Plesiosaurus (Mini)(Chap Mei)

3.2 (9 votes)

As its name suggests, Plesiosaurus was the very first plesiosaur ever to be discovered, in England back in 1823 by the legendary fossil hunter Mary Anning. At around 3.5 metres in length, it was a relatively small sea reptile, a far cry from later relatives such as Elasmosaurus and Thalassomedon.

This Mini Plesiosaurus from Chap Mei measures just under 15 cm long. Its main colours are blue-green on top and white on the bottom with dull orange eyes and stripes, black on the head and along the back, a dark pink tongue, and white teeth. Probably would have looked a lot better without the orange, but that’s Chap Mei for you.

The Plesiosaurus is sculpted in a swimming pose with its front flippers held directly underneath its body, its hind flippers angled out around 45 degrees give or take, its tail swaying to the right, and its neck bent in an S-shaped curve. Unlike so many other aquatic reptile figures, it balances nicely on the tips of its flippers. But as any plesiosaur expert will quickly inform you, there’s no way the neck could be bent in such a manner without breaking a number of vertebrae!

The sculpting on this toy is quite a haphazard mixture. The head and body have large scales, the neck and tail have small wrinkles like the ones on an earthworm, and the flippers and underbelly have crisscrossing wrinkles. Three rows of osteoderms are on the animal’s back and the tail appears to have caudal fins just like on an eel. Again, that’s Chap Mei for you.

This Plesiosaurus certainly won’t win any prizes for sculpting or accuracy, but it’s got kind of a weird, retro charm to it. Kids will no doubt enjoy playing with it. It’s also one of the rarer Chap Mei toys, so if you’re intrigued, good hunting!

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Comments 5

  • A fun fact,Orange and blue are opposites on the color wheel.When colors oppose each other, the colors vibrate, creating excitement(or discord) in the eye.That’s probably why Chep Mei chose the color combo(and why you don’t particularly like it).Learned that in Art College.

  • I love Chap Mei dinosaurs.They are pure fun,looking less like accurate modern scientific depictions and more like crazy monsters that want to kick your ass and humiliate you before they kill and eat you.

  • I like the way you combine the elements of you review such as the facts, accuracies and innacuracies and the company’s name of the prehistoric figure in a short review. It is a very effective and easy way/idea to write a review. I think that Chap Mei tried to make this plesiosaurus eye appealing and attractive with the orange stripes instead of only the dull teal colour. The plesiosaurus figure that I prefer the most is the plesiosaurus by Favourite Co. It will match well with the Liopleurodon by also Chap Mei[not the one by Safari Ltd in the second picture in comparison with the Chap Mei plesiosaurus.
    As a kid, I find it already fun to play with by visualizing the pictures. I did not know that it is a rare figure; thanks for letting me know.
    As always, simple and short review, but full of details. I see that you are a completist/serious collector of Chap Mei figures. Their figures are hits and misses, I will say that this Plesiosaurus is among them.

  • Great review. You do have to buy into the Chap Mei quirkyness to appreciate this one, or be a fan of marine reptiles like myself, despite its flaws. This one can be picked up at the moment on the Ali Express site. A search for ‘Plesiosaur”, as they label it, will flush it out, along with a page of odd rubber creations and countless Papo bootlegs.

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