Character Analysis
Great Grandchildren
Tim and Lex are John Hammond's grandchildren. They're intelligent and well-behaved, making them appealing characters to children and adults alike. Tim is the precocious dinosaur expert, and Lex is the vegetarian computer nerd. "I'm a hacker! […] I am not a computer nerd; I prefer to be called a hacker," she exclaims. Oh, excuse us, "hacker" it is then. Hacking must have been different in the early 90s.
Tim and Lex exist to enable John Hammond to show his not-evil side and to warm Dr. Grant up to the idea of having children of his own. Grant must lead the kids across the island after the T. rex attack, making him a father-figure to the pair while their awful grandfather sits helplessly back at the visitor's center.
The kids seem to get into danger more than the adults do, building tension throughout the movie. They're the first ones attacked by the T. rex, Tim is shocked by an electric fence (becoming "Big Tim, the human piece of toast"), and in the visitor's center kitchen they almost become the main course to a pair of hungry Velociraptors. Why so many scenes with the kids? It's almost like when Hammond says they will "spend time with our target audience," he's talking about the kids going to see the movie…and buy all the groovy Jurassic Park toys to go with it.