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Van Pelt is the secondary antagonist of the Jumanji franchise.

He is a sadistic, cunning, murderous, destructive, ruthless and traitorous hunter who resides within the cursed board game Jumanji . As a game hunter, he wears a hunter's uniform with a cape and pith helmet. He is also one of the game's main dangers as a portrait of his face is carved on the top left corner of one of the lids of the game box. This incarnation of Van Pelt serves as the basis of his appearance in the animated series. He is also Alan Parish's arch-nemesis.

In the film, he was portrayed by Jonathan Hyde , who also played Alan's father Sam Parrish in the same film and Stricklander in Tales of Arcadia . In the animated series, he was voiced by Sherman Howard , who also played Derek Powers in Batman Beyond , Chief McBrusque in An American Tail: The Treasure of Manhattan Island , and Metal Kor in Jak II .

• 1.1 1995 Film
• 1.2 TV series
• 1.3 Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle
• 2 Personality
• 7 Navigation

History [ ]

1995 film [ ].

Van Pelt is first introduced after one of Alan's turns on Jumanji , which releases the hunter, who immediately begins chasing him. He tells Sarah that he did not shoot her, because Alan was the one who rolled the dice instead of her, implying he is hunting down Alan because Alan released him from the game (as part of the rules, as everything released from the game is apparently "ordered" by the game itself to attack whomever rolled the dice at the time of its/their release). After managing to evade him, Alan explains that Van Pelt has been trying to kill him since they first met within the game's world, seemingly finding Alan's very existence to be offensive.

After he runs out of bullets, he switches his weapon at a gun shop with a sniper and silencer due to his previous weapon's bullets being outdated. He tries to shoot Alan from a distance when he is taken in by a police officer, his childhood friend from his father's shoe factory, Carl Bentley, and then chases after Sarah, Judy, and Peter (who is transformed into a monkey while attempting to cheat) to steal the game so Alan will come to him for it (and for them), but his plan is once again foiled by Peter and later Alan. Eventually, when Alan and his allies are on the verge of finishing the game, Van Pelt arrives at his damaged house and holds both him and Sarah at gunpoint before he could roll the dice.

When Van Pelt tells him to drop the dice, he orders Alan to start running again so that he can chase him. However, Alan refuses to run off this time, admitting that even though he is still scared, he no longer finds it in his heart to run away from what he's afraid of and instead face it to suppress his fears like his father told him. Impressed, Van Pelt acknowledges Alan of acting like a real man, and asks for any last words before he finishes him off.

Before he could pull the trigger, it was then the dice gave in the right number that allows Alan to win the game, and once Alan says "Jumanji", all of the animals and dangers of the game are sucked back into it by powerful tornado-force winds, including Van Pelt himself, much to his dismay. This also sends Alan and Sarah back to their past with their memories of the future intact before they get rid of the game and eventually begin a romantic relationship, thus altering and creating a newer and better future, while Van Pelt remains sealed inside Jumanji, which is disposed of via throwing it into a river by Alan and Sarah in hopes of never being found again.

TV series [ ]

Van Pelt returns as the main antagonist in the animated series based on the film.

He is revealed to be a part of the game, and cannot die under normal circumstances. When he actually dies in an episode after being knocked into a bottomless pit, Peter starts to become him little by little, but is saved by Alan and Judy rescuing the original Van Pelt by tossing down his rope.

His temporary death was in special circumstances due to the magic nature of the pit and in general the animated version of Van Pelt is stated to be invulnerable to harm. Indeed he is shown suffering fatal injuries such as being impaled and surviving unharmed. His later appearances are usually about hunting the heroes and failing constantly.

Unlike his movie version, who is extremely trustworthy and honorable, despite his ruthlessness, this version of the character is noticeably more certifiable, deranged, and cruel. Van Pelt has no compunction murdering children, an act his rival, Ludwig Von Richtor calls him out for and keeps the heads of humans mounted on his wall. Pelt mentions he once had a maid who eventually shot.

Van Pelt displays the ability to control certain animals in the series; summoning demonic hounds when he blows his horn, being served by a monkey butler in his lodge, using tracking weasels and summoning an elephant to use as a steed.

Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle [ ]

Personality [ ].

In the 1995 film and the animated series, Van Pelt is a truly merciless, traitorous, destructive, sadistic, bloodthirsty, ruthless, uncaring and cruel poacher who tries at all costs to hunt his prey to the very end. He is very murderous, sanguinary, treacherous, and manipulative, so he loves to hunt men and animals to display them on his wall. Van Pelt has a deep hatred for cowards and condemns people for displaying any acts of. While Van Pelt’s constant attempts of hunting Alan are part of the games rules, Van Pelt takes his objective of hunting Alan more personal due to Alan’s own coward like nature and has been hunting Alan since he was a child, while in the world of Jumanji.

Despite this, he seems to have something of a more noble side, as when Sarah tries to recover the game at the store, which Van Pelt was using as a bait to lure Alan, he surprises her and tells her to stop cringing, because he could have shot her at any moment. Sarah asks him why, and he says Alan rolled the dice, implying he's only after Alan because he released him from the game. Prior to that, Van Pelt snatches the game away from Sarah, Judy and Peter and seemingly tries to work out a deal with them but is interrupted by an incoming animal stampede. In his final moments with Alan, Van Pelt commends Alan for finally standing up for himself and even offers him a chance to speak his last words before shooting him.

In the series, as he is part of the game and, unlike the movie, never leaves the jungle, his moral and role are even more twisted, therefore his more positive traits are nonexistent and he is perfectly willing to hunt other humans; even keeping the heads of children among his hunting trophies. This personality is shared by his Welcome to the Jungle counterpart, although his professional background and objective differ; as an explorer, his goal is to possess the Jaguar's Eye at any cost.

As he is a vital part of the game's mechanic in the animated series, if he somehow dies (he can, indeed, die in the animated series, although it is very difficult to do so), the victor will immediately take his role (which almost happened to Peter). Also, later in the series, and not much unlike the movie, he begins to learn the game's mechanics. Although, in this case, since he never left the jungle, he understands it a little more, knowing exactly how to act according to the rules and even use it to his advantage. His most commonly used word is "Blast!", particularly when something goes wrong.

Enemies [ ]

• Alan Parrish
• Sarah Whittle
• Peter Shepherd
• Judith "Judy" Shepherd
• Caleb Sproul

Gallery [ ]

• Jonathan Hyde, the actor who played Van Pelt in the first film, also portrayed Sam Parrish, the father of the film's protagonist Alan Parrish. This is a method to hint that Van Pelt represents how Alan sees his father after their heated argument in 1969 when Alan angrily refuses to go to the Cliffside School of Boys, hence why Van Pelt congratulates Alan for acting like a man once he realizes what lesson his father was trying to teach him. Also, recapping the clue that describes him ("A hunter from the darkest wild makes you feel just like a child"), it can be inferred that he has no actual physical form unless summoned by a player, in which case, he would take the form of whatever person said player fears the most (in Alan's case, his own father).
• In the original book, Van Pelt was not a villain at all. Instead, he was just a lost jungle guide whose only remotely villainous action was deliberately ignoring Judy when she tried to ask for his help.
• Van Pelt can be easily described as superhuman in reality as his confrontation in the looted supermarket would have realistically ended with his death when a whole shelf full of paint cans fell on him. Coupled with the age that he seems to be, Van Pelt would have been definitely killed but he somehow survives the ordeal, which can be a possible suggestion that he might be a supernatural being who can survive lethal situations due Jumanji's powers. Van Pelt is more or less confirmed to be supernatural by existing in the 19th century, and taking on the shape of Private Dewell, indicating that he always assumes the shape of someone familiar with playing the game. The existence of a separate "modernized" character, Russel Van Pelt , also confirms the supernatural nature of Van Pelt, as he himself is "modernized" whenever the Jumanji game is "modernized".
• Van Pelt's hunting rifle is a modified Winchester M1901 lever-action shotgun, modified with an amended stock (complete with a custom checkered pattern and "cheek cushion"), a false box magazine, a rear sight, a large tube placed over the barrel with a foresight and muzzle "bell" so as to make it appear to be an elephant gun. When it runs out of ammunition, which is unable to be replenished since it was discontinued in 1903, he ends up replacing it with a Daewoo USAS-12 CQ outfitted with an unusually large scope, a drum magazine, and a suppressor to make it look like a sniper rifle, after bribing the gun shop owner into bypassing the mandatory waiting period.
• In the animated series, Tim Curry auditioned for Van Pelt before being cast as Trader Slick .
• Although Van Pelt directly antagonizes Alan, it should be noted that the real villain is the game itself, as it is directly responsible for bringing him and all its other dangers into the real world.

