Controversial opinions on dinosaur toys

[GojiraGuy1954]

First, thanks for a generally cordial exchange on a subject where passions sometimes run high. I'm glad we can have some civil disagreement.

I take your point about most theropods also not getting figures, although I'm not really sure what parameters you're setting here. You and I obviously have different thresholds for how realistic a figure must be to be included in a collection, but I have 135 unique Mesozoic theropod genera in mine, which even without explicitly doing the calculation I can tell you is a higher percentage of total diversity than any comparable clade. At a minimum, I'd include Safari's Daspletosaurus as a recent example of a high-quality reconstruction of a seldom-made genus, although of course its close relatives get plenty of attention.

I can see why someone might take it personally when someone bashes something they're a fan of, but I don't think anyone intends it to be hurtful. Similarly, I haven't liked a JP/JW movie since 1997 (and that was a close one), and I've criticized the movies on the forum, but that doesn't diminish my affection or respect for people who do like them--they just like something different from me. I hope nobody has mistaken my distaste for the franchise as a personal attack.

But I get it. I often hear people say they only collect dinosaurs, or only sauropsids, or only land animals, and it generally excludes the majority of my favorite groups (arthropods, molluscs, 'fishes,' plants), and I find that discouraging too, even though obviously nobody is saying that with the purpose of discouraging me. For me it's hard to fathom that anybody could be uninterested in figures of animals like these:

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Or plants like this one:

Small head

Idea: Cotylorhynchus & Erythrosuchus double pack

[GojiraGuy1954]

I agree with everything @Gwangi wrote. I've encountered a number of individuals in online dinosaur groups who openly sneer at those who pick the most popular genera as their favourites and they frankly baffle and amuse me more than they anger me. Who are they kidding anyway? They're nobodies. They don't get to look down their noses at anyone. But that is not what has been happening in this thread right now. 

Ultimately, I find the whole debate over which genera have received the most toys to be boring and pointless (despite my active participation in the discussion). It stems largely from my avowed stance in life as a realist. The situation is never, ever going to change and there isn't anything any of us can do about it. T. rex and the other big name beasts are always going to dominate the market, so I just don't see any point in constantly lamenting it. I think the only thing we can do (which is not an original idea on my part) is try to buy as many toys of lesser known animals as we can afford so that the manufacturers are encouraged to continue making them. That does seem to have been the case with CollectA's prehistoric invertebrates. Let's all work to keep that trend going. I want both my BotM 1/18 T. rex and a Rativates. And a Zuul. And an Aardonyx. And a Belantsea. And a Jaekelopterus. And so on.

The ironic thing is that the popular genera are usually the most complete and well-known animals. (Bar Brachiosaurus) Sorry I don't want a figure of a tooth taxon just because the name says Ostafrikasaurus rather than Spinosaurus.

[Faelrin]

Part of that is just from being discovered earlier on (or perhaps even recently as the case with Borealopelta for example), but as you said many are pretty complete. Honestly the more remains an animal has, the better it can be understood too (and probably more likely to receive museum mounts, skeletal reconstructions, paleoart, etc), which in turn could also add to its popularity. It was luck of the draw, that a) preservation bias worked in our favor, and b) the environment over millions of years didn't completely obliterate them, and/or by us.

Edit: I think this could also be why Megalosaurus has fallen out of favor after some time. It still to this day lacks decent remains, and most of what we can guess about its appearance is probably owed to its closest relatives such as Torvosaurus. On the contrary we also saw Deinocheirus explode in popularity after more complete remains surfaced, after how many decades it was just known as a pair of giant arms.

That said there is a still a plethora of relatively complete specimens that still sadly lack representation (such as Kulindadromaeus), but well I think I already covered that extensively earlier on in this thread, if not another.

I can't remember if I mentioned this before or not, but I have been compiling a list together of dinosaurs that have relatively decent remains (and/or multiple specimens, skin details, etc). I intend to post it when I finish it, but it won't be done for quite some time (halfway through Theropoda now). Just think it would be handy to have a list of everything that isn't too fragmentary to look over all at once/together (and perhaps adding what is fragmentary as such to avoid it). The main reason I have been working on it is to help narrow down my wishlist. I have no intentions on adding things that are fragmentary if I can help it. I would much rather wait until we have a better grasp on those animals first, if we ever do.

At the top of my head, Cryolophosaurus, and Spinosaurus (though gets better with time it seems when points a and b made earlier hold true) are just two of the exceptions I have. They are far from being complete, but their anatomy is perhaps safely able to be reconstructed from using relatives, etc, if not additional future specimens. Ceratopsians are another example of this, as many just have skull material only.

