Woolly rhinoceros (AAA)

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Everyone familiar with Pleistocene fauna is familiar with the woolly rhinoceros (Coelodonta antiquitatis), a large shaggy rhino that lived in Eurasia and died out at the end of the Ice Age. It is often reproduced in toy form, only less so that the more popular mammoths and Smilodon. This review concerns AAA’s reproduction of the famous shaggy beast. Bear with me as this is my first toy review and being a dinosaur lover I’ve foolishly chosen a mammal to do it on.

For the most part the figure looks pretty good. It is made of a solid somewhat flexible chunk of rubber and measures 5” long and stands 2.5” at the shoulder. The real life animal measured 11’ long and stood 6’ at the shoulder so the figure seems good where proportions are concerned. If my math is correct this would put it at 1/28 in scale. This figure should not be mistaken with the larger though similar AAA rhino that measures 11” long and 4” high.

The figure looks stocky and shaggy and stands on three toed feet, as it should. It also has the nice addition of some wrinkles around the upper lip. The pose of the figure is fairly static with the right front limb slightly lifted as if the animal is moving forward.

There are some features of the figure that are a bit puzzling. For starters is the tail, or rather the lack thereof. I don’t know if the figure was meant to have one and it is pressed against the body and thus hard to discern or if they just missed it altogether. Whatever the case may be it should have a tail. Also, the anterior horn should be flattened side-to-side rather than rounded, as in extant rhinoceroses.

The paint job… is a bit concerning. Rather than a more natural brown color AAA picked green as their color of choice. Why they did this is beyond me but it reminds me of the algae that often grows on tree sloths. There is some brown speckled around the animal’s coat as well but this could almost be mistaken for paint rub-off. The mouth and nostrils are painted white which is also an odd choice, as are the startling red eyes. As for the paint application there does appear to be some run off. Most obvious is around the horns as some of the green on the face runs up a bit at the base of the horns which are grey. The same goes for the toenails which are brown.

Overall despite my complaints the figure is fairly decent. Where prehistoric mammal figures are concerned there doesn’t seem to be much out there so this one should be of interest especially where price is concerned, I only paid a couple bucks for mine.

Often available from eBay stores here

EDIT: Since this review was written Papo has produced a woolly rhinoceros that greatly outshines this one. The author strongly urges you to seek THAT toy out, instead of this ugly hunk of rubber.