Navigation [ ]

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Van Pelt Jumanji

• Posted on January 10, 2016
• by ce-admin
• Comments Off on Van Pelt Jumanji

Van Pelt is the main antagonist played by Jonathan Hyde in the 1995 fantasy film. He is the hunter who resides within the cursed game. Van Pelt wears a hunters’ uniform with a pith helmet. He is first introduced in the film when Alan turns on Jumanji and the hunter is released consequently. He begins to chase Alan, hunting him down because the little boy released him from the game (which is part of the rules). Another reason why Van Pelt is chasing down Alan is because the little boy is not “man enough” to face him.

After running out of bullets, the villain visits a gun shop to switch his old gun with a sniper because his previous gun no longer exists in the current world, hence no bullets for it can be found. He then tries to shoot the little boy from a distance but he is arrested by a police officer who coincidentally was his childhood friend. Van Pelt then resorts to chasing after Sarah and the other kids just so that he could steal the game with the intention of expecting Alan to come for it from him. His plan is foiled by Peter, again. The next time we see Van Pelt is at the film’s climax when he hold Sarah and Alan at gunpoint when he want to throw the dice.

This time, Alan refuses to run when Van Pelt orders him to throw the dice and to run so that he can chase him. Even though he is still scared like he was scared of Van Pelt before, Alan faces him to get over with this time

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Common sense media reviewers.

Some thrills, but may be too much for little ones.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

A distinctly unfriendly community is the setting,

The main characters support each other and help ea

Much-threatened and occasionally carried out, in t

"Damn" here and there.

Parents need to know that Jumanji has lots of thrills and perils but little joy, as monstrous jungle predators pour out of an enchanted board game to overwhelm hapless kids and adults in a depressed New England town. It may be too intense for some kids, although young viewers who aren't nightmare-prone will…

Positive Messages

A distinctly unfriendly community is the setting, with kids who defy and mouth off to adults and pull pranks (though everything comes out right at the end thanks to their intervention).

Positive Role Models

The main characters support each other and help each other survive.

Violence & Scariness

Much-threatened and occasionally carried out, in the form of beatings, bitings, stingings, and stompings mostly by nastied-up members of the animal kingdom. Shooting also threatened by a maniacal hunter.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Language in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Jumanji has lots of thrills and perils but little joy, as monstrous jungle predators pour out of an enchanted board game to overwhelm hapless kids and adults in a depressed New England town. It may be too intense for some kids, although young viewers who aren't nightmare-prone will be diverted by the creatures, computer-generated by the same Hollywood whizzes who brought to life the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park . To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

Videos and photos.

Community Reviews

• Parents say (38)
• Kids say (80)

Based on 38 parent reviews

All time favorite, but you guys didn't include some key notes!

Entertaining all the way through, but can be a bit scary., what's the story.

JUMANJI begins with a 19th century expedition to bury a board game of unexplained origin. In 1969, young Alan happens to dig up the game and plays it. The relic materializes multitudes of hostile African animals, and Alan gets sucked into the jungle-world of the game. More than 25 years later two orphans (Bradley Pierce, Kirsten Dunst ) move into Alan's old house, find the game, and start playing, unleashing a fresh rampage of vicious beasts and Alan (Robin Williams ). Alan is now a full-grown semi-wild man, being tracked by Van Pelt (Jonathan Hyde), a crazed, implacable, old-school safari hunter. The only way to return everything to normal is for the kids to continue playing the game to the end, even though each roll of the dice unleashes more attacking animals, from demonic bats to man-eating plants to a ghastly herd of giant spiders.

Is It Any Good?

There's no sense of wonder, really, just one scare after another, and the fact that the killer Van Pelt is played by the same actor who embodied Alan's snooty father adds another dark note. Young viewers who aren't nightmare-prone might be diverted a little by the computer-generated beasts, which all have a slightly livid, unreal glaze that's fitting for how lurid engravings and drawings of the late 1800s might portray exotic beasts.

But Jumanji' s script is weak, and Williams pretty much plays it straight as the time-displaced, long-marooned Alan. The young actors are good, but there's a heavy undercurrent of continual peril, death, and morbidity, with no breathing room. The ending, in which history is rewritten for all the characters even better than It's a Wonderful Life , seems a little forced, to say the least, and doesn't dispel the general unpleasantness.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about what they think makes for a good fantasy adventure film. Was Jumanji funny, or more on the darker side?

If you were going to make this movie, is there anything you'd change, and if so, what?

Which game would you like to see come alive?

Movie Details

• In theaters : December 15, 1995
• On DVD or streaming : September 2, 2000
• Cast : Bonnie Hunt , Kirsten Dunst , Robin Williams
• Director : Joe Johnston
• Inclusion Information : Female actors
• Studio : Columbia Tristar
• Genre : Drama
• Topics : Magic and Fantasy , Adventures , Wild Animals
• Run time : 104 minutes
• MPAA rating : PG
• MPAA explanation : violence and scariness
• Last updated : January 26, 2024

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Characters / Jumanji (1995)

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Alan Parrish

Portrayed By: Robin Williams & Adam Hann-Byrd (young) Other Languages Michel Papineschi (European French)

