Please welcome Recur to the Dinosaur Toy Blog! Started in 2014, this series of prehistoric and modern animal toys is made in China by Shenzen Ankyl Toys Co., Ltd. Their modern animals range from domestic dogs and horses to sharks and whales, while their prehistoric line currently consists of over 30 beasts. First up is the flagship dinosaur itself, the immortal Tyrannosaurus rex.
This is one of three different T. rex figures available from Recur, and it’s the newest, released in 2016. A fairly large beast, it measures slightly over 34 cm long and 14 cm tall. Its main colour is beige painted over with orange and brown. There are dark grey accents on the head, yellow eyes, a red mouth, and white teeth. Finally, the claws are dark brown. A very conservative colour scheme. Some stripes or spots would have been welcome.
The T. rex is posed in a walking stance with its tail raised and twitching to the right, its head turned slightly to the left, its fearsome mouth open, and its long pointy tongue raised. Looking at the head, there’s clearly a Jurassic Park influence at work here, what with those inaccurate but undeniably intimidating “angry” brow ridges. They always make for a frightful looking visage. As well, the arms are a little too big and have pronated wrists, an all too common anatomical error among theropod toys. The neck, however, is nice and thick and stout, as it should be. The feet are oversized, but the toy clearly would never stand on its own if they weren’t. And it does stand very well.
The T. rex‘s skin has a wrinkled, leathery texture with heavy scales on the feet. The teeth are proportionally larger and chunkier than the real deal, but that’s probably a safety precaution. And on that note, let’s talk about the materials making up this T. rex. The feet and shins are hard plastic, but the rest of the toy is comprised of soft PVC, which makes it very light and highly durable. You could hurl this baby at the wall, throw it down a flight of stairs, drop it off your balcony (my wife is telling me I am absolutely not allowed to try), or leave it in a kindergarten classroom, and aside from perhaps a scratch or two, it would probably be just fine. Nor would someone be overly hurt if they were accidentally bonked with it. In other words, this is a very good dinosaur toy for children to play with. There’s a visible hole in the seam in the left leg on mine; hopefully this is just a random quality control issue.
So what’s the final verdict on this T. rex? Well, speaking as someone who likes accurate, up-to-date depictions of dinosaurs the best, I’m honestly not keen on the cinematic appearance of this toy. I’d love nothing more than to see the JP look die out completely, but that’s my personal peeve. This is nevertheless a ferocious-looking, well-sculpted piece and again, the use of PVC makes it extremely durable and a great dinosaur toy for little enthusiasts. I think that Recur has a lot of potential as a dinosaur line and that they’re definitely worth keeping an eye on.
Thanks to Recur for this and other advance samples. Stay tuned! Available from Recur’s AliExpress store
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[…] one can argue that Jurassic World has been a major influence in the creation of a few of their models. It’s similar to how the films influenced Papo’s models as […]
[…] In 2016, a new brand of toys came onto the dinosaur collecting scene, with a huge selection in their Ancient Animals line. Recur, and its parent company Ankyl Toys Co. Ltd., has been around for a while, but only recently have their products have been revealed to the public (presumably for the first time outside of China). What sets their products apart from the competition is the fact all of them are made out of flexible PVC plastic, and most are filled with a synthetic cotton. As of now, there are 41 toys to choose from, and some of them appear to be in different sub-lines, although Recur has not come out and say if this is true or not. For instance, most of their new products for 2017 are simply jumbo-sized versions of some of the dinosaurs they already released, but I don’t know if they have stated anywhere that these ones are part of a different group. There is also a massive difference in the style of how some of them are made. For instance, the Edmontonia is clearly cartoonish, but the Ankylosaurus they made for this year is a lot more realistic in appearance. Today’s review is another example of this strange contrast in style. What I have here today is what I like to call Recur’s monstrous version of Tyrannosaurus, which was sculpted in a tripod stance instead of having a horizontal pose like the one that was already reviewed. […]
[…] age, the arms does not show the extreme pronation that is typically seen on older(and still some newer) theropod figures. The tail on this guy is bulky, perhaps the meatiest one I have seen on a toy […]
[…] falling short in terms of accuracy. Hopefully this will change in years to come. As I noted in my very first Recur review, I think that this company has a great deal of potential and that they’re worth keeping an […]
Heh, it looks like it’s wearing that inflatable T. rex costume that’s rapidly becoming the new rubber horse mask of meme fame.
Well, both of those are based on Rexy from Jurassic World. The custome is licensed, however.