[Dinoguy2]

Part of that is just from being discovered earlier on (or perhaps even recently as the case with Borealopelta for example), but as you said many are pretty complete. Honestly the more remains an animal has, the better it can be understood too (and probably more likely to receive museum mounts, skeletal reconstructions, paleoart, etc), which in turn could also add to its popularity. It was luck of the draw, that a) preservation bias worked in our favor, and b) the environment over millions of years didn't completely obliterate them, and/or by us.

Edit: I think this could also be why Megalosaurus has fallen out of favor after some time. It still to this day lacks decent remains, and most of what we can guess about its appearance is probably owed to its closest relatives such as Torvosaurus. On the contrary we also saw Deinocheirus explode in popularity after more complete remains surfaced, after how many decades it was just known as a pair of giant arms.

That said there is a still a plethora of relatively complete specimens that still sadly lack representation (such as Kulindadromaeus), but well I think I already covered that extensively earlier on in this thread, if not another.

I can't remember if I mentioned this before or not, but I have been compiling a list together of dinosaurs that have relatively decent remains (and/or multiple specimens, skin details, etc). I intend to post it when I finish it, but it won't be done for quite some time (halfway through Theropoda now). Just think it would be handy to have a list of everything that isn't too fragmentary to look over all at once/together (and perhaps adding what is fragmentary as such to avoid it). The main reason I have been working on it is to help narrow down my wishlist. I have no intentions on adding things that are fragmentary if I can help it. I would much rather wait until we have a better grasp on those animals first, if we ever do.

At the top of my head, Cryolophosaurus, and Spinosaurus (though gets better with time it seems when points a and b made earlier hold true) are just two of the exceptions I have. They are far from being complete, but their anatomy is perhaps safely able to be reconstructed from using relatives, etc, if not additional future specimens. Ceratopsians are another example of this, as many just have skull material only.

This kind of list would be very helpful. I will echo the sentiment that a lot of people focus on getting toys of as many genera as possible regardless of completeness, which strikes me as silly. A figure of a tooth taxon is an imaginary animal at worst, an intentionally inaccurate representation of a better known relative at best.

It is beyond pointless to ask for a figure of Argentinosaurus when you could have a Dreadnaughtus or Patagotitan. What's going to happen is the artist is going to over correct to make it look different from those and you'll wind up with a figure that is not out of date, it's just a creature that never existed. Like the PNSO titanosaur 

[Sim]

3. We should stop focusing on Spinosaurus figures, as we have already gotten very good ones, and start focusing on stegosaurs and kin. We only got 2 dacentrurus and both are kind of crummy in my opinion

I agree that there's been enough Spinosaurus figures.  However as much as I like stegosaurs, I don't think there's a need to focus on them, there's already been a lot of good stegosaur figures and PNSO HAS been focusing on them.  It's pointless to make Dacentrurus into a figure, we don't know what it looked like.  And this reates to what others have been saying in this thread recently - I see no point in making figures of animals without a known appearance.   This applies to Brachiosaurus, Therizinosaurus, Sinotyrannus, Zhuchengtyrannus, Siats, Olorotitan, Argentinosaurus, Oviraptor, Magnapaulia, Gigantoraptor, Ichthyovenator, Hatzegopteryx, Quetzalcoatlus and Elasmosaurus.  I also find it disturbing how on Wikipedia restorations for such animals are often made, sometimes even full skeletals.  I think these things are misleading in suggesting more is known of the animal than the reality.


Some other unpopular opinions I have are:

1. CollectA's figures tend to not be good, especially their theropods.

2. The Safari 2017 Tyrannosaurus is overrated.

[Leyster]

S @SidB I agree on Collecta's theropods. They get them almost right... then they completely miss the muscolature of the hindlimb/tail base. Every single time. It's gotten worse since they scrapped bases. And their feathers look weird, too. It's nothing to care too much in the stardard models, but became noticeable in the larger ones ie. the Deinocheirus.

[Stegotyranno420]

3. We should stop focusing on Spinosaurus figures, as we have already gotten very good ones, and start focusing on stegosaurs and kin. We only got 2 dacentrurus and both are kind of crummy in my opinion

I agree that there's been enough Spinosaurus figures.  However as much as I like stegosaurs, I don't think there's a need to focus on them, there's already been a lot of good stegosaur figures and PNSO HAS been focusing on them.  It's pointless to make Dacentrurus into a figure, we don't know what it looked like.  And this reates to what others have been saying in this thread recently - I see no point in making figures of animals without a known appearance.   This applies to Brachiosaurus, Therizinosaurus, Sinotyrannus, Zhuchengtyrannus, Siats, Olorotitan, Argentinosaurus, Oviraptor, Magnapaulia, Gigantoraptor, Ichthyovenator, Hatzegopteryx, Quetzalcoatlus and Elasmosaurus.  I also find it disturbing how on Wikipedia restorations for such animals are often made, sometimes even full skeletals.  I think these things are misleading in suggesting more is known of the animal than the reality.