• Action Survivor : He was only a kid when he was sucked into Jumanji, and was forced to figure out how to fend off all of the game's horrors very quickly just to survive.
• Alone with the Psycho : His last trial of the game is facing Van Pelt unarmed.
• …And That Little Girl Was Me : He chronicles the beginning of the game to Sarah, who is in denial about it ever happening, before revealing that he is Alan.
• Beard of Barbarism : Due to spending 26 years in the jungle while never shaving. He gets rid of it once he leaves Jumanji.
• The Beastmaster : He might not command them, but he knows how to keep them away ( and he must! ).
• Be Careful What You Wish For : Wanted to leave his family and life behind. In Jumanji, he got it.
• Berserk Button : He really doesn't like it when Peter accuses him of being afraid of the game.
• Break Out the Museum Piece : At different points, he uses an antique sword in the Parrish home to fight the perils of Jumanji. Alan : (to the portrait over the case) Sorry, Angus.
• Canon Foreigner : Despite being the main character of the film, he is actually not in the book, nor is any character resembling him or his fate.
• Childhood Friend Romance : In the final scene, the de-aged Alan and Sarah eventually developed feelings for each other. Cue the epilogue and they're a married couple expecting their first child .
• Cloud Cuckoo Lander : He comes out of the game as an adult man, used to life in Jumanji, and clueless about how long he was gone and what happened to his hometown and family.
• Coming of Age Story : A bizarre one, but still. The film shows Alan learning to care about others, putting on his father's shoes, and facing challenges himself rather than running away from them, "Like a man".
• Deadpan Snarker : Developed into this as an adult. Being played by Robin Williams kind of makes it inevitable.
• Decomposite Character : His not-so-friendly personality and "experience" in the game make him more akin to Van Pelt's namesake than the hunter himself.
• Disaster Dominoes : In the same day he causes his best friend to get fired, gets beaten up by bullies, his father tells him he's being sent to a boarding school, and he gets sucked into a Hungry Jungle with Everything Trying to Kill You .
• Earn Your Happy Ending : Sucked into the game's jungle as a child, forced to survive untold horrors for 26 years, only to discover that his family is dead. After many trials and tribulations, he gets his family and fortune back, along with the girl and his own friends and family, a thriving family business and even gets the chance to save Peter and Judy's parents.
• Experienced Protagonist : Having spent 26 years trapped inside Jumanji, he's well familiar with the dangers and hazards that are brought out from the game.
• Face Your Fears : His last speech before Van Pelt is about facing his fears "like a man".
• Fish out of Temporal Water : It doesn't really get mentioned, due to everything else he's dealing with, but he's completely unaware of all that has happened in the world in the twenty-six years between when he went in to the game and when he emerges as an adult.
• Generation Xerox : Much to his chagrin, he finds himself talking to Peter like his father used to talk to him as a child.
• Impoverished Patrician : He was born to the richest family in town; thanks to Jumanji, he finds himself homeless and dressed in skins and leaves (and later, in clothes lent to him by a homeless man ). Thank God there was a Reset Button .
• It's a Wonderful Plot : In its own bizarre way, the game shows how much harm he would do to others if he disappeared one night as a child. Not only did his parents suffer, but the whole town did as well.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold : In the present, he's a bit brusque and short-tempered but it's understandable given what he's been through and he is able to apologize such as when he tears into Peter and realizes he's acting just like his dad used to.
• Kilroy Was Here : The hut he lived in while trapped in the game is still present by Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle with the words "Alan Parrish Was Here" carved into one of the walls.
• Large Ham : At first, due to years of being in the jungle leaving him a bit off, to put it mildly. That and being played by Robin Williams, meaning it'd be odd if he wasn't hammy.
• Lonely Rich Kid : Before going to Jumanji, he is the son of the richest man in town, but he has no friends except Sarah and Carl (until he gets him fired), and is a victim of bullying.
• Lovable Coward : Alan tends to run when faced with major threats, but remains sympathetic anyway. It's justified given the kind of stuff he's up against where running is the only way to avoid death.
• Mountain Man : Living in Jumanji turned him into a social misfit who is really good at surviving in the wild. He also has a messy beard and had to fashion his own clothes once he grew out of the ones he wore into the game.
• Mr. Exposition : As a Jumanji veteran, he is an expert in the challenges populating the game and lectures the other characters on how to avoid them.
• Mundane Luxury : Living in a brutal jungle for two and a half decades has made him appreciate the little things about modern life such as indoor plumbing and being able to wear a suit rather than whatever he could piece together.
• When he realizes that his father went broke and ultimately died because he disappeared.
• Again, when he realizes what a hardass he was to Peter and is compelled to apologize.
• Again , when he learns that his actions got Carl fired from his job at the shoe factory.
• Nobody Calls Me "Chicken"! : He was quite willing to leave Peter and Judy to figure the game out for themselves until Peter said he was too afraid to play, not even in an antagonistic manner but sympathetically. Peter then reveals this was entirely intentional.
• Oh, Crap! : His very soul trembles when he realizes Van Pelt is coming.
• Older Than They Look : Technically, he lives 26 extra years thanks to Jumanji. Not that he enjoyed them one bit.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business : Once he's freed from Jumanji and starts playing again, he's at different times sarcastic, joking, and stern, but he never loses his single-minded focus on finishing the game and breaking the spell. When the rhyme about Van Pelt appears, though, he becomes absolutely petrified and starts running for his life, abandoning the others and the game in the process.
• Papa Wolf : To Judy and Peter. He uses the survival skills he’s acquired from his time in the game to protect the kids from various creatures the game sends out.
• Properly Paranoid : He knows Jumanji is no mere toy and he is very reluctant to continue playing.
• Rebel Prince : He would rather run away than choose a life that his dad could give him. He does learn to accept his position after 1969 plays again. The novelization also admits that he has great resentment of his family dynasty.
• Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated : Nobody expected him to return after 26 years.
• Rightful King Returns : After learning of his parents death, he looks forward to meeting Peter and Judy's aunt and telling her that the house rightfully belongs to him.
• Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory : He still remembers Peter and Judy 26 years after Jumanji reset. He's even able to warn their parents against taking the ski trip that gets said parents killed.
• Talkative Loon : When he comes out of the game. Judy and Peter find him almost as terrifying as the lion. Justified as he was alone in a hostile jungle for over twenty years with no one to talk to.
• There Will Be Toilet Paper : After he shaves for the first time, he's excited that he doesn't have to wipe with leaves anymore.
• Throwing Your Sword Always Works : Though he doesn't actually injure Van Pelt, the sword he throws still lands on its point, nailing Van Pelt's sleeve to a column and deflecting his shot.
• The first crosses with Offscreen Moment of Awesome —he seems to be a quiet, shy child in 1969, gets badly beaten up by bullies, and runs and hides rather than admit his mistake in the shoe factory. But being sucked into what he later calls "the deepest, darkest jungle in existence" forced him to become the Action Survivor described above, and do it before turning twelve.
• The second occurrence is also the emotional climax of the movie—when Van Pelt, who's the embodiment of all of his fears, has him at gunpoint and tells him to "start running," Alan refuses, and admits that while he's absolutely terrified, he's going to face what he's afraid of instead of trying to escape. It's even implied that this decision is what allows him to win the game, as the second die doesn't stop rolling until he makes the choice to stand up to Van Pelt.
• Took a Level in Jerkass : Towards Peter when the pelican snatches the board game and he yells at him for not getting it. Even after Peter gets it from the river, Alan just gives him a halfhearted thanks. Later, when Peter returns the group, his anger at Peter was forgotten, only to resurface when he saw Peter become a monkey for trying to cheat. On the way to the mansion he scolds at Peter for messing up, but soon apologizes when he realize he's treating Peter like his own dad treated him.
• Timeshifted Actor : Obviously, played by a different actor as an adult and as a young teen.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes? : Alan is terrified when he realizes he just rolled in Van Pelt.

Sarah Whittle

Portrayed By: Bonnie Hunt & Laura Bell Bundy (young)

• Babies Ever After : She's pregnant in the Distant Finale .
• Broken Bird : After watching Alan get sucked into a board game, getting attacked by bats, and then being dismissed as insane by everyone in town for trying to talk about what happened, she ends up a bitter, lonely shut-in who's heavily implied to be reliant on prescription medication just to make it through her days.
• Canon Foreigner : Like Alan, she is a film-only character.
• Cassandra Truth : Everyone else blew her off when she tried to tell them about Alan's disappearance.
• Fortune Teller : She became one known as "Madame Serena" as an adult, in the broke town timeline.
• Girl Next Door : To Alan, literally and figuratively, she is the nice and relatable girl that lives nearby.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold : She's blonde and, as a child, the kindest person in town, even bringing Alan back his bike after bullies steal it. Even after growing up isolated and friendless, she remains a kinder person to the kids than the adult Alan.
• Heroic Sacrifice : She tries to jump in front of Van Pelt's bullet when it looks like Alan is about to die. Thankfully, Alan's successfully won the game at that point, so they both live.
• I Have Your Wife : Van Pelt attempts to take her to bait Alan.
• Love Interest : Alan's. They get together after playing the game.
• Mama Bear : To Judy and Peter. While she’s not as action oriented as Alan, Sarah is willing to put her life on the line to keep the Shepherd children safe from harm. She’s even willing stand up to the gun-toting Van Pelt when he has her and Judy cornered.
• New-Age Retro Hippie : Deconstructed —as an adult, Sarah relies heavily on things like star signs and fortune telling, but it's all but stated that she doesn't really believe in those things and is instead using them as a shield to justify her isolated existence and keep people away after the whole town wrote her off as crazy.
• One Head Taller : As a child, she towers over Alan by a good five or six inches. As adults, they're almost the same height.
• Ripple-Effect-Proof Memory : Despite claiming that she's starting to forget the events that followed the game after finishing it, she still remembers Judy and Peter 26 years later.
• When she ended up getting attacked by African bats after Alan gets sucked into the game, she ran out of the Parish mansion, forsaking Alan to a potentially horrible fate.
• Then, after dealing with the man-eating plant, Sarah is so scared of playing the game again that she tries to run away. She doesn't get far before Alan catches her.
• Set Right What Once Went Wrong : Her final actions as an adult—refusing to let Alan fall to his doom ("I won't leave you!"), chasing after him once he goes downstairs, and then trying to shield him from Van Pelt's bullet—suggest that she's trying to make up for abandoning Alan and getting him trapped in Jumanji in the first place.
• Team Mom : She quickly becomes more protective and sympathetic to Judy and Peter than Alan.
• That Man Is Dead : At first, she refuses to admit she is Sarah.
• This Cannot Be! : Her reaction to meeting Alan alive as an adult is certainly shock.
• Timeshifted Actor : Same reason as Alan; 26 years is too much for a single actor.
• Together in Death : When Van Pelt is about to shoot Alan in the end, Sarah runs to be with him, and maybe catch the bullet herself.

Judy Shepherd

Portrayed By: Kirsten Dunst

• Adaptational Angst Upgrade : In the book, Judy and Peter's parents were still alive. In the film, Judy and Peter are orphans.
• Brief Accent Imitation : When Aunt Nora calls home and she pretends to be someone else, sporting a British accent.
• Consummate Liar : She is great at deceiving others but, in her defense, it's always for a greater cause.
• Cool Big Sis : She is very protective of Peter.
• Death by Adaptation : Strongly implied (at least) near the end of the game, when she is hit by a flower poison dart and passes away in Peter's arms, murmuring how she would like to see her parents again. In the book, neither Judy nor her parents died.
• Freudian Excuse : The reason Judy keeps telling lies is because she misses her parents and is trying to hide it from everyone.
• Perfect Poison : Dies within minutes of being hit by a plant poison dart, but with no other apparent ill effects.

