agreed to commit corporate espionage and sabotage in exchange for a large sum of money. Had he not shut down several vital systems of Jurassic Park…well, realistically, some other disaster would probably have occurred given the track record that followed. But that’s a different argument. Nedry’s plan was delightfully complex, including a carefully planned route and calculated timetable, so naturally, everything went wrong, resulting in both his death and all the chaos that followed.
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Right from the beginning, the audience was aware that Nedry was not a character to be trusted. He had money problems, and while it’s tempting to start a debate about how companies like InGen should be paying programmers more, and Hammond’s blasé dismissal of him is monstrous, we’ll save that for another time. Ultimately, this sets the scene for Nedry to agree to work against his own employers. While it’s not shocking that Biosyn Corporation would correctly assume he was the weak link of the company, it is still confusing that anybody thought this plan would work out.
Truthfully, Nedry’s plan was doomed to fail from the start. While he may have thought he had a carefully crafted scenario, he clearly didn’t leave any flexibility for emergencies or surprises. It’s easy to point at Dennis’ crash (and resulting death) and say that this is the point where his plan went wrong, but it had begun failing long before that.
The Questionable Foundation of Dennis Nedry’s Plan
Right from the beginning, it’s pretty clear that Nedry was not the right choice for this plan. He meets Dodgson (Cameron Thor) in what should have been a covert location, but Nedry is far too excited to get his hands on the money to care about something as insignificant as discretion. They’re both lucky that another employee wasn’t hanging around within earshot, but Nedry’s confidence won out this time.
During this “covert” meeting with Dodgson, Nedry receives the iconic Barbasol can, which is really a brilliantly concealed carrier for the dinosaur embryos. From here, the plan was for Nedry to head back as usual, sabotage the security systems, fill the canister, and make sure it gets off the island. No big deal, right? Wrong.
Nedry’s instructions were simple: obtain a sample of each of Jurassic Park‘s dinosaur embryos, put them in the Barbasol can, and get to the dock before the ship leaves. While the film doesn’t outright state it, it’s pretty clear that Nedry was meant to hand off the Barbasol can to the employee at the dock, another Biosyn agent. This would have allowed Nedry to go back and act like business as usual. However, a cheeky detail in his code and the flagrant way in which he stormed through the Park ensured that part was never going to work.
Nedry’s Mistakes Along the Way
The storm quickly threw the best-laid plans and coding to the wind, and that was a huge problem. His need to rush through the security process had him making mistakes left and right, and we’re not just talking about the crash. Nedry legitimately thought it was a good idea to jump into a bright raincoat and take a company-branded car. Had anybody caught on to what he was doing, this would have made it even easier to track him down.
From here, Nedry made a series of missteps, opening electric fences, rushing through access roads, and getting completely lost. Crashing into the sign was the nail on the head, ensuring he had zero idea which way he should be heading. He was aiming to get to the East Docks, but his death by Dilophosaurus tells us that one of two things happened: either Dennis ended up farther North than anticipated, or he wasted so much time getting lost that his killer had time to stroll out of her enclosure and track down a tasty meal.
What Nedry’s Rogue Program Did
It’s important to remember that while Dennis Nedry was selfish and full of himself, he was still an excellent programmer. There’s a reason Hammond needed him: he helped create all the systems that allowed Jurassic Park to stand a chance at success. Naturally, this meant he also knew how to circumvent or break each of those elements. He created a back door so strong that the only viable solution to shutting it down was to reboot the entire system, a major plot point for the movie. This in itself was another brilliant move because rebooting also deleted the code from the system, cleaning up Nedry’s tracks. He effectively put them into an impossible position: revive the park or maintain the evidence.
In the book, Nedry didn’t leave that taunting bit of code, so he left the possibility of return open for himself. However, movie Nedry burned bridges on his way out, so even if he hadn’t died, he would never have been allowed back on the premises. The more we look at it, the more gaps we can see in Nedry’s plan. There were a hundred different ways this could have gone wrong, and that was before the chaotic element of the storm came into play. He really should have waited for another opportunity.
