Episode 60 is all about Eoraptor, one of the earliest known dinosaurs of all time.
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In addition to Eoraptor, we had another great discussion with Brad Jost, host of the Jurassic Park Podcast, a show that covers everything about Jurassic Park and Jurassic World. You can follow Jurassic Park Podcast on Twitter @, and listen to our previous cross-over episode in “Styracosaurus: Episode 42.”
In this episode, we discuss:
- The dinosaur of the day: Eoraptor
- Name means “dawn plunderer”
- Named “dawn” because it’s one of the earliest dinosaurs
- Name raptor refers to its grasping hand
- Not related to Velociraptor or dromaeosaurs (other than having raptor in its name)
- Species is Eoraptor lunensis
- Species name means “moon inhabitant” and named based on it being found in the “Valle de la Luna” which looks like a lunar landscape
- One of the earliest dinosaurs (lived in the Triassic, in western Gondwana, now Argentina)
- First described in 1993, and then thought to be the earliest known dinosaur
- Considered an early dinosaur because of its more primitive features
- In 2013, a new dinosaur was formally described: Nyasasaurus from Tanzania, that is believed to be 12 million years older than Eoraptor
- Eoraptor bones were first found in 1991, by Ricardo Martinez, a paleontologist from the University of San Juan (found in Argentina); took 12 months to collect the holotype, then it was prepared at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago; it was first put on display in Chicago, and then sent back to San Juan Argentina, where it went on display at the Museum of Natural Sciences
- Paul Sereno and Alfretto Monetta from the National University of San Juan led a team to search for fossils in Argentina in 1991. They searched 5 weeks without finding anything, and then Ricardo Martinez found an Eoraptor tooth (ended up also being a skull and mostly complete skeleton)
- Paul Sereno and colleagues (Forster, Rogers, and Monetta) named Eoraptor in 1993; debate over whether it’s a basal saurischian and a basal theropod
- When first described, thought to be a theropod, based on its hand and other features
- In 1997 Phil Currie said it was closer to a saurischian and ornithischian, and in 2011 a different team found it to be a basal sauropodomorph
- In 2013 Sereno and others redescribed Eoraptor and said it was a basal sauropodomorph
- What changed?
- Originally considered to be a theropod (bipedal, narrow build)
- Another dinosaur that lived in the area was Eodromaeus, which was discovered in 2011, and convinced scientists that Eoraptor was a sauropodomorph, with some teeth suited for eating plants (Eodromaeus had sharp teeth and is considered to be a theropod, and the earliest theropod, which means that Eoraptor, which is more ambiguous, was probably not a theropod)
- Eoraptor and Eodromaeus lived at the same time, which shows one was carnivorous theropod and other was basal sauropodomorph
- Eoraptor and Eodromaeus looked similar and were similar in size
- Early dinosaurs looked similar (though eventually developed into sauropods, theropods, and ornithischians such as stegosaurs, ankylosaurs, and ceratopsians)
- Sereno said “What can I say, I was young,” about mistaking Eoraptor for a theropod. He also said “that if you were transported back 230 million years, and you turned your head as they ran by, you would be really hard-pressed to tell them apart. The differences at the root of the dinosaur family tree are really subtle.”
- Eoraptor was small, at 3.3 ft (1 m) long
- Light, ground-dwelling, bipedal
- Weighed about 22 pounds (10 kg)
- Fast runner
- Probably not the apex predator of its habitat (lived with many archosaurs)
- Herrerasaurus may have eaten Eoraptor (lots of Herrerasaurus bones found)
- Has a kink in its upper jaw
- May have been omnivorous
- Some of its teeth were leaf shaped
- Some of its teeth were curved and saw-edged, but it did not have a sliding joint in its lower jaw to hold large prey in its mouth
- Had five digits on each hand, and the three longest digits on each hand had large claws (probably for prey); the fourth and fifth digits were too small to be used for hunting
- Could also use claws and teeth to tear apart prey
- May have eaten insects and lizards
- Later dinosaurs tended to have fewer fingers (T-rex only had two)
- Forelimbs were half the length of hindlimbs
- Had really large eye sockets, so some scientists think the bones found were of juveniles (also some have skull bones not fully fused together)
- Lived in a volcanically active floodplain with forests; warm and humid, with strong seasonal rain
- Can see Eoraptor in the documentary, Dinosaur Revolution, where an Eoraptor saves a female Eoraptor from a Saurosuchus
- Fun fact: A friend of ours gave us their copy of “Cinefex” from August 1993 which goes into a lot of depth on the creation of the dinosaurs for Jurassic Park. In it they say: “To demonstrate his interest in the project, character creator Stan Winston provided Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment with detailed pencil drawings of the dinosaurs by Mark ‘Crash’ McCreery. Using ostrich photographs as reference, McCreery sketches the similarly configured gallimimus… …(and) a Tyrannosaurus rex. The T-rex—and all dinosaurs— were to be presented as warm-blooded, agile and fast-moving creatures, a reflection of the latest scientific evidence” and Sam Winston Studio eventually was selected as the effects provider for the full-scale dinosaurs
For those who may prefer reading, see below for the full transcript of our chat with Brad Jost:
Sabrina: We’re here today with Brad, the host of the Jurassic Park Podcast, where you can learn everything there is to know about Jurassic Park and Jurassic World. We definitely recommend checking it out. We’ve had Brad on the show before and we’re happy to have him again today to talk about all the dinosaur media highlights form 2015, so welcome Brad.