Peter Shepherd

Portrayed By: Bradley Pierce

• Big Brother Instinct : Little brother, actually, but he has this to the point where, in the novelization, he went crazy and attacked a classmate for calling Judy a liar (the classmate was the son of the realtor who sold them the house, who was told the true story by their aunt). He also checks on Judy after she’s attacked by the purple flower and kicks a giant spider away from her.
• Cheaters Never Prosper : Peter tries to rig his dice to finish the game sooner. Jumanji punishes him by turning him into a monkey.
• Elective Mute : He stopped talking to anyone besides Judy after their parents' deaths. When Alan is released from the game and finds his parents have also died Peter voluntarily speaks to him.
• Evolutionary Levels : Jumanji tells him he'll "slip back even more than [his] token" (a monkey), and becomes a generic monkey. Or more accurately, a little kid in a monkey suit, rather than an australopithecine or another real human ancestor.
• Failed a Spot Check : Peter runs to the shed to pick the ax. Finding it locked, he takes the ax (which is outside) and uses it against the lock before realizing that he has already what he wanted. After that, he looks straight into the camera as if saying "boy, am I stupid."
• Forced Transformation : For trying to cheat (by deliberately dropping the dice so they'd land on twelve, letting him finish the game), Jumanji causes him to slowly turn into a monkey.
• Hidden Depths : He is smarter than he looks.
• Maniac Monkeys : He becomes more energetic after being turned into a monkey, and his willingness to swing an ax is almost worrying.
• Manipulative Bastard : He gets Alan to continue playing by questioning his bravery.
• The Quiet One : He became almost mute after his parents died.

Carl Bentley

Portrayed By: David Alan Grier

• Chronically Crashed Car : His police cruiser suffers untold abuse through the movie, culminating with being swallowed by a giant, carnivorous plant. Carl admits defeat and simply yells at it to keep it.
• Determinator : Even being handcuffed to his car doesn't stop him for long.
• I Always Wanted to Say That : He always wanted to kick a door in after identifying himself as police. Doing so, unfortunately, washes him into a monsoon flood .
• In-Series Nickname : During his days at the Parrish Shoe Company, he was known as the "Sole Man".
• Inspector Javert : He's convinced that Judy and Peter's "uncle" is up to something and keeps trailing him for no reason.
• Intergenerational Friendship : He formed a close bond with thirteen-year-old Alan when he was in his 20s.
• Lemming Cops : Though he communicates with other police through radio, he keeps trying to investigate on his own instead of retreating or calling for backup, no matter what happens to himself or his car. Justified later on as it’s implied the monkeys released from the game have overrun the police station.
• Screams Like a Little Girl : When he's surfing a monsoon flood on a front door, and again when he sees a giant crocodile swimming past him.
• This Is Going to Be Huge : In 1969, he designed a 1990s tennis shoe and was certain that it would conquer the market. Unfortunately, Alan left the shoe on a conveyor belt, causing an accident that broke it, leading to Carl's unemployment. Subverted when the game resets to 1969 and Alan tells his father the truth, ensuring Carl keep his job and his shoe becomes successful after all.
• Token Minority : The only main black character in the movie.

Samuel Parrish

Portrayed By: Jonathan Hyde

• Canon Foreigner : As expected from an element of Alan's backstory, Alan's father does not exist in the source material because Alan himself does not.
• Convicted by Public Opinion : A rumor spread through town, claiming that Sam murdered and dismembered Alan, then hid the remains in the Parrish home's walls.
• Death by Despair : After Alan disappeared, Sam gave up everything he had to try to find him. His eventual death of a broken heart likely wasn't helped by rumors that he himself had murdered Alan and hidden the body.
• Fisher King : When Alan disappeared, he spent his fortune looking for him, the shoe factory closed down, and the local economy went into recession.
• Hero with Bad Publicity : After Alan disappeared, Sam was dogged by rumors that he had murdered him, giving him a terrible reputation among the townsfolk.
• It's All My Fault : He blamed himself for Alan's disappearance because he had just told him he intended to send him to a boarding school to toughen him up, and Alan lashed against him saying " I'm never talking to you again! "
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold : Despite being depicted as an aloof man and a strict father while alive, he clearly loved his son and spent everything he had to try and find him in the bad timeline. Alan only finds out how much his father truly loves him when he first escapes the game. He also apologizes to Alan for his initial attitude and says he wont force him to go to boarding school, saying they'll talk it over in the morning.
• My God, What Have I Done? : His boy disappeared one night without a trace. Right after he had an argument with him and he tried to run away.
• Papa Wolf : When Alan goes missing, he pours everything he has into finding him and is so devastated when Alan isn't found that he gives up on everything completely.
• Parents as People : He's stern and aloof but he does love Alan dearly and even apologizes for his initial harshness.
• So Proud of You : It's subtle but when Alan admits he was the one who left the shoe on the conveyor belt, not Carl, Sam isn't mad, even smiling a bit, and merely says he's glad Alan told him, implying this reaction.

Nora Shepherd

Portrayed By: Bebe Neuwirth

Appearances: jumanji | jumanji: the next level.

• Butt-Monkey : Jumanji has a knack for involving her despite not playing the game and not trying to get immersed into the actions of the players, like Carl does.
• The Cameo : Makes an appearance at the end of Jumanji: The Next Level as the owner of a restraunt, Nora's, that the characters meet up in.
• Canon Foreigner : Less so than others. She replaces Judy and Peter's parents, who are alive in the book. In fact, early versions of the script had Nora as Judy and Peter's mother , with only their dad missing .
• Hero Antagonist : Judy and Peter want to finish the game to get rid of the damage to the house before she comes back.
• Maiden Aunt : Seems to have no other family besides the kids.
• Mama Bear : While Judy and Peter may exasperate her at times, she does everything she can to help them when she realizes they're probably in danger.
• Parental Substitute : Got custody of Peter and Judy after their parents died.

