Review by Dan, Photos by Boki Ask someone to name a sauropod, and “Apatosaurus” will often be the first species to come to mind. Consequently, this prototypical animal will often be the answer if you ask “What was the first sauropod ever discovered?” In fact, that title belongs to a relatively obscure creature known as Cetiosaurus. Any fan of Cetacea...
Monsters in My Pocket was a toy franchise that started in the 80s that consisted of a series of small, rubber figures. These figures were each only a few inches tall and could each come in a variety of solid colors. What makes this toy line special is that each figure is modeled after a certain creature that exists in...
Ah, Dimetrodon – where would any dinosaur toy line be without this oddly anachronistic sail-backed pelycosaur? And where would I be if I didn’t drop names that I semi-understand? In similar places, one would imagine. Almost every dino toy company has churned one out, from Carnegie (ugly) to Bullyland to UKRD to Carnegie (better) to Inpro. Although you probably don’t...
I thought I’d review something a little different for a change. As a kid I was fascinated by the original Monster in my Pocket and managed to collect them all. After the first couple of series the lines started to go downhill though and I eventually lost interest. A repulsive line of MIMP dinosaurs was eventually released, but even that...
Can you believe we haven’t covered this figure yet? One of the first truly lo-o-ong dinosaur toys, the Invicta Diplodocus dates back to 1974. It was a simpler time, when sauropods were kind enough to drag their tails around for allosaurs to snack on at their convenience, and some of our more aged forum members were yet to become the...
By forumite Foxilized (edited by Horridus) Historical background The oil company Sinclair (USA) was, since its very beginnings in the new born 20th century, closely related to dinosaur imagery. They chose a “Brontosaurus” –yes, not the deceptive one but the thunder lizard instead- as the main logo to sell their oil. The reason was because it was seen as big...
Some dinosaurs have undergone quite radical image changes over the years – sauropods moved out of their swamps and got into shape and theropods went from blundering tail draggers to sleek, deadly (and quite horizontal) predators – some of then even gained feathers. It might be tempting to presume, however, that Stegosaurus has remained much the same – slow, stupid...
The Invicta dinosaurs are well-known for being quite anatomically accurate for their time, and especially when compared with contemporary competition. Here, then, we have their rendering of the most famous dinosaur of all, and while it’s not bad – especially when it comes to superficial details – it’s certainly not Invicta’s finest hour. The choice of pose is historically very...
The spinosaur Baryonyx was big news when it was unearthed in England in the 1980s, so it’s understandable that Invicta would have wanted to produce their own model of ‘Claws’. This 1989 plain-coloured toy is (sadly) still one of the best spinosaur toys yet produced, in spite of its outdated posture. Back in the day Baryonyx was noted for its...
Here it comes, straight from Bob Bakker’s 1970s fever dreams – the infamous banana flavour Invicta Mamenchisaurus, surely among the stranger serious sauropod toys. As any kid with a dinosaur book will tell you, Mamenchisaurus is best known for having an extraordinarily long neck, making up half of the animal’s overall length. It’s therefore quite understandable that Invicta would want...
Ah, the Invicta dinosaurs – every one a retro-tastic delight, and every one now sadly out of production (and replaced at the Natural History Museum (London) by a piece of Toyway tat not worthy of the museum’s seal of approval…BAH). Triceratops here is one of the earlier figures in the line, and it shows – which is not to say...
A firm from the German Democratic Republic, VEB (Volkseigener Betrieb) Plaho, released a series of highly collectable dinosaur figures in 1967. They were sold in the Museum of Sena in Thuringia, Germany until the mid-1980s. The follower firm to Plaho, Marolin, re-released them in 1990. Plaho / Marolin did not only make dinosaurs but produced the complete span from wildlife...