Brad: Hey how’s it going?
Sabrina: Pretty good.
Brad: Good. Yeah 2015 was pretty crazy for all kinds of dinosaur media stuff, so I’m happy to talk about it.
Sabrina: Great, yeah. We were pretty happy with the amount of stuff that came out last year.
Garret: Yeah there was a lot.
Brad: Yeah, all of a sudden. I feel like there wasn’t too much in the way of dinosaur stuff prior to 2015, and then all of a sudden it was like a flood of stuff came right to us. So I’m really happy about that obviously.
Sabrina: Me too. I kind of wonder if everybody else planned it around Jurassic World.
Brad: Yeah you’re probably right there, because they knew it would be big. I don’t think they knew it would be as big as it was, but it’s definitely a safe bet to kind of release things alongside Jurassic World, so that was a good choice by everybody.
Garret: Yeah you can especially tell when everyone tries to work the word Jurassic into the name of their thing. Why are you using Jurassic rather than Cretaceous or Triassic I wonder?
Brad: Yeah exactly. It’s so funny because there has been so much in the way of toys or different videos or kids stuff online. You just see the word Jurassic and they almost copy the font or the logo itself, and it’s just clearly they’re just trying to rip it off, and trying to, hope people mistake it for Jurassic Park or Jurassic World.
Garret: Yeah. They’ve somehow branded an entire period.
Brad: Yeah it’s sort of like the way Indiana Jones represents adventure, and everything that has to do with adventure sort of has that same font, the same you know logo and everything, same sort of music. So same thing goes for Jurassic Park, you know. Once something became a hit like it did, everybody’s gonna rip off of it. So it’s a good thing, it’s fine, you know because it’s better for us because we end up getting all this awesome stuff.
Garret: Yeah that’s true.
Sabrina: Yup. Definitely.
Brad: Yeah 2015 obviously was huge for Jurassic Park, because it’s been fourteen years since a new Jurassic movie came out, and the film itself, I really enjoyed it. I know people are mixed about it, and hopefully they tend to side on the good side nowadays but we’ll see. You know, I can’t wait to kinda look at this you know a few years down the road and see what the thought process is about the movie, to see if people still appreciate it or if they’ve come to hate it. I don’t know. So that’ll be interesting to see over the years.
But for me I loved it, and it made so much come out of the way in terms of video games and toys and stuff for fans at conventions and things. Especially the gaming, you know the Jurassic World LEGO game came out. That one included all the different films and from what I’ve heard everybody loves the game, there’s really no complaints about it.
Sabrina: Oh yeah we love that game.
Brad: Yeah, it’s just so much fun. How could you not love playing in that world? And they make it fun for you, you know? They make it comical, which is something the Jurassic Park movies are not known for too much. I mean there is some comedy, but it’s funny to see how they represent the movies in those games. So I think that’s pretty awesome.
There’s also, there was a mobile game for Jurassic World and that was pretty awesome. I know I got a chance to play it until I ran out of space on my phone, then I really couldn’t play it anymore. But one of the funny things is, I don’t know if you guys heard that news that a young boy ended up spending like six thousand dollars I think on that game. That’s insane, and you know, it just goes to show that people really like this game.
Sabrina: They are addicting.
Brad: He got his money back so it’s not a big deal, but that game is really fun. There was also the Jurassic Park arcade game that came out earlier in 2015. I don’t know if you guys have gotten a chance to play that. It’s usually at Dave and Buster’s, or it can be at any kind of local arcade.
Garret: Oh okay, no we haven’t played that one, I didn’t see it.
Brad: That one’s really awesome. It’s in the similar vein of the Lost World, the big box, you know, game that you can get in and shoot the guns and everything. So that one was really awesome, and I actually on the podcast got to talk to the guys who created the game, so it was really cool to see or to hear about what went into making those games. So that’s one of the ones I’d say definitely go find it because it was great.
Garret: Is that one where it’s like a first person shooter style? Or what’s the platform, how do you play?
Brad: Yeah exactly, so you’re, you’re sitting in that booth and you have the gun there, and I think it’s kind of like a vague timeframe. It doesn’t exactly tie into the movies, but it does represent some of the scenes that you’d see within the movies, and it all takes place in the old park. It takes place after the first movie, and it just shows kind of the way that this group of people collect the dinosaurs and contain them, and take them, I don’t know, off the island. So that was a really cool game.
Garret: Sounds fun.
Brad: Yeah that’s one of the things that I like to see, is a game that doesn’t destroy dinosaurs. I feel like a lot of shooter games end up just killing all dinosaurs.
Garret: Yeah like Turok.
Brad: Yeah, it’s not always fun when you’re just destroying them. I kinda like to not destroy them. So that’s why I like that game a lot. Jurassic World also brought a lot of toys, now I don’t know if you guys are into collecting or anything. Did you happen to pick up any toys from the movie there?