• Adaptational Villainy : In the book, Judy rolls a lost jungle guide who ignores her and is only interested in checking his map. No other human "threat" is summoned.
• Adventurer Outfit : He wears a Victorian era safari outfit, fitting for a big game hunter in a world based on sub-Saharan Africa.
• Ambiguously Human : Is he really human, or just an illusion created by the game? He seems to be "human" in the same way the other Jumanji denizens are " animals " and " plants ."
• And You Were There : Is played by the same actor as Alan's father.
• Ax-Crazy : He's very unhinged and violent, perfectly willing to hunt a child.
• Baddie Flattery : When Alan finally stops running from Van Pelt and chooses to stare him down, knowing that it means he's a dead man, Van Pelt compliments Alan on "finally acting like a man" after all this time. It's enough for Van Pelt to allow Alan to say a few last words, which proves to be his undoing when Alan rolls the exact die roll to reach the end of the game and say "Jumanji", thus winning the game and undoing everything that happened.
• Beard of Evil : He has a short, villainous goatee in contrast to the full bearded Alan.
• BFG : Van Pelt's elephant gun was deliberately exaggerated by the production crew, who crafted a pipe on top of a real gun. It's another possible hint to Van Pelt's inhumanity: He is as much an exaggerated, vicious caricature of a Victorian Great White Hunter as any Jumanji creature is of its real-world wildlife counterpart. The more modern semiautomatic shotgun he acquires after his elephant gun runs dry is no slouch, either.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality : He's out to hunt Alan, because Alan rolled the dice. Van Pelt is only after Alan, because he was the one who summoned Van Pelt. It makes perfect sense to him and he never questions or tries to explain it.
• Butt-Monkey : Despite his late entry, he is the character that receives the most direct, physical abuse.
• Decomposite Character : He might have Van Pelt's name, but it's Alan who mostly follows his role from the book.
• Dragged Off to Hell : When Alan wins the game, he tries to shoot Alan, only for his bullet, his gun, and Van Pelt himself to be physically sucked back into the Jumanji board game before it slams closed, giving off this impression.
• The Dreaded : Alan is positively terrified of him. Considering he lives in Jumanji , that's saying something.
• Dull Surprise : One of the tall telling signs that he's a creation of the game rather than a sentient being is his lack of reaction towards modern culture and society. Being told his choice of bullets has gone out of production for nearly a century? Mild disappointment followed by an immediate demand for a new gun.
• Early-Bird Cameo : His image is in the upper left corner of the Jumanji board game.
• Egomaniac Hunter : In a classic Jungle Opera he'd be a Great White Hunter —but this is Jumanji, the land of Everything Trying to Kill You .
• Even Evil Has Standards : Yeah, he's Hunting the Most Dangerous Game , but he'll only try to kill the player who summoned him. When Carl tries to stop him, he never shoots to kill, and he doesn't try to kill Sarah when she's at his mercy.
• Evil Brit : he has the look and he definitely has the accent.
• Evil Poacher : Not shown much, since he seems uninterested in hunting anything that isn't Alan, but he's definitely a hunter and an antagonist.
• Evil Sounds Deep : He speaks with a deep, melodious voice.
• Faux Affably Evil : He's polite to anyone who didn't roll him out of the game, as well as the gun shop owner, but it doesn't change the fact that he's still focused on hunting and killing his target (which happens to be a human).
• Fish out of Temporal Water : Downplayed . He's completely unfazed by modern society and technology, but he's still walking around in Victorian clothes and using ammunition that went out of production in 1903. Although he's smart and pragmatic enough to just buy a modern gun the instant he finds out he can't get more ammo.
• Great White Hunter : A villainous version in that he's Hunting the Most Dangerous Game . It's also implied Van Pelt hunted Alan within the jungle of Jumanji as well, picking up where he left off while abiding by the game's rule of only hunting the player who rolled him. And the thing is, Alan isn't even really sure why, just knowing that "everything about me, he finds offensive."
• He-Man Woman Hater : He is obsessed with Alan facing him "like a man" and shows contempt for his companions.
• The Heavy : It'd be a stretch to call him the Big Bad , but he's definitely the most prominent of the game's manifestations who persistently hounds Alan from his first scene to his last.
• Hunting the Most Dangerous Game : He only cares about hunting Alan. He knows Alan is sentient and even talks to (and lectures) him before trying to shoot him.
• If I Wanted You Dead... : Van Pelts' only goals are to hunt down Alan no matter what; everyone else that gets in his way only get scared off by warning shots. He even states this as he corners Sarah by citing that she wasn't the one who rolled the dice that summoned him, "Alan did."
• Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy : He shoots at Alan a lot of times, but never nails him. The first one fired from offscreen in the study might have intentionally been a warning shot to give Alan a sporting chance.
• Implacable Man : Nothing will stop him from pursuing Alan. Alan tries to stop him by pinning him to a column with a sword; Van Pelt seizes it by the blade barehanded, snaps it in half , walks off the half still lodged into the column and resumes the chase without actually looking at it. Van Pelt: Coming, ready or not.
• Large Ham : He has a very boisterous and bombastic personality.
• Last-Name Basis : We never learn his first name in the original film, with some places crediting him as "Hunter Van Pelt" or simply "The Hunter".
• Like a Duck Takes to Water : Unlike Alan, who had to adjust to the world of 1995 after suffering a future shock, Van Pelt knows exactly what to do in his new environment, such as finding a gun shop to buy bullets for his gun. When told that his choice of bullets went of production in 1903, Van Pelt treats it like a minor inconvenience and immediately orders a replacement weapon, going as far as bribing the gun owner, before resuming his hunt for Alan without missing a single beat.
• Meaningful Name : "Van Pelt"—an animal's fur is often called a pelt, and Van Pelt is an Evil Poacher .
• The Nicknamer : Refers to Alan as "Sonny Jim" while hunting him, only acknowledging him by his given name when he stops running.
• Nigh-Invulnerability : He shrugs off having his shoulder pinned to a wall by a sword, and getting slammed through a shopping display and crushed by an avalanche of paint cans barely slows him down. Similar to the other living creatures the game summons, it's unclear if he can even be hurt, much less killed.
• No-Sell : Alan throws his sword at Van Pelt in an attempt to stop him chasing him; it manages to pin him to a column for about a split second (by his shoulder) but he simply snaps it in half and continues his chase, (the sword didn't even make him bleed, it nearly got his arm but only went through the shoulder portion of his blazer). '''Not good enough, Sonny Jim!"
• Noble Demon : He will never shoot anyone who isn't Alan. When Carl tries to stop him, he shoots at his (increasingly abused) cruiser and a lamp post over him as a distraction, rather than killing him. He also tells Sarah directly that he only wants Alan, not her or the kids, choosing to abide by the game's rules and hunt the player who summoned him. And when he finally has Alan cornered, he offers him a chance to run away first, compliments him when he refuses to do so, and then allows him to say some last words.
• Ominous Walk : Keeps his military-esque march while following Alan instead of running after him.
• Rule of Symbolism : Van Pelt isn't just a hunter—he represents Alan's strained relationship with his father, who constantly expected his son to "act like a man" and treated him coldly. It seems to be the game deliberately forcing Alan to face his worst fear .
• Screams Like a Little Girl : When he is about to crash at the Sports store, he gives off a girlish scream, which is comical with the rest of his persona.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Money! : He avoids the waiting period and background check by throwing a bag of gold coins on the gun store's counter.
• Super-Persistent Predator : As a human opponent, he is much more resilient, intelligent and dangerous than any animal that comes out of the game. He will keep coming after being dealt with once, use his surroundings to his advantage and even improve his weapons.
• Terms of Endangerment : He addresses Alan as "Sonny Jim," a dark take on what a father might call his son. It seems deliberate both In-Universe (Van Pelt's riddle states that he "makes you feel just like a child") and on a meta level (Van Pelt represents Alan's relationship with his father).
• Trigger-Happy : He might be more successful if he took a couple of seconds more to aim, but maybe this is intentional.
• The Unfettered : The one rule he abides is that he hunts the player (Alan) that brought him into the real world and no one else. That doesn't mean, however, he wouldn't use the other players as hostage bait if it means bringing Alan to him. Or buy a more deadly, modern weapon to hunt him with.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight : Only Carl takes notice of him, and it is because he is shooting an elephant gun in a residential area and in broad daylight. Nobody comments on the fact that he is dressed like a 19th century African Great White Hunter in 1995 New England.
• Villainous Breakdown : He's genuinely terrified when he gets sucked back into the game. His final line? "HEEEEEEEEEEEELP!"
• Villain Respect : When Alan finally chooses to stop running and face Van Pelt, Alan says "my father told me you have to face what you're afraid of." This gets a genuine laugh out of Van Pelt, who responds "Good lad. You're finally acting like a man. " Of course, Van Pelt then immediately intends to shoot Alan, but it's something.
• Why Don't You Just Shoot Him? : We can only speculate, but he might enjoy the chase more. That, or ending the hunt too quickly wouldn't be sporting.
• Worthy Opponent : He has a certain warped respect for Alan, the way an old-fashioned hunter does it's prey. When Alan refuses to run and faces down Van Pelt, Van Pelt compliments him for his bravery and gives him a chance to say his last words.
• Would Hurt a Child : He has possibly been hunting Alan since he was a teen.

Portrayed By: N/A

Appearances: jumanji | jumanji: welcome to the jungle | jumanji: the next level.

• Always Chaotic Evil : The animals and even the plant life of Jumanji are nothing but dangerous and consistently trying to kill the players. Monkeys are incredibly destructive, carnivores like lions and crocodiles eat people, stampedes lay waste to everything in their path, arthropods are humongous and deadly, and there's a big game hunter that tries to shoot whoever rolls the dice. And that's not even close to everything that can be summoned.
• Ambiguously Evil : As a board game, its purpose is to be played and nothing else. Yes, it unleashes dangers on whoever plays it, but there's nothing forcing them to play in the first place. It also has a Reset Button that is pushed after finishing a game and undoes all collateral damage. As a video game, players are constantly in danger from the native wildlife, but the game also creates helpful Non-Player Characters and grants avatars certain strengths to help them complete the levels.
• Artifact of Doom : You are better off not playing.