Some other unpopular opinions I have are:

1. CollectA's figures tend to not be good, especially their theropods.

2. The Safari 2017 Tyrannosaurus is overrated.

So where can I find a list or something that has all the extinct fauna we have a good idea about? It's getting tiring seeing a full skeletal of a obscure dinosaur only to figure out much later that we only know it from a tooth.

[Faelrin]

@Stegotyranno420 I've been working on such an extensive list, mainly for myself first, but I feel like it could be another month or so from now before I finish it and share it here. Starting with Theropoda, and then going from there. It's definitely quite the time consuming fare though, because of how much research this will entail. Definitely going to feature Dinosauria, and then I may expand from there (such as Pterosauria, etc), but we'll see. I think I mentioned this earlier in this thread, or another one. Can't remember which. I know D @Dinoguy2 also expressed interest in having something like that as well, after I mentioned it. Figured I'd inform you. I'll be sure to tag you and him when it is finished and posted here, as well as anyone else that may be interested in such a resource.

[Gwangi]

3. We should stop focusing on Spinosaurus figures, as we have already gotten very good ones, and start focusing on stegosaurs and kin. We only got 2 dacentrurus and both are kind of crummy in my opinion

I agree that there's been enough Spinosaurus figures.  However as much as I like stegosaurs, I don't think there's a need to focus on them, there's already been a lot of good stegosaur figures and PNSO HAS been focusing on them.  It's pointless to make Dacentrurus into a figure, we don't know what it looked like.  And this reates to what others have been saying in this thread recently - I see no point in making figures of animals without a known appearance.   This applies to Brachiosaurus, Therizinosaurus, Sinotyrannus, Zhuchengtyrannus, Siats, Olorotitan, Argentinosaurus, Oviraptor, Magnapaulia, Gigantoraptor, Ichthyovenator, Hatzegopteryx, Quetzalcoatlus and Elasmosaurus.  I also find it disturbing how on Wikipedia restorations for such animals are often made, sometimes even full skeletals.  I think these things are misleading in suggesting more is known of the animal than the reality.


Some other unpopular opinions I have are:

1. CollectA's figures tend to not be good, especially their theropods.

2. The Safari 2017 Tyrannosaurus is overrated.

I agree about CollectA, in fact I'm finding that I'm not really a big fan of their dinosaurs at all. For me all their best figures are the non-dinosaurs like Lisowicia, Edaphosaurus, the cephalopods, etc. I also generally prefer Safari's mammals over CollectA's.

[Bread]

I have to agree on Safari's Feathered rex to be overrated. It is a beautiful sculpt, but the fact that it is FULLY  feathered was always a slight nitpick. If it lacked the feathering cover on the legs and tail I would like it more, followed by believing the hype is real with that figure.

[SidB]

I have to agree on Safari's Feathered rex to be overrated. It is a beautiful sculpt, but the fact that it is FULLY  feathered was always a slight nitpick. If it lacked the feathering cover on the legs and tail I would like it more, followed by believing the hype is real with that figure.

While agreeing that this figure has fallen somewhat in status with the tide of opinion no longer favoring the fully feathered approach, back in 2017 this was 'state of the art', the best on the market of mass-produced T-rexes, seeming consistent with the latest in cladistic bundling thought, unless you were a long-term Battat vv. 1 and 2 affectionado, like myself. It marks the highwater mark of that particular approach, and not yet utterly discredited as a possibly valid interpretation.

[SidB]

My controversial opinion and a half-wished hope - please, oh please PNSO, stop the production lines, pause for several months, and give us collectors some time to appreciate the landslide of gems that you have already issued over the last year!

[Bread]

I have to agree on Safari's Feathered rex to be overrated. It is a beautiful sculpt, but the fact that it is FULLY  feathered was always a slight nitpick. If it lacked the feathering cover on the legs and tail I would like it more, followed by believing the hype is real with that figure.

While agreeing that this figure has fallen somewhat in status with the tide of opinion no longer favoring the fully feathered approach, back in 2017 this was 'state of the art', the best on the market of mass-produced T-rexes, seeming consistent with the latest in cladistic bundling thought, unless you were a long-term Battat vv. 1 and 2 affectionado, like myself. It marks the highwater mark of that particular approach, and not yet utterly discredited as a possibly valid interpretation.

Oh for sure, this figure without a doubt was beautiful upon reveal. No hate towards the figure whatsoever, but I just feel like it has too much hype around it. If it had some less feathering around the tail and legs, I would fully understand the hype. Even when this figure was revealed there was an understanding that Tyrannosaurus probably did not possess a full feathered coat. Just my opinion though, but I am glad this figure was bought by many. Just goes to show how amazing Doug Watson's work is.

[Bread]

My controversial opinion and a half-wished hope - please, oh please PNSO, stop the production lines, pause for several months, and give us collectors some time to appreciate the landslide of gems that you have already issued over the last year!

