Concavenator (Jurassic World Dino Rivals, Dual Attack, by Mattel)

Well, a full year has gone by, and it’s safe to say that the Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom toy line has been a success. So much so that some of the toys have won the Toy Associations best Action Figures award for 2018, which is a lot more than Hasbro’s lazy attempts from back in 2015. For 2019, the people at Mattel had promised to bring out at least 16 new species and one of these is the Spanish hump-backed theropod known as Concavenator. Concavenator corcovatus is not a new species on the dinosaur toy market, however, it is a new species for a Jurassic Park toy line. The animal grew up to six meters long, making it a smaller member of its family which includes the likes of Giganotosaurus, Carcharodontosaurus, and Mapusaurus (to name just a few). The thing that makes Concavenator stand out from all other theropods, is a hump on its back, and possibly the presence of quill knobs on the arms (though this is still up for debate).

The Concavenator toy that Mattel has created for the Jurassic World Dino Rivals line is a part of their new Dual Attack range, which are around the same size of their Roarivores, only without the electronics. Instead of a single button that makes the model roar, there are two buttons that perform one of two actions. The first button is located right behind the neck, and it allows the model to chomp its jaws, the second button is essentially the animals hump, which allows the model to swing its tail. Now when I first saw youtube videos of this toy in action, I was not at all convinced I would like the tail swiping action, and would have preferred it to be another simple roarivore. However, once I got this toy for myself, I grew to like these features, and found myself pressing both buttons, every once in a while, because the actions they perform work so smoothly.

Okay, so the toy works well as a toy, but by now you might be wondering how it stands up as a replica of Concavenator. Well, it is flawed, to say the least. The most glaring issue on this figure is the fact that the hands kind of resemble human hands, complete with thumb-like digits. Moving on from the hands, the head of the model is oversized and box-shaped, and the neck may be a bit too short. The only other issues I can find with this toy is in the legs and feet. To put it simply, they are way too thick, but this was obviously done to allow the model to stand on its own two feet. Really, I don’t see any point in criticizing this model for its accuracy due to the fact that it is a Jurassic park toy, and not an attempt to replicate the animal for educational purposes.

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In terms of detail, the bottom part of the model is mostly decked out with wrinkles, with more detail sculpted on the top half of the model. The animal’s signature hump is decked out with a variety of bumps that go down its entire length, and the tail is decked out with smaller bumps that I can easily tell are meant to be scales. Other details include scutes along the base of the tail, and over the back of the animals head, and scales sculpted on the arms, and lower legs. The colors on this model are a mixed bag in my opinon. The base color is a dark shade of blue-green, with the signature hump painted in a dark red hue. The eyes, bottom jaw and the throat area are painted in yellow, and the toe claws are painted in black. Other colors include additional red around the eyes, and pink for the tongue. Strangely, the tail portion of the toy has yellow painted on it, when there is no yellow to be seen on the animals back. All in all, the colors don’t appeal to me, but that might be up to personal taste.

Overall, as a toy, this model is pretty neat, and I’m sure some kids will get a kick out of it, though if you’re looking for an accurate toy of Concavenator, there are a few other options out there, although they might be harder to obtain. One last thing I want to mention is that there is apparently a repaint of the figure scheduled to come out. If you want one of these, you could find it at any major retailers like Target and Walmart at the time of this writing (providing that they bother to stock this figure at all ). Otherwise, you’re left with no choice to get it at an inflated price on Ebay or Amazon.