• Berserk Button : Trying to cheat is the only known way to make the game legitimately angry.
• Big Creepy-Crawlies : Everything in Jumanji is oversized in some way compared to its real world counterpart. This goes double (or tenfold) for arthropods.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality : It is a living, sentient game and so it naturally has a different flavor of morality than its players. Cheating is so highly offensive that it will devolve you. It will try as hard as it can to prevent players from winning because games are supposed to be challenging so that they can be fun. As soon as someone wins, everything is re-set; no harm, no foul. It will also go on indefinitely, waiting for players to continue even if it takes decades. If that means players being trapped inside for all that time, so be it.
• Death World : The world inside Jumanji is a massive jungle filled with extremely dangerous animals where everything, even the wildlife, is lethal and players can be trapped there indefinitely until the game is finished.
• Delighting in Riddles : After the dice land, the crystal ball in the middle of the board will describe the upcoming challenge in a vague rhyme. Jumanji still has a fondness for rhyming even after turning into a video game.
• Disproportionate Retribution : Oh, you don't want to play after rolling? Then the game will not continue until you do, and you must live with all the consequences thus far. You want to rig a game? Hope you enjoy bananas !
• Everything Trying to Kill You : The default mode of every creature in Jumanji. And if they don't actually try to kill you, they will try to ruin your day in some other way. Even the pelicans .
• Evil Is Not a Toy : Despite it trying really hard to portray itself as one, the game is anything but. Dare to begin playing with it, and it will not hesitate to screw with and very possibly kill you until you either win or die.
• Exact Words : The instructions sell Jumanji as a game "for those who seek to find a way to leave their world behind", and clarify that the "exciting consequences" will disappear after completing the game. Both are true, but do not prepare the clueless new player about what's coming.
• Fate Worse than Death : Being sucked inside the game. Best case scenario is that you will have to spend at least some time in a world where just about everything is trying to kill you until someone rolls a five or an eight. The worst case is being left there indefinitely as happened with Alan.
• Faux Affably Evil : The game's riddles definitely give off this vibe, seemingly taking delight in letting players know about the horrible creatures they are about to encounter.
• Graceful Loser : The game will do everything it can to kill you and stop you from finishing but once you do, it accepts that you have won fair and square and sets things right again, even reversing time back to when the game was started.
• Hammerspace : The game is either a portal to another dimension or it contains a full dimension inside. Either way, it can summon multiple, gigantic animals that are several times the size of the board, and at the end they all get sucked back inside.
• Hungry Jungle : The world inside Jumanji is a jungle teeming with hungry animals and dangerous plant life.
• I Know What You Fear : Some of the challenges summoned don't seem completely random, but a result of the game being out to scare the players even more by tinkering with their own fears. Van Pelt in particular, plays on Alan's fear of his father and coincidentally has the same appearance as his father. Does he change his face every time a new kid plays?
• It Can Think : Jumanji wants to be played. It abides neither cheaters nor quitters. Alan : Oh, no. The game thinks I rolled. Sarah : What do you mean "the game thinks"?
• Jungle Drums : The sound of drums draws the attention of potential players. All you have to do is be near the game to hear it.
• Jungle Opera : The game's jungle follows many of the tropes associated with this genre, such as being chased by stampedes and beset by dangerous environments.
• Magic from Technology : Inverted . The board game's magic is twice confused with technology .
• Misplaced Wildlife : Jumanji's setting is "the jungle", but not any one in particular. Animals from different continents and environments of Earth live there together.
• Noble Demon : As evil and sadistic as it may appear, the game offers you the chance to not play (until you do) and it never forces or coerces anyone to start playing. It even warns you about what's coming. Then it rolls back all consequences after you complete it, indicating that it does have some sense of fair play. It even allows its players to be brought back to when the game first started and retain their memories of the timeline, although how positive that last part is is up for debate given how traumatizing the experience is, and the game might be helping with that as well , as Sarah says she's forgetting the whole thing once the game is over, but clearly remembers the kids and their story in the aftermath.
• No Fair Cheating : The game can punish those who attempt to fudge it. Peter learns this the hard way.
• Planimal : The Man-Eating Plants populating the game react to their environment in real time, grow fast enough to appear moving, hunt actively, and hide and make distress noises when they are hurt.
• Pocket Dimension : Jumanji is either inside the board game or the board game is a portal to it. Jumanji is not Earth, in any case.
• Post-Modern Magik : Upon being tossed aside by Alex Vreeke in favor of playing video games, the cursed board game turns itself into a video game cartridge in order to continue attracting potential victims.
• Reality Warper : The game can not only summon creatures from inside but also alter those outside, as Peter finds out . It can also summon weather and turn the floor you stand on into quicksand .
• Really 700 Years Old : The game appears intact and is played through 1869, 1969 and 1995. Who knows how old it is.
• Reset Button : After finishing a game, everything that came out during it, and its consequences are rolled back. If the game lasted for decades, you even get that time back with your memories of the intervening time at least somewhat intact.
• Riddle for the Ages : What is Jumanji? Who made it, and why? We don't know, and the few players who survive don't even want to find out. They just want it as far away from them as possible.
• Schmuck Bait : It draws in players using the sound of drums only they can hear and yet, for some reason, said players' first reaction is to play it. By the time they rethink things, it's already too late turn back.
• Sealed Evil in a Can : Just a simple board game from the outside. If you choose a token and roll the device, then you see all the terrible things and sadistic intelligence on the inside.
• Voluntary Shapeshifting : In Welcome to the Jungle a potential new player dismisses playing as "nobody plays board games anymore" and was more interested in video games. The same night Jumanji transformed itself into a video game cartridge with its own unique console.
• Would Hurt a Child : Only children can hear its drums. Which is probably why it doesn't have a recommended age label. It also has no issue sucking children into its world and leaving them at the mercy of the wildlife and Van Pelt.
• Characters/Jumanji
• Jumanji: The Animated Series
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• Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle

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Film Review: ‘Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle’

Four teenagers turn into Dwayne Johnson, Jack Black, Kevin Hart, and Karen Gillan in a 'Jumanji' sequel that strands them in a jungle of no fun.

By Owen Gleiberman

Owen Gleiberman

Chief Film Critic

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When “ Jumanji ” came out, in 1995, one’s first impulse was to consign it to the increasingly overstuffed file marked “Junky Cheeseball Robin Williams Movies.” The film’s one true distinction was its jungle beasts. The lions and monkeys and elephants and rhinos and zebras, rampaging through a kitchen, were brought to life through the then-novel miracle of digital imagery; this was two years after “Jurassic Park,” but the technology still felt bold. As an adventure, “Jumanji” was deluxe magical trash, but its creatures, so fearsomely alive, seemed to be part of some brave new menagerie.

“ Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle ” is just trash, with nothing magical about it. A quartet of high-school kids gets sucked into a video-game-console update of the Jumanji board game, landing in the most generic of jungles — and that’s where they stay, except for one detour into the most generic of fake Middle Eastern bazaars. Whatever the rules of this particular game, they remain mostly unexplained and largely beside the point. It’s like watching the lamest Indiana Jones sequel ever imagined, minus Indiana Jones.

In his place, our four heroes morph into video-game avatars played by a tossed salad of movie stars, who don’t generate adventure-comedy chemistry so much as they do loudly clashing styles of showboating. The film’s notion of wit is to have Spencer (Alex Wolff), a stringbean gamer, metamorphose into an explorer-archaeologist played by Dwayne Johnson , who flinches and says “Oy vey!” like the nerd he still is inside. If Johnson, and the film’s script, had truly run with this idea, it might have been funny, but Johnson, for the most part, is just Johnson: too committed to his image to tweak it much.

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One of the other kids is a hulking jock nicknamed “The Refrigerator” (Ser’Darius Blain), and the wears-out-its-welcome-in-10-seconds joke is that he gets turned into a zoologist played by Kevin Hart , thereby losing several feet of height. The other two high schoolers are female, so it may seem odd that one of them, Bethany (Madison Iseman), turns into a cryptographer played by Jack Black , but once you’ve seen Black, in tweedy hunter’s garb and big round spectacles, do his mincing impersonation of a high-school trollop (very Meanest Girl of 2003 ), it no longer seems odd, just vaguely embarrassing. The other girl, Martha (Morgan Turner), becomes Ruby Roundhouse, a commando in a halter top played by the charming Karen Gillan, who winds up playing straight woman to the three walking icons of paycheck shtick.

In “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,” each of the characters has a trio of bars tattooed on his or her wrist, which means that in the game universe of Jumanji they all get three lives. Jack Black is eaten, in one very quick bite, by a gnashing hippo, and moments later — voilà! — he pops down from the sky. Johnson gets tossed off a cliff, then pops down as well. Hart eats pound cake and explodes (for some reason), and so on. Gillan, in the meantime, does some fight-dancing to Big Mountain’s reggae version of “Baby, I Love Your Way.” Did I mention that the four are trying to wrest a giant glowing emerald from the movie’s bad guy — Bobby Cannavale, with no role to play — so that they can restore it to the forehead of the looming mountain sculpted into a jaguar?

Excitement! Suspense! Childlike innocence! Ingeniously staged action set pieces! These are a few of the things you will not find, anywhere, in “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle.” The one performer in the film who establishes his own relaxed rhythm, and stays in it, is Nick Jonas, proving once again that he’s got quick-draw acting chops. The movie has snakes and a crocodile pit and a scorpion slithering out of Bobby Cannavale’s mouth. It’s supposed to be a video-ized board game come to life, but really, it’s just a bored game.

Reviewed at AMC Lincoln Square, New York, Dec. 6, 2017. MPAA Rating: PG. Running time: 119 MIN.

• Production: A Sony Pictures Entertainment release of a Columbia Pictures, Matt Tolmach Productions, Radar Pictures, Seven Bucks Productions prod. Producers: Ted Field, Matt Tolmach, William Tietler, Mike Weber. Executive producers: Dany Garcia, David B. Householter, Jake Kasdan.
• Crew: Director: Jake Kasdan. Screenplay: Chris McKenna, Erik Sommers, Jeff Pinkner, Scott Rosenberg. Camera (color, widescreen): Gyula Pados. Editors: Steve Edwards, Mark Helfrich.
• With: Dwayne Johnson, Kevin Hart, Jack Black, Karen Gillan, Bobby Cannavale, Nick Jonas, Alex Wolff, Madison Iseman, Ser’Darius Blain, Morgan Turner.

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Making ‘Jumanji’ With Robin Williams: An Oral History

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By Bruce Fretts

• Nov. 2, 2017

It’s not easy becoming a monkey boy. Bradley Pierce found that out when his character started sprouting fur and other apelike features while playing a magical board game in the 1995 Robin Williams movie “Jumanji.”

“It was three and a half hours of makeup application every day for almost 70 days, and as a 12-year-old boy, sitting still for longer than five minutes can be challenging,” Mr. Pierce recalled in a recent interview. “One day early in the shoot, Robin sat in one of the makeup chairs next to me to keep me company and give me tips on how to get through the application process, because he had done it on ‘Mrs. Doubtfire.’ He was incredibly kind and generous with his time, energy and wisdom.”

