Very occasionally, the fossil record allows us a fascinating glimpse into interactions between various extinct animals. Take the “Talkeetna Mountains Hadrosaur” for example. Discovered in Alaska in 1994, it is a juvenile specimen that washed out to sea after its death and eventually sank to the bottom to become fossilized. Preserved toothmarks on the bones suggest that the corpse was scavenged upon by a mosasaur, probably Tylosaurus proriger.
Today’s review will focus on Mojö Fun’s 2010 interpretation of that famous and fearsome mosasaur. As you can see, it’s sculpted with its long tail swinging sharply to the left. This gives the toy a length of around 16 cm. Main colours are dark and light olive green with black eyes, white teeth, and a pale mouth interior with a purple tongue. And for some strange reason, Mojö opted to add a series of medium green and pale pink spots on the flanks, and rather sloppily at that. Needless to say, the toy would have looked much better without them.
The Tylosaurus‘ skin has a fine crisscrossing wrinkle texture all over. The head has the proper conical shape of a mosasaur, although it looks slightly too thick for Tylosaurus and the teeth are too small. The tongue, however, has a forked tip, which is a definite plus. And the tail features a fluke at the end. Granted, it’s more eel-like than shark-like, but it still looks good.
And now let’s address the two elephants in the room. First, as you can see from the comparison photo, the Mojö Tylosaurus bears a very suspicious resemblance to the version from CollectA. I’m generally cautious about tossing around accusations of plagiarism, but in this case, it may well be justified. And second, like its CollectA doppelganger, this Tylosaurus is missing its nostrils. Lame.
Overall, the Mojö Tylosaurus is an okay toy at best. Not the worst rendition I’ve come across, but far from the cream of the crop. Kids will no doubt enjoy playing with it though.
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In Reply #2 here http://dinotoyblog.com/forum/index.php?topic=3335.0 SBell mentioned Mojo was founded by people who had worked for CollectA, and that some of the figure designs appear to have had joint ownership which is why some Mojo figures look similar to CollectA figures.
The model has not been officially retired but a new colour scheme variant is being introduced. We will get pics of the new colour scheme up onto Everything Dinosaur’s Facebook page and blog site in the next 2 weeks or so.
Yes, I have seen it on Mojo’s prehistoric and extinct page, apparently, the new color scheme are white stripes running along the back of the model and tones of grey dark ,medium and merging into white, check it on their page.
Thanks.
I’ve got this little guy.To be honest,I wanted to make the review about it,but you were first(Luckily,I was lazy and didn’t write a single letter 😀 ).
I am glad I’m not the only one,who noticed that Mojo sometimes simply copy other brands.
This figure reminds me B.W.Hawkins’ Ichtyosaur statue.You know,this guy:
https://c1.staticflickr.com/8/7078/7309520322_d7c205d0c3_b.jpg
It is better looking than Papo’s ”Tylosaurus.” I can see that the company has put a little research on this guy. Fortunately, it does not look like the old, vintage restrorations of Tylosaurus,when scutes were put on their backs. Nice review, fun for kids during bath in the tub. Is this figure retired?
I don’t think it’s been retired. It’s still available for order at a number of online stores.