I think many members, especially those who are always lurking in the PNSO threads (I myself are amongst those), wish for PNSO to slow down releases either by stopping for a bit or releasing one figure per month+.

Here is a controversial opinion as I have not said one in a bit: I find large therapods, besides the Tyrannosaur and Spinosaur families, to be a pass for me. Now that's not to say I dislike large therapods such as Giganotosaurus or Mapusaurus to be boring, but figure/collecting wise they just are not my taste. Although, I do find Acrocanthosaurus to be an interesting large therapod due to its spine-sail like appearance, and if a company like PNSO made one, it was be an immediate purchase.

[SidB]

My controversial opinion and a half-wished hope - please, oh please PNSO, stop the production lines, pause for several months, and give us collectors some time to appreciate the landslide of gems that you have already issued over the last year!

I think many members, especially those who are always lurking in the PNSO threads (I myself are amongst those), wish for PNSO to slow down releases either by stopping for a bit or releasing one figure per month+.

Here is a controversial opinion as I have not said one in a bit: I find large therapods, besides the Tyrannosaur and Spinosaur families, to be a pass for me. Now that's not to say I dislike large therapods such as Giganotosaurus or Mapusaurus to be boring, but figure/collecting wise they just are not my taste. Although, I do find Acrocanthosaurus to be an interesting large therapod due to its spine-sail like appearance, and if a company like PNSO made one, it was be an immediate purchase.

I have all of PNSO's recent theropods in these categories (Carnotaurus, Allosaurus, Torvosaurus, Carcharodontosaurus) and I'm glad to have acquired them, BUT, in agreement, I hope that there are no more for a good while. There is a certain sameness to them. These are enough for me for the time being. I yearn for an Ornithomimus or a Deinocheirus, etc., or even more ornithischians. How about a sauropod, PNSO?

[Bread]

My controversial opinion and a half-wished hope - please, oh please PNSO, stop the production lines, pause for several months, and give us collectors some time to appreciate the landslide of gems that you have already issued over the last year!

I think many members, especially those who are always lurking in the PNSO threads (I myself are amongst those), wish for PNSO to slow down releases either by stopping for a bit or releasing one figure per month+.

Here is a controversial opinion as I have not said one in a bit: I find large therapods, besides the Tyrannosaur and Spinosaur families, to be a pass for me. Now that's not to say I dislike large therapods such as Giganotosaurus or Mapusaurus to be boring, but figure/collecting wise they just are not my taste. Although, I do find Acrocanthosaurus to be an interesting large therapod due to its spine-sail like appearance, and if a company like PNSO made one, it was be an immediate purchase.

I have all of PNSO's recent theropods in these categories (Carnotaurus, Allosaurus, Torvosaurus, Carcharodontosaurus) and I'm glad to have acquired them, BUT, in agreement, I hope that there are no more for a good while. There is a certain sameness to them. These are enough for me for the time being. I yearn for an Ornithomimus or a Deinocheirus, etc., or even more ornithischians. How about a sauropod, PNSO?

Yeah I am all for some smaller, unique, and sometimes ignored species such as Ornithischians, etc. However; I guess this is another controversial opinion of mine but I feel like there are enough Deinocheirus on the market, or at least ones that satisfy my needs. Yes I'd love PNSO to make one, but I rather see a proper Therizinosaurus or Ornithomimus be made.

[Halichoeres]

Idea: Cotylorhynchus & Erythrosuchus double pack

Excellent idea.

[Sim]

The Safari 2017 T. rex does appear to be inaccurate as there is an osteological correlate for scales in T. rex on the jugal where the Safari figure has feathers.  With or without this detail the feathered face of the Safari T. rex feels too much for me and this is coming from someone who generally prefers feathered faces on feathered dinosaurs.  It looks great on the Safari 2017 Velociraptor and Coelophysis, but not on the Safari 2017 T. rex in my opinion.

[Dinoguy2]

My controversial opinion and a half-wished hope - please, oh please PNSO, stop the production lines, pause for several months, and give us collectors some time to appreciate the landslide of gems that you have already issued over the last year!

I agree. PNSO is honestly only hurting themselves with this release schedule. Back in the day, when Carnegie would release one or two new figures per year, you could take time to really appreciate them. Even Battat, which released it's figures in "Waves", was easier to collect. A couple of figures per year, or two or three spread out over time.

If PNSO released 3 or 4 of these figures each year I'd probably be trying to collect them all like I did with Carnegie and Battat. As it stands there's no way for me to do that, which means I'm being picky, only buying the ones I really REALLY like, even though they're all pretty great. With fewer releases each year I'd be much more inclined to even buy the less great ones.

[Faelrin]

Yeah I definitely can't keep up with them. I would hope to see them slow down as well. Especially as the prices have gone up from last year's offerings.