Garret: We didn’t get any of the, we thought about getting the Collector Edition of Jurassic World that came with Indominus rex and the T-rex, but we ended up getting the regular tin case thing.
Brad: Yeah those things are really cool too. For when it comes to toys, it was kind of not a collector’s year really. So if people are looking to collect items it’s not really that great because some of the toys were really hated upon by most of the fans. So I’m sure some of your listeners maybe have some of these toys. They could be disappointed with them because the nature of the old toys, they were so good and so much fun to play with. But hopefully Hasbro picks it up. And I think they just didn’t realize how big the movie would be.
Sabrina: So what about the toys was it that they didn’t like? It was just not as realistic looking?
Garret: Too simple or something?
Brad: Yeah it was very simple, they had, the sculpts are not up to par. There’s a lot of disconnected pieces, like the jaw on like the T-rex, it’s very disconnected looking. The paintjobs weren’t very good, just really odd color choices. There was a lot of screw holes in the dinosaurs themselves, so that’s something you didn’t really see a lot of in the old toys because of I guess whatever material they were made out of. They were more like rubbery, but the new ones now are like a hard plastic and they have all these screw holes all over them, so it kind of takes away from your imagination I guess when you see these screw holes all over the place.
Garret: Yeah that’s not great.
Sabrina: Speaking of toys real quick, have you seen the Toy Story mini, it’s like about thirty minute long, what was that called again? Oh the Land That Time Forgot.
Brad: Exactly, I don’t know if I caught it recently. I saw it a little while back. Isn’t that like a Halloween special or something?
Garret: Yeah it was a couple of months ago.
Sabrina: It was, yeah some kind of holiday special because they’d just gotten a bunch of new toys for Christmas I think, and then…
Brad: Yeah that thing was a lot of fun. They were like some lizard creatures and stuff like that right? And they were just like trying to destroy the familiar Toy Story gang?
Garret: Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. We got some cool dinosaurs that are pretty realistic. Where did those come from?
Sabrina: Safari Limited.
Brad: Are they probably the Papo ones or…
Sabrina: No I think it was Safari Limited…
Garret: And there was a university, I wanna say Carnegie, yeah, they teamed up and then made these really accurate…
Sabrina: To scale.
Garret: … yeah, to scale dinosaurs. And it was like you were saying they were all rubber style, so they were molded and they were painted really well.
Sabrina: Yeah, they were actually the centerpieces for our wedding.
Brad: How awesome.
Garret: Yeah we assigned people by dinosaur table.
Brad: That’s really cool. Yeah you’ve gotta assume that everybody knows what dinosaur to go to right?
Sabrina: Well they didn’t so we also had to give numbers, but…
Garret: Yeah we backed it up with numbers afterwards. We weren’t gonna do dinosaurs, we were like they’re labeled, they can figure it out, and then we realized some people might not be able to figure it out.
Sabrina: Most people.
Brad: That’s awesome. Yeah I gotta check those toys out. One of the ones that people have really loved this past year are the Papo figures. I think they sell them at Toys R Us and everything, but they basically sort of like the representation from the Jurassic Park movies but they’re not affiliated in any way. They have different paint schemes but they are really, really high quality. So if you want to go pick up some sort of collector’s item or a toy just to play with, those things are really awesome and probably better than the Jurassic World series that came out.
Sabrina: Good to know.
Brad: I think one of the things that people also hated was the fact that there was no humans. There was just dinosaurs, so you know, everybody used to love playing with the human figures so it was kind of a shame to see them not, you know, put into this line.
Sabrina: Yeah that’s surprising considering how big; well I guess if they didn’t think it would be as big…
Brad: Yeah that was the problem overall I think, and it actually ties into the theme parks as well. I don’t know; have you ever gone to the Islands of Adventure in Orlando?
Sabrina: Oh I haven’t.
Garret: Sabrina hasn’t, I have.
Brad: That place is awesome. I actually just came back in December from there.
Sabrina: Oh I saw your pictures, yeah.
Brad: Yeah, it’s so cool. They have the entire Jurassic Park area, a few different rides and everything, but I think one of the entire mess-ups they had with Jurassic World was you know not projecting how big it was gonna be, even for their theme parks. They actually had a plot of land that could have fit another ride, but instead they added King Kong to that area just in 2015 I think they started building it. And it’s kind of a shame because with how well this movie did it would have been a perfect spot for a new ride to go, and I really think it messed up the idea of that park because it’s separated into different lands. And Jurassic Park is one of those lands, one of those islands. So all of a sudden you’re walking through Jurassic Park and there’s a King Kong ride, so it’s a very interesting take and I think the studio didn’t realize how big the movie would be.
You know, so unfortunately that happened, but it did kind of pick up the slack. There was a raptor encounter, I’m sure you guys have seen that thing floating around. They had that awesome encounter, so you go in, you stand in line to meet the raptor, and you can take some pictures with it and it’s really cool because there’s actually somebody within the costume. So they’re diving at you as you’re taking a picture with them, they’re kinda sniffing you, it’s pretty cool.
Sabrina: That’d be a fun job.
