#carnosaurs

Charcaradontosaurus watercolour.

My anatomy skills died while making this and then returned partway through but it was already too late to fix some things.

What's the first thing you think of when you hear the word Dinotopia?

If your answer is the 2002 miniseries coproduced by Hallmark and Disney, I would not blame you. For the uninitiated, Dinotopia is a series that takes place on an island where dinosaurs had managed to survive the KT event that ended the Mesozoic era. The island is surrounded by a deadly reef and a turbulent storm system, so it's remained hidden for generations. Over time, countless humans have shipwrecked on its shores with almost no hope of escape due to the impassable storms and reef.

Normally, this would spell doom for the survivors, but not in this case. The dinosaurs have evolved to essentially become sapient and have taken the humans under their wing. Together, humans and dinosaurs have managed to create Dinotopia, an idealistic society where conflict is essentially a thing of the past and most inhabitants have embraced the wonders of their enlightened civilization.

Well...most anyways.

While most of the predatory dinosaurs were able to switch to either a vegetarian diet or subsist on fish, the bigger carnivores like Tyrannosaurus rex didn't make the transition to being civilized.

In the miniseries, this resulted them being depicted as bloodthirsty monsters that only want to devour humans and "good" Dinotopians.

The thing is though...their portrayal was radically different in the source material.

Dinotopia was originally an art book series written and drawn by James Gurney, a plaeoartist in his own right. The plot of the first two books follows a lot of the same story beats as the original series. A duo find themselves on Dinotopia and have to learn how to fit in, while exploring the new world they found themselves in. I highly recommend them due to the fantastic artwork and a lot of the creativity gone into bringing the aforementioned setting to life.

Special mention goes in this case to the predatory dinosaurs who are handled...substationally different than they were in the mini-series.

On paper, the basic similarities are there. The big carnivores live as their ancestors did compared to the civilized dinosaurs and will attack those who wander into their territory.

The difference here is how they're presented. Bix, a Protoceratops ambassador who befriends our heroes, explains that it's less the predators being monsters and more being...well, predators. They simply couldn't make the transition because their appetites and big bodies' high demand for meat are major roadblocks.

And they aren't above reasoning. Those who wish to venture into their territory of the Rainy Basin can offer huge piles of cooked fish and smoked eel for safe passage. The carnivores will accept the offering, and the travelers can proceed with no trouble.

While they certainly can be a threat, it doesn't mean they aren't above diplomacy. In fact, they turn out to be allies more often than not in the original trilogy. During the second book, The World Beneath, Arthur Denison (one of the shipwrecked heroes I mentioned) frees a young carnosaur from being trapped by a fallen tree.

This turns out to be a huge boon for our heroes since they proceed to get menaced by a Tyrannosaurus shortly after...before a huge Giganotosaurus comes out of the trees and gets the tyrannosaur to back down, descalating the situation.

This is Stinktooth, the overall leader of the Rainy Basin's carnosaurs and more importantly, the father of the juvenile Arthur freed. Stinktooth is grateful for the rescue of his son and permits the group safe passage to a sacred temple that the predators guard.

It's here we get a lot more development for them. As it turns out, the Rainy Basin does have a society of sorts where all predators adhere to the ruling of a leader. In this case, it's Stinktooth. They're also revealed to have a sense of duty since their initial hostility was due to the heroes trespassing on grounds they deemed sacred. Which in hindsight, they have a good reason given what comes out of the ruins that could threaten them all.

This happens to be a strider, which the villainous Lee Crab tries to use to escape Dinotopia and potentially bring ruin to all. And here's where Stinktooth helps out again. He allows Arthur to ride on his back as he swims out to sea in pursuit of the strider so the machine can be powered down to keep Dinotopia safe.

Overall, the dinosaurs of the Rainy Basin (Stinktooth in particular) prove that they can be reasonable and even heroic when the need arises.

Interestingly, the third book also shows they aren't the only ones since many other predators have found different ways to coexist with the Dinotopians. A species of red-faced Tyrannosaurs in the Blackwood Flats have learned to become obligate scavengers.

And in the borders of Chandara, there exists several monasteries that are home to an order of carnivores (implied to be Acrocanthosaurs) that have learned to become shaolin monks.

Now I'm gonna repeat that cause it bears repeating.

Shaolin. Monk.

Acrocanthosaurs.

...if that is not one of the best ideas I've heard, I don't know what is.

It also shows how the original Dinotopia books tackled the topic of sentient carnivorous dinosaurs a bit better than the miniseries did. Which is one of the things that made them special due to the creativity needed to put all of these things together and build a believable and rich setting. Again, I highly recommend the original books for both the creativity and artwork, as well as Dinotopia Lost, a spin off novel by Alan Dean Foster that goes more into detail on the Rainy Basin, and features a pair of tyrannosaurs working with the heroes to save their offspring from a band of pirates.

Man-At-Arms: FIGHT! We outnumber them 330 to 1!

Every day I should post an image of a video game that has impacted me without any contextual explanation. I’m going by a ‘only one game per franchise’ rule and it kills a man. But it’s almost done!

IIRC the quill knobs were proposed with the original description

They were, but other people have refuted them, so this study in theory refutes the refutes, as it were?

Wings? Probably not. Most it would have had would be protofeathers on the body (and arms, but not wing-like)