The extensive world of Jurassic Park continues to keep growing, reaching multiple mediums as well as a large number of movies. Between the original trilogy starring Jeff Goldblum and Sam Neill and the current trilogy of Jurassic World films led by Chris Pratt, there are six live-action movies that have hit the big screen.
Since the early 90s,' there have been Jurassic Park-themed video games - not only in arcades but also on consoles. Even now there are still brand new Jurassic World video games released.
Not only have there been movies, games, books, and other mediums, but the world of Jurassic Park has also been shining on the small screen with animation. Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous has had four successful seasons on the small screen and is set to end with its upcoming fifth season.
We were able to speak extensively with the main voice actors behind Jurassic World: Camp Cretacous - Paul Mikel Williams and Raini Rodriguez and you can hear the whole thing below! We've also included a portion of the transcript and the full video interview at the bottom!
Paul-Mikel Williams: I definitely feel like going into it I was just super excited about playing Darius. And then once I got to the second, maybe the third season, my mom started coming to me talking about these people that were sending me messages and saying they related to my character. And people also saying that we don't get enough representation in these fields as far as people loving dinosaurs and wanting to be paleontologists and scientists. Once I started hearing these letters and these tweets and these Instagram messages,
I started getting into the fact that I wanted to portray myself and not just portray what I thought was the character. Because that's when I realized that I was the character. And getting to play myself, a young black man in America, it's amazing to me to me that we get this representation right now, and just for colored people all around the world. So getting to play someone who loves dinosaurs and has youthful energy and displays that to all of these older kids around them. It was just a lovely experience.
Raini Rodriguez: I related to Sammy very quickly. I am originally from Texas. I have a big Latino family just like her. I'm very family oriented. I tend to be the mother hen of any friend group that I'm in. So to see Sammy on screen, she was me. For me, I came from a representation point of view. I'm like wow, to be able to play this kind of character that is very similar to me with high energy and very talkative, and just loves everyone around her, I was like, "wow, this is me, this is crazy!"
Even auditioning for it, I sent it in from my family's tire shop in Texas, sitting in a corner and recording, thinking "If I could get into this franchise in this universe I would die." This was so exciting even just auditioning for this. And then fast forward five years later, and we're here. It's a dream I didn't know I had to be a part of the Jurassic franchise. This is just insane.
To be able to watch Sammy evolve over the last five seasons and grow as a person and as a character. To be able to watch her make mistakes and learn from them. And to see how accepting and loving she is of all the characters and the dinosaurs. How she can be level-headed but really, a lot of times, she thinks with her heart. So sometimes, she doesn't everything fully because it's kind of a family or bust mentality for her. So she's willing to lay her life over the line every time to make sure everyone is okay.
So to kind of watch her grow over the last five seasons has been crazy. It surpassed anything that I can think of. My biggest thing was that if this show is going to go past season one, please don't let me get eaten by a dinosaur, so I can go past Season 1 as well, and now we're on Season 5, so we'll see what happens on July 21st!
What do you guys think of the trailer and the interview itself? Will you be checking this season of Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous? Regardless, be sure to share your thoughts in the comments and check out the full video interview below!
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In this chat, I'm joined by two incredible young voice actors - Paul Mikel Williams & Raini Rodriguez. The two play the characters of Darius and Sammy, respectively, in the 5-season long animated series - Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous.
With the new season right around the corner, we spoke with the actors about their thoughts on the series and its end after this new season. I learned a lot of facts about their careers and what it's like to be such a young actor.
Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous Season 5 hits Netflix on July 21st.