Brad: Oh it’s gotta be so much fun. And they have a park ranger who’s kinda modeled after like a mix between Doctor Alan Grant and Owen Grady from the movies. So it’s pretty cool to see that, and then they actually toured that thing around, I think it’s going to, it went to one of the conventions. San Diego ComicCon I believe it was; and you know that’s a huge experience for fans. And Jurassic Park kinda hasn’t been too well noticed there recently, but this year was awesome. They actually had that like raptor encounter there; they had the giant park gates, so really 2015 was the year for Jurassic World fans and Jurassic Park fans, so I think pretty much that sums up everything for Jurassic there. So that was an awesome time, and I can’t wait to see it continue this year.
Garret: That’s really cool.
Sabrina: Now I wanna go to Orlando.
Garret: Yeah we had one of those guys in a dinosaur suit at our wedding too actually.
Brad: Oh really?
Garret: Yeah it was supposed to be a juvenile T-rex I think. It was a little bit bigger than…
Sabrina: His name was Duncan, and they put a lot of time and effort into building this animatronic head for him.
Brad: Oh wow.
Sabrina: And it was really cool. It’s kind of funny because they’ve got this very realistic looking head, but then you also see the guy’s legs in like black leggings alongside the T-rex legs.
Garret: Yeah, and the little shoes that are like big T-rex feet.
Sabrina: And we loved it, all the adults loved it, but all the kids cried instantly when they saw…
Garret: They were really afraid. Yeah they told us, because it was at a zoo and they had this for other things that they did at the zoo, they said that originally kids were terrified so they changed its mouth to make it look more like it was smiling, and then it helped a little bit.
Brad: Yeah I could see that.
Garret: It was really cool, I was lucky, Sabrina went to go do her wardrobe change and they came and got me and they said oh you’re really into dinosaurs? I was like yeah. They’re like do you wanna try on one of these? And I was like yes. So I got to go get into a Parasaurolophus and move it around a little bit.
Sabrina: Yeah you said there were cameras.
Garret: Yeah there was like a little camera through its face. And then this one could sneeze, so there was like a little spray bottle you could like squirt out the front and little armatures where its body…
Sabrina: That thing’s pretty awesome. I gotta see this thing in action.
Brad: I think, you know, it’s been a year for that stuff as well. You know, it’s so cool to see, you know, different touring companies going around, like is it just Walking with Dinosaurs I think?
Sabrina: Yeah, that’s a great show.
Brad: It’s so awesome to see this stuff, you know, taking over and being really, really good and high quality. And actually they just announced one for Jurassic World happening I think this year sometime in Australia. So eventually it’ll tour around, but it’s kind of like a, I don’t know if it’s like Walking With Dinosaurs but there is some dinosaurs that move around and everything, and there is some sort of exhibit to go along with it. So that’s really cool to see this stuff being announced.
Sabrina: Definitely. Yeah I think that one opens up in March.
Brad: Yeah, I know it’s coming up soon so…
Brad: Aside from Jurassic Park there was another awesome movie, The Good Dinosaur, which I’m sure you guys definitely saw. I don’t think we got to talk about it too much, but I know I loved it. I thought it was a really, really fun movie.
Sabrina: Yeah, fun and really pretty.
Brad: Oh yeah.
Garret: I thought it was okay. I wasn’t as thrilled with it. It was good. I mean, but I think my expectations were really high since it was a Pixar movie and dinosaurs, and I think actually I liked Jurassic World a little bit more than I liked The Good Dinosaur, which was surprising to me because I figured Pixar is so… yeah.
Brad: They have so much going for them and I know there was a lot of issues going on for them behind the scenes with that movie, so that’s probably where the disconnect happened where it didn’t turn out the way they had hoped I guess.
Garret: Yeah, I think when we talked a little bit about it I had said I think it was maybe a little bit over-simplified, and then Sabrina had found out that originally their script was super complicated…
Sabrina: It was three storylines. And they couldn’t figure out a way to wrap it up all in the end, and then they changed directors and that’s when they scrapped it all.
Garret: Yeah and they changed all the actors too, and everything, and I think they just went for an over-simplified approach which is great for kids, I think for kids it’s an excellent movie. Kids that see that movie now will probably feel the same way that Sabrina and I feel about Land Before Time now.
Brad: Exactly, yeah.
Garret: But being an adult and seeing it, it wasn’t like a typical Pixar movie where there was lots of little hidden jokes and stuff like that for adults because there was so little dialogue.
Brad: Yeah, that’s one of the takeaways I found. It was more just geared towards kids, and I didn’t have a problem with that. I really enjoyed it, but it didn’t have that second story where you know as an adult you can kind of appreciate certain aspects. And definitely it was a little too goofy at times. I think like they had that Styracosaurus scene, and nothing really came of it. It was just like a two second scene. It was too goofy for me. And sort of the same goes with the, were they pteranodons or pterodactyls of some sort?
Garret: Yeah, something.
Brad: They were really goofy, at least one of them. They really reminded me of the hyenas from The Lion King.
Sabrina: Oh that’s a good point.
Garret: That’s true; they were a lot like that.
Brad: They were very similar, they had the one that was like crazy and the other two I guess were more sane, but that was the things that took me out of it for a minute because I didn’t really grab on to those characters.
Garret: Yeah, yeah that was, a lot of stuff like that.
