Jurassic Park Series 1: Stegosaurus

Year of release: 1993

Accessories:

-Removable Dino Damage wound patch

-Collector’s Card #3 (alternate card (#62) for 1994 re-release)

Description: this large four legged herbivorous dinosaur figure measures just over 20 centimetres in length. It stands in a largely neutral pose, except for its right hind leg which is moved slightly forward and its head which is posed to the left as if the creature is looking at something in that direction. Stegosaurus has no poseable body parts. The figure sports a large dino damage wound with removable skin patch on its left flank, revealing muscle tissue and bones underneath. Part of the skin on the patch sticks out so it’s easy to remove. Like the other large dinosaur figures of this toy line this sculpt features “realistic” dinosaur skin, meaning its body is composed of soft flexible material instead of hard plastic like the smaller figures. This goes for all of the body, save the legs. The plates and spikes on its back and tail are also made of this material, though in reality they were made of bone tissue. This Stegosaurus carries a total of ten plates (all more or less triangular with small grooves and specks on the sides) on its back, from the neck to the end of the tail, where the line of plates ends with two smooth spikes. The first three plates (which are located on the neck) are attached to each other because of the way the Stego’s head is posed.

Stegosaurus sports as green a paint job as seems possible. The lower parts of the animal (legs, belly, underside of the tail, sides of the neck, throat and head) are painted light green, as opposed to the plates, spikes and most of the back which are coloured darker green. On the flanks the two shades of green meet and form an aesthetically pleasing combination of light green lines and dark green spots in a random pattern. The back of the beast’s head features some small dark green lines but the rest of the head is all light green. Stego has tiny bright green eyes with black pupils and white teeth, while the inside of its mouth is pink. Its small claws on the feet aren’t painted in a different colour. On the left lower hind leg a large dark green JP logo is found along with the number .07.

Analysis: though this Stegosaurus features a classic and beautiful green paint job (albeit a bit monotonous), the figure as a whole is quite disappointing. It has no poseability and no real action feature to speak of, except for the dino damage wound. This wound is much larger than the one the Young T-Rex features and also looks less artificial and more random, as if a large carnivore dared attack this spiked creature and bit a huge chunk of flesh out of its flank. The wound looks convincing enough, but the small bit of flesh sticking out of the patch to make it easily removable looks a bit odd, like the creature has an old flesh wound there.

Though the box mentions a ‘whip action spike tail’ this is a great exaggeration. The soft material the figure’s skin is made of allows the tail to be flexible, but no more so than the tail of the Young Tyrannosaurus Rex or Triceratops figures. Does this mean these creatures also have whipping tails? No. It just shows the designers didn’t bother to add a real whipping tail action feature to this sculpt, like they did later on with the TLWS1 Stego (a sculpt which corrects all of this figure’s errors by the way). Of course the flexible tail can be used to knock figures over, but it just feels and looks cheap.

Playability: almost nonexistent. This figure features no moveable body parts at all. The only real action is provided by the dino damage wound patch, which fortunately is easily removable and also not hard to restore. The whipping tail action feature the box shows is quite a scam. Interestingly enough, Stego’s neck can be twisted around, allowing for some very minor poseability, but when released it immediately flips back. The flexible dinosaur skin does make this figure sensitive to easy paint wear, especially when the tail is used in rough attack actions. It would be a shame to ruin this creature’s paint job, especially since it’s one of its few successful features.

Realism: as if the lame action feature and lack of playability aren’t disappointing enough, the creature’s design is all wrong too. Stegosaurus wasn’t featured in the first JP movie, so the designers had to start from scratch. It’s obvious they didn’t really do research to see whether their sculpt was accurate, because it turned out to be one of the least paleontologically correct dinosaur figures of all the JP toy lines. Most obviously, the shape of the plates is totally wrong. Also, Stego here has only two spikes on the end of the tail, which is even more stupid when you take a look at the collector’s card this figure comes with: the back of the card clearly states this dinosaur had four spikes, like the creature on the picture (which however has too much plates on its back). Another big mistake of this figure is the fact that the front legs are on the same height as the hind legs (which also causes the neck and head to be posed too high in the air), while in reality they were much shorter. Compared to human figures this Stegosaurus is also undersized, though compared to the other mistakes this seems hardly worth mentioning.

Repaint: as part of the first JP toy line this figure is naturally not a repaint. It would not be repainted for later toy lines either, which in understandable, since the far superior TLWS1 Stegosaurus took over the role of large spiky dinosaur figure.

Overall rating: 4/10. A good wound and a fine paint job don’t make up for a lame action feature and an almost total lack of playability. Stegosaurus is one of Kenner’s least appealing figures and as such hardly worth the effort to track down and purchase. It’s quite common, even MIB it’s not difficult to find, and fortunately it shouldn’t cost you too much should you really want one.