Sometimes there’s no avoiding bad timing. Since paleontology is an ever-shifting field of scientific understanding, any artistic or commercial renditions of prehistoric life risk becoming obsolete at the drop of a new find. Such was the case for Safari Ltd., who announced the release of a new Dilophosaurus model for 2020 to replace the previous Wild Safari version – only for a brand-new paper to drop later that same year, providing a new, thorough analysis of all known Dilophosaurus fossils and providing new insight into the Early Jurassic predator’s life appearance.
Thanks to its appearance in Jurassic Park, Dilophosaurus is, in the words of one paleontologist, “pretty much the best, worst-known dinosaur.” Even if you’re well aware that it wasn’t small and didn’t spit venom and didn’t have a frill around its neck, you probably grew up reading about how fragile its twin crests were and how relatively weak its bite was.
Greetings DinoWaurriors! While being a great medium to introduce the masses to dinosaurs, films can have an awful effect on people by presenting inaccuracies and people drinking them in as fact. Such is the case with Dilophosaurus in Jurassic Park. In the film, it was presented as a small predator, venom spitting with a frill, when in fact it had no frill, no venom sacs and was seven meters in length.
It was a truly sad day for the entire dinosaur toy community when Battat Terra sculptor Dan LoRusso passed away in 2015. He was immensely talented, meticulous in his research, and most importantly of all, friendly and kind. At the time of his death, he had begun working on sculpts of Majungasaurus, Plateosaurus, and Yutyrannus for the Terra line.
With this year being the 30-year anniversary of the release of Jurassic Park, I thought it was well past time (5 years to be exact) that I reviewed this figure that was released for the 25th anniversary of the film. It’s the Dilophosaurus Pop! by Funko. Although many Jurassic Park/World Funko figures now exist they don’t have a strong presence on the DTB.
Review and photos by Faelrin, edited by Suspsy
Before the mainline sized 3.75″ Hammond Collection came onto the scene this year and became all the rage, there was the ill-fated Amber Collection, a line of figures intended for 1/12 scale collectors. After its launch in late 2019, it saw poor species diversity (too many Velociraptor figures), poor quality control, poor accuracy to the source material at times, and limited distribution globally (mostly online only), etc.
In the world of paleoart and paleomerch, it’s very common to see artists and toymakers draw inspiration from the imagery of other creators. Often this can be a good thing and a chance to reinforce contemporary understanding – consider how many vintage toys drew from Charles R Knight and Rudolph Zallinger – but sometimes it ends up becoming flagrant theft of another’s hard work.