Brad: Like you said though, the movie was beautiful, and it was actually… I’ve seen tons of awesome artwork floating around. I actually have two pieces on my wall here. There’s some really awesome toys that were out. There’s some really good ones within the Disney store itself. I think they have different ones in like say Target versus the Disney store, so…
Garret: They have some really cool Arlo’s, there’s like a pillow and then there’s like a regular, different sizes of the stuffed animal, and like plastic ones and everything.
Brad: Yeah I thought it was a really, really awesome effort, and even better than the Jurassic World toys. They were just really good quality, and I really enjoyed them. I would actually, every time I’d go to the store they would all be like sold out. There would be, that would be just a completely empty section. So it’s funny to see that The Good Dinosaur really didn’t do well financially.
Garret: Yeah, but that does make you wonder maybe what they didn’t get in movie sales maybe they can make up a little bit in merchandize.
Brad: Yeah that’s what I’m hoping because I don’t want this to be a complete failure, you know? That would be a shame. It’s already looked at as like the worst Pixar movie, and you know that’s a shame. I mean that’s kind of putting it down a bit too much. But like I said it was a good film, awesome toys, great artwork, and there really wasn’t too much representation within Disney, I was just there, and there wasn’t too much. There was some toys here and there but within the parks there wasn’t much to say really.
Sabrina: Interesting. I noticed on Disney’s blog they posted a few things of like hey, here are some dinosaur things we already have in our parks.
Brad: Oh yeah.
Garret: Yeah like we’re not gonna do anything for Good Dinosaur, but…
Sabrina: But we already had some stuff.
Garret: Check out this thing that’s seventy years old.
Brad: If you like dinosaurs, come check out all the old things we’ve had here for so long.
Garret: Yeah, exactly.
Brad: You know, some of this stuff has been around there forever. There’s a good representation of dinosaurs in those parks. Obviously the full ride for dinosaurs is great. They have that Ellen energy adventure thing that you go through the dinosaur scene. There’s a dinosaur on the lake there, Gerdie, in Hollywood Studios.
Sabrina: Is that where you can buy the ice cream?
Brad: Yeah, yeah. There’s a few other things I think I’m missing, but it is a really good place for dinosaurs. I’m really surprised about that, because nothing about Disney makes you think dinosaurs.
Garret: That’s true.
Brad: I was hoping that this movie would help turn that around, but it’s not looking too optimistic. You know what I’m really hoping is maybe DVD sales will kinda boost it.
Sabrina: Could be. We found out that’s not, The Good Dinosaur hasn’t been released in theaters in all countries yet. I guess Singapore and Hong Kong.
Garret: Yeah so we were over visiting some family overseas there in Southeast Asia basically, and one of our relatives said like oh are you guys gonna see The Good Dinosaur, he’s like ten, when it comes out. And we’re like yeah we saw it like a month ago.
Sabrina: And his jaw drops. What?
Brad: So you guys got special sneak peeks?
Garret: Because I think it doesn’t come out until like February over there, so… I don’t know if they’re gonna do anything; they probably don’t usually re-work it at all.
Brad: Yeah, no I can’t see that happening. They already put so much work into it, and I’m really surprised it even hit the screen knowing all the issues it had behind the scenes.
Garret: That’s true.
Sabrina: Yep, they made it work.
Garret: That reminds me though, we were talking a little bit about scientific accuracy of Jurassic Park on your podcast, and in The Good Dinosaur it was kind of funny because that was like the least scientifically accurate dinosaur portrayal I’ve seen maybe ever, do really if you compare The Good Dinosaur and Jurassic Park or Jurassic World that way, Jurassic World is doing a phenomenal job with accuracy.
Brad: Yeah, but you know I think in the same way that Jurassic World dispelled that they’re just theme park monsters, they’re not dinosaurs, I think The Good Dinosaur did the same thing in a way by, you know, you saw the meteor kinda like fly by Earth, so it didn’t actually happen, but then it was like I think it was an unspecified amount of time.
Garret: Yeah, I think it just said like millions of years without really…
Brad: Yeah there was no direct date, so it could be now, today, and dinosaurs obviously would evolve right? So I don’t know, maybe they’d become farmers. It’s possible right? I mean it doesn’t describe, you know, all the outrage that people had about the evolution of these dinosaurs, but I’m willing to look past any of those things because the movie was so beautiful. I kinda like the difference between the cartoony dinosaurs and the amazing backdrops.
Sabrina: Yeah they spent a lot of time on the background landscape, and they even built a whole database of clouds.
Brad: Yeah they did some really awesome work. It just looked amazing. Every mountain scene looked insane, the clouds looked amazing, and even more so the water looked incredible when they had that whole sequence in the water, and they really had to make it look awesome. And they really did an amazing job, so I think people should give this one a second chance really.
Garret: Yeah, I think as far as kids movies go it’s a lot better than most of the movies out there. And definitely as far as dinosaur kids movies goes it’s in the top five or so.
Sabrina: Yeah, I Think the main reason it probably got so much flack is because it was Pixar so people were…
Garret: … really high expectations are never good for you when you’re trying to make a movie. And I think Jurassic World surprised people with how good it was too, so seeing The Good Dinosaur shortly afterwards…
Brad: Yeah maybe people were just let down because it was Pixar, like you said, and because Jurassic World really did insane amounts of money, so really any amount it took in was gonna be a disappointment. And especially Inside Out came out this year, that’s been widely looked upon as one of their best movies, so…
Garret: I loved that one.