“Jumanji” was a challenging shoot, not least because of the complicated story line. In 1969, young Alan (Adam Hann-Byrd) gets sucked into the titular game to the horror of his friend Sarah (Laura Bell Bundy). Twenty-six years later, orphaned siblings Peter (Mr. Pierce) and Judy (Kirsten Dunst) restart the game and release an adult Alan, played by Williams. To complete the adventure, they, along with a grown-up Sarah (Bonnie Hunt), battle stampeding elephants and rhinos, carnivorous plants and a monsoon.

The film proved a monster hit, earning $262.8 million worldwide, and has now spawned a sequel, “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle,” starring Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart and opening Dec. 20. Members of the original film’s cast, as well as the director Joe Johnston, shared their memories of its demanding production.

Producers presented a script for “Jumanji,” based on the children’s book by Chris Van Allsburg , to Mr. Johnston, who had successfully worked with young actors and special effects on “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids” (1989).

JOE JOHNSTON The studio said they would make the film if we could get Robin to do it. He had passed on the original script. A bunch of us stayed up all night doing a cut-and-paste job and changed a lot around [the screenplay is credited to Jonathan Hensleigh, Greg Taylor and Jim Strain], and Robin liked it enough to say yes.

The filmmakers assembled the rest of the cast, including Jonathan Hyde, who played dual roles as young Alan’s aloof father and a hunter who terrorizes the players.

JONATHAN HYDE It was a strange shoot. We were in Vancouver through the winter. It’s a wet, cold city. For five months, that became a bit of a drag.

JOHNSTON I was a little put off by Bonnie Hunt’s performance on the first day of shooting. I thought it was completely over the top. But once she made me understand what her character had gone through to become this crazy lady, she sold me.

BONNIE HUNT (via email) Joe had a clear vision. Naturally, Robin wanted some improvisation, so those two worlds had to meet. Respectfully, we always did takes as written, but then Robin would ask, “Joe, could we please have one more for us?”

JOHNSTON I was a little apprehensive at first, based on what I’d heard about Robin and how he wants to ad-lib and go crazy. It wasn’t like that at all. He understood that he needed to be this very critical part of the machine. It was a tightly structured story. He never went out of the box.

BRADLEY PIERCE A lot of things Robin would improv would go over Kirsten’s and my heads. He would go on these Ethel Merman riffs where he would sing all his lines like her. It was hysterical, but I didn’t realize he was imitating a real person.

The film combined animatronics and puppetry with computer-generated effects that had to be added in postproduction.

LAURA BELL BUNDY I was told, “You’re going to be chased by bats. There will be no bats, but you have to run around screaming your head off as if there are.” Actually, there was one mechanical bat on my shoulder. The O. J. Simpson trial was going on at the time, and the crew nicknamed it Ito [after the judge]. It was really cute.

Through the long hours of shooting, Mr. Williams would keep the mood light on the set.

HUNT In between setups, we would drop our “Jumanji” roles and improvise, just to get it out of our system. Characters would spring to life based on the daily headlines or waiters from dinner the night before, and the crew was a wonderful audience. It was pure joy.

ADAM HANN-BYRD Robin was such a gentle soul. He had this larger-than-life manic persona, but he could turn that off when he wanted to. He was a complicated guy.

PIERCE Robin’s son, who’s my age, would come up, and they would invite me to join them at the zoo or the aquarium or a movie. It was great to see him as a dad and a friend rather than just a comedian. It was amazing to get to know the man behind the characters.

HYDE Every Monday night, Robin went to a comedy club in Vancouver and did an hour and a half of improv with the locals, then another hour and a half of solo stand-up — three hours of burning off excess steam. He was glorious.

Although she was only 12, Ms. Dunst was already a seasoned veteran, having co-starred in “Little Women” and “Interview With the Vampire,” among other films. The actress wouldn’t comment for this article, but she made an impression on her cast mates.

BEBE NEUWIRTH (who played her aunt) She did have a depth. Even as a child, she was a very interesting actress who had something unusual about her.

PIERCE I won’t say I didn’t have a crush on Kirsten. She’s only about six months older than me, but she had done more film projects than I had. It was nice to have a friend my age to give me guidance. She gave me tips on how to keep your energy up so you’re ready to film the next scene without being so rambunctious that it’s unprofessional.

When the film was released in December 1995, it was an immediate box office success , but some critics suggested its violent action sequences were too scary for children.

JOHNSTON That did surprise me. Maybe I was too close to it. I assumed people knew it was a fantasy.

HYDE Children love to be frightened — I think it’s an important part of childhood. People between 25 and 35 come up to me and say, “You scared the [hell] out of me when I was a kid.” I have to say that’s usually quite gratifying. That’s what was required.

Over time, “Jumanji” has become a cherished classic, with families watching it over and over.

JOHNSTON There’s a little bit of “It’s a Wonderful Life” to the story. What if you could go away and come back and see what life would be if you hadn’t existed?

HUNT Kids always remember the first movie that makes their hearts pound. Then that feeling becomes nostalgic, and you want to revisit it and share it with a new generation.

PIERCE There’s something very relatable about the fears of the characters. Yes, the lions and mosquitoes and crocodiles are very scary, but the real fears came from the interpersonal relationships — the fear of being yourself and being comfortable in your own skin. That really made the film connect with people.

The cast looks back on the making of “Jumanji” with great fondness, and some of them still have mementos they took from the set.

NEUWIRTH I have hippopotamus salt-and-pepper shakers. I don’t remember how they fit into the story, but somehow I have them.

HANN-BYRD I ended up taking one of the massive vines that grow on the walls of the mansion. I had to get it back to the States, so we took it through customs, and everyone freaked out, so I had to explain. I still have that vine in my parents’ house.

PIERCE Robin gave the cast hard-bound copies of the script as wrap gifts, and he signed them. He wrote something like, “You were a great monkey boy and a pleasure to work with. You have a bright future ahead.” He was very much an inspiration, not just as a performer, but as a person.

The original ensemble wishes the makers of the new film well but said it wouldn’t be the same for them without Mr. Williams.

HYDE I was hoping they would make another “Jumanji” while we were all still alive.

HANN-BYRD I was totally devastated when Robin died. He really did care about everyone around him. There was only one Robin Williams.

An earlier version of this article mischaracterized the forthcoming “Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle.” It is a sequel, not a reboot.

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'Jumanji': Revisit everything you didnt know about the board game adventure

From would-be stars to unlikely connections, here are some fun facts about Jumanji.

Jumanji , director Joe Johnston 's adventure classic, is now streaming on Peacock , giving fans new and old the chance to revisit all their favorite moments from the wild movie about wildlife storming through a small New England town. It's been almost 30 years since the film first hit theaters, and shortly thereafter became a home video favorite for kids everywhere with its tale of a board game coming to life and wreaking havoc.

But even after all this time, we're betting there are still a few things you don't know.

RELATED: The best fantasy movies you can stream right now

Thankfully, SYFY is here to help, with a video outlining a bunch of fun, often surprising facts about the making of the film, and since a  Jumanji  rewatch is just a click away, we thought it might be fun to revisit all of those facts and learn (or re-learn) a few things about how the movie got to the big screen.

You probably know, of course, that  Jumanji  stars Robin Williams and Kirsten Dunst, but what you might not know is that the film could have starred Bruce Willis and Scarlett Johansson instead. You might also know that all of those stampeding animals in the film were created with the help of CGI, but did you know that the studio briefly considered actually trying to get a herd of rhinos to do some stampeding on camera?

Plus, what does  Jumanji  have to do with  The Polar Express ? Why is the same actor playing both Alan Parrish's father and the big-game hunter who steps out of the game and wreaks his own kind of havoc? And did you remember that, long before The Rock stepped up to revive the franchise, we got another  Jumanji  continuation in the form of an animated series?

Find out more about these fun facts and beyond in the video above.  Jumanji is streaming on Peacock right now .

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Film Details

Brief synopsis, cast & crew, joe johnston, robin williams, kirsten dunst, bonnie hunt, bradley pierce, david alan grier, technical specs.

Because of the magically surreal and potentially lethal aspects of Jumanji, a board game that's intrigued its players for hundreds of years, few people want to play a second time. For you see, unless you complete the game, Jumanji takes over your world. Young Alan Parris discoverd the ornate Jumanji board in 1969, when he was just twelve. When he sits down to play it for the first time with his reluctant friend Sarah, he's transported into the jungle realm of Jumanji, disappearing before Sarah's startled eyes. Because Sarah is too frightened to finish the game, Alan remains trapped in the rainforests of Jumanji for 26 years until two new children, Judy and Peter, sit down to play the game in the attic of Alan's childhood home. If Alan, Judy and Peter can find the now adult Sarah, they have a chance to finish the game--or risk their hometown being taken over by the exotic denizens of the seemingly unstoppable force called Jumanji... forever.

