Irritator (Dino Hazard)

Brazilian paleontologist Tito Aureliano published the time-travel dinosaur adventure novel Dino Hazard: Realidade Oculta (English subtitle: Hidden Reality) in 2015, and since then he and a team including other paleontologists and artists have been spinning off paleo-themed merchandise and media, including a video game. The setting for the story is Brazil in the middle of the Cretaceous period, and it features a wide variety of animals from the Albian-Cenomanian of South America, with a sprinkling of African fauna (Africa and South America had only recently separated and the divergence between their biotas was pretty minor at the time). For our purposes, the most important part of the merchandising campaign is the nascent toy line. The first entry is Irritator challengeri, with a bonus lungfish.

I believe there are three versions of this model available, Basic, Standard, and Premium, which differ in the level of detail of their paint. For buyers outside of Brazil, the Standard version is available from yvyfigures.com (various other retailers are also stocking it now). The Standard version comes in a box with a nice riverbank base and a lungfish (Equinoxiodus alcantarensis) to prey upon. The box also bears the imprint of Yvy Figures, which seems to exist just to make Dino Hazard toys, as, for example, their YouTube account was only created in January. The figure is sold as 1:20 scale; however, based on the holotype it’s more like 1:12. It could be considered 1:20 for the close, possibly synonymous, relative Angaturama.

The sculpt is outstanding, the work of Hugo Cafasso (apparently the sole proprietor of Yvy). It’s well-proportioned and well-balanced, and the texture mostly consists of fine pebbly scales, with wrinkles crossing the body here and there. Some of the wrinkles are perhaps slightly overwrought, but it avoids the over-the-top texturing that a lot of brands aimed at adult collectors indulge in. My copy balances well on a level surface with the tail just a few millimeters clear of the ground. It only balances on its base, however, if it’s holding the lungfish that is included as an accessory.

The hindlimbs are comparatively short, and the forelimbs long, and there is a ridge along the back suggesting elongated neural spines, all of which are nods to its kinship with Spinosaurus, although of course we do not know with certainty what any of this looked like. The overall proportions are perfectly defensible in light of lacking remains, and make for a cohesive and attractive composition. The birdlike scutes on the foot are unlikely, but that’s really the only nit I can pick. The coloration is conservative, with an olive drab shading to a darker gray-green along the back and at the extremities. The distribution of color recalls a Siamese cat, whose melanin deposition is temperature dependent and therefore more intense with greater distance from the body’s core. The wicked claws are painted a contrasting tan color.

The only definite remains of Irritator consist of most of a skull lacking the tip of a snout. A contemporary snout tip from what is likely a larger individual might be from the same species, although it currently carries the name Angaturama limai. Phylogenetic analyses that include Irritator typically find it closer to Spinosaurus than to Baryonyx, which allows us to make some extremely tentative inferences about its appearance, but when reviewing a figure like this it’s worth reiterating that there’s very little that we can say for certain about accuracy, except as it conforms to what we know about spinosaurids in general. Under this rubric, the head looks good! The nares are retracted, the eyes are in the right position, and the tooth count for the known portion of the skull is accurate. The crest is speculative but plausible. I generally prefer my figures without articulations, but the joint on this jaw works well and isn’t as obtrusive as it could be, although from just the right angle you can look straight through the back of the head to the other side. The face is a fairly vibrant yellow, maybe recalling a jaçana or a lapwing. The tiny eye is red, and I suspect painted by machine rather than by hand–just a bit too tidy to have been done by a human. The teeth are a bit yellowed instead of the bright white we often see in theropod mouths.

The limbs are unknown for Irritator, but the orientation and proportion of these is within the range you’d expect for a spinosaurid. They’re separate molded pieces attached with glue, which is also true of the tail, the head, and the jaw. They aren’t the cleanest seams I’ve ever seen on a multi-part mold, but they’re pretty good. They don’t detract from my enjoyment of the sculpt, but your mileage may vary.

Now, let’s turn our attention to the star of this little diorama, Equinoxiodus, which I confess was more exciting for me than the main theropod model. Extant lungfishes occasionally get made into toys, but it’s essentially unheard of for extinct ones. This figure combines the body shape of an Australian lungfish (Neoceratodus), the fins of a South American lungfish (Lepidosiren), and the head morphology and coloration of a pirarucu (Arapaima). As with Irritator, some speculation is necessary, since Equinoxiodus is known only from toothplates. The visual nod to the modern Brazilian ichthyofauna is cool (and the pirarucu is an air-breather to boot). And modeling it after a South American lungfish, with its spaghetti fins, has a certain biogeographic logic. However, the toothplates suggest that this animal was more closely related to the modern Australian lungfish than the South American one (recall that South America was still connected to Australia by way of Antarctica during the Cretaceous). What is more, the threadlike fins of lepidosirenids are oddities relative to the history of lungfishes. It would have been more parsimonious to give this figure the typical sturdy lobed fins that basically all lungfish body fossils show. Interestingly, illustrations in Aureliano’s novel show an Equinoxiodus with fleshier fins.

The lungfish figure has a very actinopterygian mouth, showing a little cheek-like connection between the jaws. In a pirarucu or catfish, this connection is formed by the maxilla, which rotates relative to both the premaxilla and the lower jaw. Lungfishes have maxillae fused to the braincase, though, so their mouths don’t look like this–they are goofy and “cheek-less,” if you like. Personally, I would have preferred that the lungfish be a bit less obviously damaged (an intact fish could not bend in the manner depicted). As it is, it only really works displayed as prey, whereas I would have liked the option to display it by itself or with other aquatic animals. It’s also made to a smaller scale than its predator, closer to 1:25 or 1:30, based on the space available in the head for known toothplates.

The Dino Hazard team has big ambitions, with a large Carcharodontosaurus due for release later this year, and hints that the other players from the story are targets as well. The cast of the novel includes dinosaurs like Amazonsaurus, terrestrial crocodiles like Araripesuchus, pterosaurs like Tropeognathus, mammals, coelacanths, actinopterygian fishes, and even an amblypygid–there’s no shortage of fascinating organisms that could be adapted for a big Dino Hazard diorama. And, if you’ll permit me a gratuitous editorial aside, I’m so grateful for the existence of a dinosaur story that isn’t part of the incoherent grotesquerie that is the Jurassic World franchise, and I wish the Dino Hazard endeavor every possible success. Maybe some sequels in other time periods? After all, the Permian and Triassic of Brazil are amazing.

Parts of this review were adapted from a post in my collection thread on the Dinosaur Toy Forum.