Brad: Yeah it was really emotional, really good. And The Good Dinosaur had some of those qualities, but not all of them, so… but I really wonder how we would think it would be if we had seen The Land Before Time and The Good Dinosaur at the same time?
Garret: Yeah, yeah it’s really hard to tell. It’s kinda like when you talk to kids about Star Wars movies, and they say their favorite movie is episode one because they love Jar Jar and all that stuff.
Garret: Yeah, and everybody else is like what are you talking about, that’s the most awful thing. It just depends on what age you are when you see it.
Brad: Yeah really I think you said it before; The Good Dinosaur could be The Land Before Time for kids today, so hopefully it is. I’m really excited for that prospect. And I think you guys mentioned it just recently, The Land Before Time and We’re Back: A Dinosaur Story released on Blu-ray. So that’s really cool, and sometimes movies take forever to get on Blu-ray, and these two are one of them. They took forever for some reason. Did you get a chance to pick any of them up?
Garret: We just got them two days ago actually. Somebody pointed it out to us that they were released and then we…
Sabrina: Immediately went to buy them.
Brad: Yeah I didn’t get a chance to pick them up yet, but from what I’ve heard, you know obviously it’s gonna be good looking. It’s gonna be a lot better quality. You know I think it helps people notice a little bit more flaws when it’s in high definition. You know something that wasn’t really meant for high definition in both of these movies. I’m really looking forward to them because I’m used to seeing you know on a tiny screen when I was younger, so I’d love to put that back in my DVD player.
Sabrina: Or VHS, and then watched it so many times that you lose a lot of the quality.
Garret: Yeah, I’m especially interested to see, you might see more of the like details of the actual drawings. That could be kind of cool actually in like an artistic way.
Brad: Yeah, well either way I think it’s great, you know, whether you see these flaws or not. It’s awesome to have these, you know, on a good quality DVD that you can throw in your player any time. So I’m really looking forward to getting them.
Garret: Yeah, they were pretty cheap, I was actually surprised. I think they were only like ten bucks apiece, weren’t they?
Sabrina: Yeah around that.
Brad: Yeah I guess they would be really cheap because you know kids don’t really know what they are to be honest.
Garret: Yeah, and Disney doesn’t own them so they don’t do that annoying thing where they’re like…
Sabrina: In the vault.
Garret: Yeah. It’s out for one year and then it goes away again.
Brad: Well maybe kids know about The Land Before Time because isn’t there like twenty of them or something?
Sabrina: Oh gosh yeah, but only the first one’s good.
Brad: Yeah I think there’s one coming out this year, isn’t there?
Sabrina: Oh really, they’re still going?
Brad: Yeah I’m pretty positive there’s one coming out this year.
Garret: I wonder if any of them are good. I think I’ve seen maybe, on and off with maybe the first six, and then…
Sabrina: I saw the first fourteen. That’s…
Brad: Oh wow.
Garret: Were two through fourteen all bad?
Sabrina: Yeah. Two was okay and then after that it was downhill. My mom knew I liked dinosaurs, and she knew I really liked The Land Before Time, so for every year at Christmas I got a new one in the sequence.
Garret: If they’re coming out like clockwork like that it’s probably not a good sign.
Brad: Yeah they’re just like throwing them out on DVD; I honestly didn’t know they went so high. I didn’t realize they were still making them until recently, so it’s, it’d be interesting to go back and watch them all.
Sabrina: That’s, yeah that’s a lot. The first one’s available on Netflix too for streaming.
Brad: Is it available? I thought I looked for it, I didn’t see it.
Sabrina: Oh maybe it got taken away.
Brad: I’m pretty sure; yeah it might have gotten taken off recently. I think a lot of stuff got taken down.
Garret: Yeah that happens.
Brad: Because I looked for it, and it wasn’t there.
Sabrina: Oh, that’s too bad.
Brad: Yeah I actually did look through Netflix, there’s not a ton of great content really. There’s a few documentaries, I think Dinosaur 13 is on there. So there’s stuff like that, but there’s really not too much in between. Some kiddie things here and there but…
Garret: Yeah, Netflix can be a little hit or miss sometimes.
Brad: Yeah there’s that stuff, and then there’s like the sci-fi movies like, you know, really, really low budget, really low quality, terrible something or other versus something else, so…
Garret: Yeah, we watched a weird one didn’t we where they landed on an island… that’s what it was. They were in either South America or Africa, and they were like going down a river and they were gonna document some old village, and then it turned out there were dinosaurs there attacking everybody.
Sabrina: It was like a weird low-budget Jurassic Park meets Blair Witch…
Garret: Well like the second Jurassic Park where they were going onto an island and like…
Brad: Oh yeah, yeah…
Garret: But it had the same feel as those like made for Sci Fi Channel movies, I don’t know if you ever watched those, like Sharknado kind of thing?
Brad: That’s, you know I’m willing to check out any of these movies because who knows? There might be some sort of laughable awesomeness to it that makes it kind of good, you know?