Bebe Neuwirth

Adam hann-byrd, florica vlad, robin driscoll, peter bryant, leonard zola, annabel kershaw, laura bell bundy, brenda lockmuller, jonathan hyde, gillian barber, patricia clarkson, brandon obray, malcolm stewart, lloyd berry, sarah gilson, darryl henriques, cyrus thiedeke, gary joseph thorup, frederick richardson, james handy, thomas ackerman, philip edward alexy, roy t anderson, charles andre, david andrews, eric armstrong, mary arnold, okan ataman, sandina bailo-lape, stanton barrett, tom barwick, derek j baskerville, becky bates, greg beaumonte, david benson, george bernota, joe biggins, james d. bissell, tom blacklock, joanne bloomfield, sara bolder, scott bonnenfant, bob bornstein, tracey boulton, christopher boyes, steven bramson, carra braveman, barbara brennan, jill brooks, donald d brown, elizabeth a brown, robert bruce, adam bryant, norman buck, cheryl buckman, yancy calzada, lynne carrow, lauro chartrand, eric chauvin, doug chiang, robert clark, caitlin content, dave conway, sandy cooper, theresa corrao, robert cort, caroline cranstoun, chuck cross, gail currey, rory cutler, robert dalva, peter daulton, steve davis, christine derek, jim doherty, andres p dominguez, dean drabin, lisa drostova, tony eckert, teresa eckton, jenn emberly, les erskine, frank eulner, yuri everson, marty ewing, rick fearon, andre fenley, elaine fleming, james p flynn, james forsyth, corbin h fox, steve frakes, george gambetta, delaina-lu gamblin, brian gernand, bruce giesbrecht, alec gillis, michael ginsburg, susan goldsmith, gretchen goode, dow griffith, grant guenin, derek guiley, liam gadsby hailstone, jim henrikson, jonathan hensleigh, christophe hery, rebecca heskes, mark cordell holmes, james horner, david horsley, george hull, richard hymns, hiroshi kan ikeuchi, david jacox, daniel jeanette, james kagel, florian kainz, nathan kaproff, paula karsh, karen keener, tom killeen, bill kimberlin, pamela klamer, scott kroopf, michael kruger, b nick kuchera, tedd kuchera, beth kushnick, karen lafler, elizabeth lapp, nancy larman, william e lawrence, julija learie, charles leitrants, cynthia lewis, david linck, sherry linder-gygli, paul lougheed, nancy jill luckoff, john lundberg, michael p lynch, beth mackie, betsy magruder, josselin mahot, harish mandyam, paul michael marini, robert marty, bill mather, cotton mather, tony matijevich, sandra mayo, fausto mazzuto, dale mcbeath, sandy mccallum, terry mcewen, david mckeown, tim mclaughlin, patty mcreynolds, klaus melchior, yvonne melville, fred meyers, daniel michalske, mark s. miller, richard miller, mike mitchell, steven molin, jack mongovan, doug moreno, tim j morgan, claudia mullaly, dana mulligan, melissa mullin, shawn murphy, cheryl nardi, barbara l nellis, wendy newton, scott nicholson, jonathan null, wendy o'brien, brent o'connor, michael olague, glen pearson, marshall peck, miscellaneous notes.

Released in United States Winter December 15, 1995

Released in United States on Video May 14, 1996

Written and illustrated by Chris Van Allsburg, "Jumanji" won the prestigious Caldecott Award for Best Picture Book in 1981.

Began shooting November 14, 1994.

Completed shooting April 7, 1995.

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Sam Parrish

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Samuel Alan "Sam" Parrish was the father of Alan Parrish, husband to Carol, a descendant of General Angus Parrish and CEO of Parrish Shoes. He appears in the 1995 film, played by Jonathan Hyde, who also played Van Pelt as a dual performance. Sam is unseen in the animated series, but he is mentioned.

Personality [ ]

Although Sam was a strict and firm man, due to his living class and years at Cliffside's school, he was nevertheless a wise father to Alan, loving him more than anyone else. Yet their relationship was strained because of Alan's inability to stand up to face his fears and his lack of interest in continuing family tradition by entering Cliffside, resulting in a falling out between them on the night Alan went missing.

In the alternate timeline, it was shown that Sam's love for his son was so great that he was willing to abandon everything in hopes of finding him. Alan's reaction to this news showed that he had no idea Sam loved him so much. After returning to 1969, when Alan reconciled with him, Sam took on a noticeably softer tone than he previously had in the movie and appeared to enjoy the idea of talking with Alan "father to son" rather than "man to man."

Sam enjoyed smoking a pipe, especially at work in the factory.

Biography [ ]

Early life [ ].

Sam at work.

Samuel Parrish was born in June 18, 1921, and followed in his family traditions by attending the Cliffside School for boys, feeling that he owed who he was to his years of higher education. As he grew up he inherited finest house in New England, the Parrish Mansion, and took up the Parrish traditional role of CEO at Parrish Shoes, as the fourth generation of Parrish produced quality footwear. Sam eventually met and married Carol and they had one son named Alan. While also living in the finest house in the neighborhood with his family, Sam was also frequently at work managing the Parrish Shoes Factory in Brantford, making the best shoes in New England. Following a run-in with Billy's gang, Sam sent Alan out of the factory before firing Carl Bentley for his prototype shoe damaging the factory machine (unaware it was actually that Alan placed the shoe on the conveyor). That night, Sam attended a party with Carol celebrating Brantford's growing economy as the guest of honor, leaving Alan at home, due to a falling out between them in regards to enrolling him for Cliffside, whether he like it or not.

"JUMANJI" timeline [ ]

Due to Alan's imprisonment within "JUMANJI" , Sam and Carol came home to find their only son missing, thinking that he had ran away from home as a result of their heated arguing. Both parents were clearly devastated at Alan's unexplained disappearance, spending much of their time and money searching for him without success and Sam even ended up losing his faith by having abandoned Parrish Shoes resulting in Brantford's economy collapsing. Sam eventually died and was buried with Carol a few years before Alan returned to the real world thanks to Judy Shepherd and Peter Shepherd playing "JUMANJI" .

Due to the uncertainty of Alan's fate, unpleasant stories began to spread that the boy was murdered by his own parents and his remains hidden in the mansion, especially by Sam. One factor to consider was that the Parrish family were held in high regard in Brantford and got special treatment from the police, otherwise, the entire Mansion would have been torn down in hopes of finding any remains of a body. Even the only witness Sarah Whittle accepted this to be Alan's fate, but he refused to believe the ridiculous stories citing Sam was never the kind of man to do that.

Restored timeline [ ]

Alan and Sam reconcile after he won.

When Alan and Sarah were transported back to 1969, the events created from their gameplay of "JUMANJI" were undone and the immediately picked up where they left off by Sam returning to the mansion to pick up his forgotten speech notes. Overcome with joy by winning "JUMANJI" , Sam was alarmed that Alan immediately reconciled with him (unaware of the previous dramatic alternative lifestyle), but was nevertheless happy that their relationship had been healed and promised they would discuss their situation tomorrow. Before Sam left, Alan told him that he put the shoe on the conveyor belt, not Carl Bentley. Sam reacted calmly and said that he’s glad he took responsibility, then leaves.

Sam is unseen in the Jumanji animated series, but he is referred to. When Alan first arrived in "JUMANJI" 23 years before Judy and Peter found the game, Alan referred to his dad owing the (now closed) Parrish Shoe Company and later paid Trader Slick a large sum of dollars for a boat, which he knew he would have to explain to his dad somehow. He also refers to his dad as taking part in duck hunting season, referencing the Sam Parrish and Van Pelt dual role speculation.

Van Pelt's role in the 1995 film is believed to serve as an allegory for Sam Parrish's lesson about standing to face fears.

• The most obvious clue being the fact that both Van Pelt and Sam Parrish are played by Jonathan Hyde in the film.
• The other clues being when the hunter tells Sarah that he did not shoot her because he is hunting down Alan because Alan released him from the game (as part of the rules).
• It can also be noted that the clue that released the hunter related to the victim feeling like a child; part of the reason why Van Pelt is hunting him down because Alan is not man enough to face him, since Alan is always running away from him, akin to Sam Parrish inciting his son to face his fears.
• At the climax, Alan refuses to run off this time, admitting that even though he's still scared, he no longer finds in his heart to run away from what's he afraid of and instead face it to get it over with. Amazed, Van Pelt acknowledges Alan of finally acting like a real man, followed by Alan returning to 1969 and reconciling with his father to have a man to man talk later.
• 2 Alex Vreeke
• 3 Alan Parrish

Jumanji (1995)

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