Nothing has brought me more joy in recent years than David Silva’s Beasts of the Mesozoic figures. Some may call me a material boy, and that’s ok. We are humans, and we thrive on material culture. Part of that culture is our toys and figures which enrich our lives in an aesthetically pleasing fashion. There are very few action figures out there that are as aesthetically pleasing as the ceratopsians from Beasts of the Mesozoic, and the gigantic Pentaceratops is no exception. Join me, Emperor Dinobot, as we take a look at this red giant.
Full disclaimer: These are not my best photographic efforts. Even though this glorious plastic specimen was finally in my hands, I rushed through every photograph, with every intention of posting a review in an expedited fashion. It has been 13 months since, and I could have gone back to take some more with my new camera, but ultimately decided these were good enough. I mean, these are just pictures of cardboard, right?
I was impressed immediately with the gigantic size of these boxes. I got the Torosaurus in conjunction with the Pentaceratops, and I was blown away. And I already had the Pachyrhinosaurus! How could they get bigger?
As with every figure, a collector card is included, this time with art from Shannon Beaumont, and it reads:
Pentaceratops sternbergii
(Five-horned face)
Length: Around 6m (20ft) long
Location: Kirtland Formation, New Mexico, USA
Time Period: Late Cetaceous, 75.8 m.y.a.
“Five-horned face” is in reference to Pentaceratops‘ two long epijugal bones, plus to the two brow horns and nasal form. Pentaceratops is known for having the longest frill of any ceratopsian and has the largest skull of any land vertebrate ever at over 10ft tall!
The pictures, once again, do not do it justice. It is possible that the colors are unfriendly towards flash. This mass of plastic is a proper beast. Measuring 16 inches long, the figure comes with 20 points of articulation just like with the other ceratopsians. The color is based on the Amazonian Horned Frog, but the color is much wilder here. It almost looks like a certain tattooed Sith Lord, along with Kosmoceratops! The body is cast in a carmine red plastic, even though in the pictures it looks orange. It is darker than that, and not very friendly to flash photography. The unguals have a light grey color, and the horns are of a warm grey, including the frill’s hornlets and the giant triangular epiparietal horns at both distal ends of the frill. The stripes are shiny black, surrounded by a yellow edge around the skull area. The lower body gets lighter orange in tone.
I skipped on a good picture of the mouth, but it does have two pairs of dental batteries, and a ball jointed tongue. At 1/18 scale, I find this generally 6-7 meter long animal to be a bit large in comparison with 1/18 scale figures.. The head is massive, the biggest in comparison to its body size of all of the Beasts of the Mesozoic ceratopsians figures, mirroring the real life animal, which, along with the similar but more derived Titanoceratops, has the biggest head relative to the body of any land animal thanks to its elongated face, and long frill. Only Torosaurus beats it, and that is because Torosaurus was a bigger animal. Well, fine, there is a debate of which animal had the bigged head, but if we are going by relative with the body, Pentaceratops wins because while it had a long head, the body is shorter, taller and stockier than other ceratopsians. That is why the box is taller than the rest of the figures in the series, too. Talk about ironic.
It was pointed out to me that I missed an opportunity when taking this picture, since I do own another Chap Mei Pentaceratops. It would have been a penta-clan, get it? Because there would have been fiv…never mind, what is done is done. I am just too lazy at this point to do a re-shoot because this figure is a bit heavy, and the Jurassic World Pentaceratops is a bit out of reach in my display area. I am also missing the Papo one. Also pictured is the Schleich Pentaceratops.
I absolutely adore this figure, and as of this writing, it is on sale at the creative Beast Studio website!
I hope the year-long wait was worth it. I think this is a must have because it is quite different from the otther figures. The body mold is unique and not shared with the others as far as I know. It is also very impressive to look at. Highly recommended.
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This is a beautiful figure and one of the better ones in the line, but it’s over scale size dissuaded me from getting it. Mattel’s Pentaceratops, though not nearly as nice, is a better size for 1/18 and is a decent figure, so I opted to get it (actually 2 of them, I’ve posed them fighting 🙂 ).
En réalité le pantaceraps de mattel n’est pas si mal a cotté du pentacerapts de betes du mésozique pour moi je les aimes tout les deux
J’aime les deux dinos aussà (my French isn’t very good sorry)
They are all a bit oversized. The worst offender is Zuniceratops. They look better with GiJoe height figures, or even Kenner ones.
Yeah, Zuni is about 1/12 or even 1/10 scale. Avaceratops is probably the second worst offender; Centrosaurus is pretty big too. To my surprise, even the Triceratops is somewhat on the big side….certainly would never have expected that.
This is probably my favorite BOTM ceratopsian paint scheme, along with the Xenoceratops. It just looks so darned COOL. And how awesome is that oversized frill on its head – making this guy’s box a little bigger than even the more massive Trike. and Toro. boxes are!
I know, right?