Sabrina: That’s true, we laughed a lot.
Garret: This movie was kinda like that, and they were putting, there was a guy and he had one dinosaur that liked him, and he strapped a camera to its head. So there was this like dinosaur POV thing and it was like running around and stuff.
Brad: Oh so that’s exactly like Jurassic World then, you know, they put the cams on the side of the raptor’s head so I could see it. They’re trying to tie in…
Garret: I think Jurassic World stole it.
Brad: It’s very possible. I didn’t get a chance to do it yet, but did you check out the Back to Dinosaur Island VR experience?
Garret: Oh, so I just ordered the Oculus Rift.
Brad: Oh, wow, awesome.
Garret: Because I couldn’t resist.
Brad: Yeah, oh yeah that stuff’s amazing. I only have the Google Cardboard, I don’t know if you’ve seen that. That thing’s really cool too even.
Garret: Can you see the, can you watch that video on Google Cardboard?
Brad: I believe you can, but I have an iPhone and I don’t think the iOS version of YouTube, because I think you can find that video on YouTube. But the iOS version doesn’t have the ability to do the split screen. So I guess if you have the Android version it actually has a button you can press to do the split screen, so I can’t do it so I didn’t even bother.
Garret: Yeah we just watched, we watched it on YouTube too and saw like the one perspective the whole time. It looked pretty cool. And there are a couple other games that are coming out with some of that VR support, which is why I wanted that Oculus so bad.
Brad: Yeah that, I can’t believe it; you know it’s like one hundred percent the future now. I think there’s CES going on now, and they’re presenting all these amazing technological advancements, and gaming is one of the biggest ones. And it’s really interesting to see where it’s going.
Garret: Yeah, that’s gonna be fun. And there’s a couple other dinosaur games, what was the one? Ark Survival Evolved I think it’s called? And it’s kind of like the one you’re talking about where they’re trying to capture dinosaurs a little bit, but this one’s more of like a massively multiplayer online thing, maybe not massively multiplayer, I think it’s like fifty people at a time. But you can go to your dinosaur, you can go find dinosaurs, and you can either hunt them or you can try to domesticate them. And certain ones you can ride around on and stuff. And that game supports VR, which was the real thing that sold me on it. I’m like I gotta play that game in VR.
Brad: That’s pretty awesome. So you’re gonna get it to work with the Oculus Rift, right?
Sabrina: And then just ride a dinosaur in our living room.
Garret: Yeah. All day. Sabrina will be like yank it off my head, like, ‘you haven’t eaten. You’ve only pretended to eat in the game. You don’t know what reality is anymore.’
Brad: You know, VR is hilarious to watch from the outside. If you’re not the one doing it, if you’re the one watching the other person, it’s pretty hilarious so I can imagine riding a dinosaur will be you know really comical. So definitely have like a video camera ready when he starts to…
Sabrina: That’s a good idea.
Garret: We’re gonna have to do that. I saw there was a great one of people on like a roller coaster and how they like panic, and I can’t imagine what it’s gonna be like, because in that game things like t-rex will come roaring out at you. I’m gonna be like walking through the woods, or like riding a little gallimimus or something, and then a t-rex is gonna come out and I’m gonna like fall down onto the couch and…
Brad: Yeah, I think it would honestly scare you. Like it would be pretty terrifying.
Garret: Oh yeah.
Brad: Did you guys hear about the, maybe not too similar, but computer game called Mesozoica?
Brad: Yeah I got to talk to somebody who made that game, and you know it’s still in process and I think there’s been a few issues behind the scene, but not too bad, but that game looks pretty cool as well. So that’s like more of a theme park simulator, so it’s got all kinds of containment, and you can basically pick what your dinosaurs look like in a way. You know, so if you want them to have feathers or you don’t, you know, it’s up to you.
Garret: That’s cool.
Sabrina: Hey, wasn’t that on Kickstarter?
Brad: I believe it was, yeah. I think they did a lot of work first before Kickstarter, and then they did a Kickstarter I think to kind of raise even more money to make it even more better. So it’s still in the process of coming out, and I think if you go to their Facebook you can look at their updates and everything as it goes along. So I’m really interested to see what happens with that.
Garret: Yeah, that one’ll be cool too. Lots of good dinosaur games coming out, and like we were talking about, it’s really nice to see these games where it’s not just shooting dinosaurs all the time and it’s a little more interactive. Maybe a theme park or you’re trying to domesticate them or even just capture them or whatever, but, rather than just shooting them or them trying to eat you.
Brad: Yeah, exactly, I like that aspect of it. Actually speaking of that Jurassic Park Arcade, now there is an aspect where you are shooting the dinosaurs, because there is a gun in front of you and you do have to fend them off, but they actually have like interesting guns. Like there’s like a freeze ray, there’s, I don’t even know, there’s all kinds of crazy projectiles. So it’s a really cool way to look at it I guess. So hopefully you don’t kill too many dinosaurs in the process of freezing them.
Garret: That’s funny.
Brad: But really, 2015 was awesome. It was a great year, 2016 has a lot to live up to.
Sabrina: Yeah. I mean I’m already expecting there to be a bunch of dinosaur discoveries, so…
Garret: Yeah. And I’m glad the Jurassic World series is ongoing too, because I think that helps to maintain the whole world’s interest in dinosaurs.
