Author: DinoToyBlog

Dr Adam Smith aka DinotoyblogDr Adam S. Smith (aka 'DinoToyBlog' here, and 'DinoToyForum' on the Dinosaur Toy Forum) is a curator and palaeontologist at the Nottingham Natural History Museum, Wollaton Hall, UK. Adam launched the Dinosaur Toy Blog in July 2007 and followed it up with the Dinosaur Toy Forum in January 2008, and the Animal Toy Forum in December 2012. He is particularly interested in marine reptile figures, especially plesiosaurs. Adam also runs The Plesiosaur Directory website and has published several popular articles and technical papers on fossil marine reptiles. He is a children's book author with 'The Plesiosaur's Neck' (2021) and 'The Tyrannosaur's Feathers' (2023).

All reviews by this author

Review: Dimetrodon (small version) (AAA)

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3.2 (17 votes)

There are at least five different AAA Dimetrodon sculpts so I’m calling this the “small version” to differentiate it from the others. This one is from the 1980s and there are a handful of interesting aspects that make this figure stand out from other similar cheap Dimetrodons.

Review: Struthiomimus (Marx)

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Struthiomimus dinosaur toy by Marx

4.1 (26 votes)

Review and Photos by BlueKrono and DinoToyBlog.

Struthiomimus, the ‘ostrich mimic’, was named in 1917 for a species (S. altus) originally referred in 1903 to the closely related genus Ornithomimus. Despite the history of ornithomimosaurs spanning back to the late 1800s, they are relatively rarely made as toys.

Review: Iguanodon (Marx)

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Upright Marx Iguanodon dinosaur toy in a monochrome chocolate brown colour.

4.2 (16 votes)

I’ve been meaning to plug some of the gaps in our Marx review series for a long while, so thanks to the other reviewers who have been most patient with me. The Marx Iguanodon toy under review today was part of the Second Series Mold Group, PL-1083, first released in 1961.

Review: Prehistoric Animals (Panini, review part 2)

Panini prehistoric animals and dinosaur toys

4.3 (10 votes)
In part 1 of this review we looked at 12 dinosaur toys (and one pterosaur) from Panini’s Prehistoric Animals line. In part 2 we pick up where we left off to complete the full set of 24 toys.

Figure numbers 13 to 15 are a trio of marine reptiles, and their dark blue colour works very well for aquatic animals.

Review: Prehistoric Animals (Panini, review part 1)

panini prehistoric animals playset

3.4 (9 votes)
Sticker albums are a staple of many a childhood and they were certainly a part of mine. However, unlike my school  contemporaries in the early 1990s, I didn’t deal with stickers of footballers or garbage pail kids, all my swapsies were dinosaur stickers of course! And the toys that came with them…

Panini’s Prehistoric Animals sticker album has been published in several editions over the decades going back to the 1970s.

Review: Guanlong (Wenno)

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2.4 (5 votes)
The unusual Chinese tyrannosauroid, Guanlong, was described in 2006, so it is understandably represented by only a few toys. Safari Ltd gave it a half-hearted shot, as did Geoworld and Kaiyodo, but the definitive Guanlong is still lacking. Unfortunately, this Wenno Guanlong is not going to fill that void.

Review: Iguanodon (Jurassic Park Junior by Playskool / Hasbro)

Iguanodon Jurassic Park Junior toy

2.6 (11 votes)
This so-called “Li’l Iguanodon” was part of a short-lived ‘Jurassic Park Junior’ toy line released in 2001, presumably prompted by the release of Jurassic Park 3 in cinemas that same year. The line was aimed at young audiences and is made up of cutesy renditions of several dinosaurs from the Jurassic Park film series.

Review: Archaeopteryx (version 1)(Museum Line by Bullyland)

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Archaeopteryx Bullyland toy (version 1)

4.2 (13 votes)

Our recent review of the 2017 Bullyland Archaeopteryx prompted me to search through the Dinotoyblog archives to compare the new version with the old…only to discover that we’ve never reviewed the original Bullyland Museum Line Archaeopteryx. That immediately helped me settle on which figure to review next.

Review: Carnotaurus (Disney’s Dinosaur by Thinkway)

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2.8 (10 votes)
This might seem like Déjà vu, but it isn’t. We recently reviewed a Disney’s Dinosaur Carnotaurus by Mattel here but savvy Disney didn’t put all their dinosaur eggs into one basket. They licensed ‘Disney’s Dinosaur’ to an array of different manufacturers, which means there are more versions of the Disney Carnotaurus than you can throw a family of lemurs at.
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