Brad: Yeah definitely. I mean we have to wait until 2018.
Sabrina: I know.
Brad: So it’s gonna be long and brutal.
Sabrina: I wish they did it like Star Wars where they had some spinoffs in between.
Brad: I know, that’s what I’m hoping we get some sort of announcement of like at least a comic book or, like, a Netflix show would be amazing. I don’t think it’s gonna happen, but something like that would be really cool. But 2018, that’s gonna be a long time, so I’m hoping we maybe get some sort of director announcement or maybe some sort of plot, some sort you know announced. That’d be great, but it’s gonna be a long lull of news and information. So, hopefully we get some good games, like you said all these games are gonna be coming out so that’ll keep us busy.
Garret: Yeah they could do a cool in-between game; sometimes they do that with movies, where they put a game that bridges the gap of what happened between the movies. That’d be a lot of fun.
Brad: That would be, I mean there was that concept art and a little bit of footage that popped up at some point last year, it was like a little bit of Chris Pratt running and some dinosaur artwork and stuff like that. It was supposed to get released, but never did. So maybe they can use those models for a game that’s set somewhere. Maybe before Jurassic World, after Jurassic World, hopefully something.
Garret: Or they could do, oh the Matrix that’s what I was thinking of, where they had the Animatrix too in between that was hugely popular. That’s like a, because it’s obviously difficult to do a big budget high CGI level thing all the time, if they could do like a hand drawn version.
Sabrina: Star Wars did like an animated series too.
Brad: Yeah, Star Wars is a good model. They have currently an animated series. They had the Clone Wars, and now they have Rebels. They have comics everywhere, all kinds of comics.
Garret: They’ve got like ten video games.
Brad: Books, oh yeah, they’ve got everything on all cylinders just going like one hundred miles an hour the whole time, everything is working right, and this same kinda goes for like Marvel. You know, they have, the comics don’t tie in with the movie series or anything, but there is the TV shows that they have some on Netflix, some on ABC. So I’m hoping Jurassic Park gets that same treatment, because let’s face it, it is, after Star Wars beat it, it is the number two movie from last year, and it’s, I think it was just past right around now for the number three spot all-time.
Garret: Wow. Do you know what the money is? Do you know around what the money is? I remember it being like 500 million from opening week or so.
Brad: Well for Jurassic World, what it’s at now?
Garret: Yeah, any idea?
Brad: It’s at like 1.6 billion dollars. It’s just sitting there, and it was at number three for a long time. It couldn’t come close to Titanic or Avatar. I think Titanic’s like two point one or something like that and Avatar is like two point seven or six.
Sabrina: Maybe they should get James Cameron to direct the next one.
Brad: They should yeah. He’s too busy, he’s like working on three Avatars as we speak, so yeah that’s gonna keep him busy.
Garret: That’s awesome though.
Brad: It’s totally awesome to have the number four movie that we can say now. So hopefully they pay attention to those figures and do the better thing next time around with better toys, better games, everything.
Garret: Yeah and maybe do some of that in-between stuff. That would be awesome.
Brad: Yeah, that would be really cool. Here’s hoping but I’m not sure. I don’t really bank on Universal too much, they don’t really do things like that too much, so…
Garret: Yeah, Disney is the all-time leader in multinational conglomerate marketing and…
Brad: Yeah, yeah exactly. It’s all them. If only it had come out with them originally but it’s a Universal project there so it’s all on them to do the theme park tie-ins and the comics and the everything else, the TV series, so hopefully we’ll get something.
Sabrina: Well, thanks so much for taking the time to be on our show today.
Brad: Yeah no problem, it was fun.
Sabrina: Yeah, always fun to do crossover episodes with you, so…
Brad: Oh definitely yeah. Actually that’s one of the best things I think of 2015 was meeting everybody, and like podcasts like yours and mine, and meeting everybody through Twitter and other areas, and in Instagram, Facebook, it’s really been cool meeting so many awesome people in 2015.
Garret: Oh absolutely, yeah.
Brad: So hopefully we’ll get to do this again.
Garret: Definitely. So if people wanna find you on the Interwebs, where should they go and where are you available?
Brad: Well, I do most of my work over on Twitter, so that’s @jurassicparkpod. You can email us [email protected], and we tend to read everybody’s emails on the show so if you have any questions or anything about the movies or anything else revolving Jurassic Park or Jurassic World, send them over. And I mean really that’s it. You can find us on iTunes, we’re on Stitcher, Pod-O-Matic, YouTube, so you can find us everywhere really. But Twitter’s our main hub, so definitely go check us out over there.
Sabrina: Great, and we definitely recommend that you do.
Garret: Yeah, it’s a great podcast, with…
Brad: Thanks guys…
Garret: … higher production values than we have. I wanna try and get some of the, you know, cool sound effects and everything like you do on yours in ours, but I’m still learning.
Sabrina: 2016 goals.
Brad: Yeah, it makes the show much more fun, so all the listeners love that aspect of it, so…
Garret: Yeah we gotta step up our game, try to get to your level.
Brad: Thanks guys.
Sabrina: Yeah, thanks.