Jurassic Park Series 2: Quetzalcoatlus

Year of release: 1993-1994

Accessories:

-Three pieces of capture gear

-Collector’s Card # 32

Description: this big Pterosaur figure features a long, skinny body ending in a small tail. Right under the tail it has a pair of thin, long legs, each with three claws. Two of these claws are poseable, with the third one positioned opposite the others, so the creature can grab things like human figures or small dinosaurs with these claws. On its left upper leg this critter is marked with a large white JP logo, numbered .18. The whole body, including its legs, arms and neck, is coloured grey, light grey on its underside (belly, throat and lower part of the tail) and dark grey on the rest of the body, almost black on its back. The claws on its feet are not painted differently.

The front part of the body ends in a thin neck with a big head on top of it. This head sports huge beak, not in a spiky shape as with the various Pteranodon figures, but of a much more elaborate and detailed, somewhat boxy, design. The head ends in a small pointy crest, but the most noticeable feature is the fiery crest on top of the skull, above the little black eyes. Most of the head is coloured bright red, except for a small area under both eyes and the very lowest part of the beak, while the crest on its head is mostly yellow with some red at the bottom, reinforcing the 'fire' feel of this figure (hence its nickname, Firebeak). The inside of the mouth is not painted.

Most noticeable are the wings of the Quetzalcoatlus. On each side of its body, a black clamp is positioned, to which a thick arm is attached, ending in four fingers, the last of which is very long and runs to the tip of the wing, where a small rectangular pin is found. The pins can be pushed into the small holes next to the creature’s legs, creating a wings-folded-in system. The wings can fold out with force by pressing the large button on the back, which also controls a flapping wings mechanism. The rest of the wings consists of a fine cloth, coloured similarly dark grey as most of the figure (though a variation with dark beige, almost light brown, cloth also exists), with a plastic strip in the middle of the wing holding it together, though giving the wings a bat like motif.

This figure comes with three pieces of capture gear. There's the typical small cuff, which comes with every JPS2 dinosaur in one shape or another. Also included is a big head piece, which fits around the beak and partially over the head so the Quetz can't open its mouth. Lastly, there is a small leg piece that restrains both legs.

Analysis: the JPS1 Pteranodon was a rather disappointing Pterosaur sculpt, but Kenner showed it was capable of doing better by giving us this vastly superior Quetzalcoatlus figure. It has a much different feel and looks fabulous, especially the head sculpt with its bright fiery paint job. The rest of the figure features a somewhat monotonous paint job though (too much grey, some additional colour schemes would have helped), but it's still a wonderful sculpt with plenty of action features, some good, some only decent.

Like the JPS1 Pteranodon, and in fact almost every Pterosaur sculpt, this Quetz has a large beak that can be opened for grabbing prey. The beak is big enough to catch most human figures, and thanks to its mouth's serrated inside (but no teeth) figures won't slip out so easily. As if the beak isn't enough, this figure also comes with large claws on its feet for grabbing additional victims. These can really hold a figure tight and they’re strong enough, so when “in flight” the catch doesn’t shake loose and fall to the ground (though its legs are less stable and usually bend down when the Quetz is lifted up, but this doesn't hinder the claws' effectiveness).

Then there are the wings. Though their design is original, they're less of a success then the rest of this sculpt. They're unfortunately rather small (also because the torso is just too long), and though the cloth is a nice touch, it’s more susceptible to damage and dust, so rough play is not recommended. Also, the arms are way too thick compared to the rest of the body, and thanks to the extra strip of plastic in the middle of the wings this figure has a sort of bat like quality to it, unlike real Pterosaurs had. The clamps next to the body make the wings look too artificial. So far the look of the wings, but now for their use. The flapping wing mechanism works much better than the one the JPS1 Pteranodon featured, though a smoother button would have been preferable, because now it hurts the fingers when the button is pressed too long. The unfolding system is a bit odd; though in real life Pterosaurs could fold their wings in some fashion too (in order to walk using their hands), it would probably not be very healthy for a Quetzalcoatlus to fold its wings in this position. But the unfolding looks cool, and it certainly saves space when the creature’s wings are folded in. Overall, credit has to be given to the Kenner designers for the originality of these wings, but as for their use they could have done a better job.

That leaves the capture gear, three pieces in total. The cuff like tag that comes with this figure like it comes with all JPS2 creatures is a redundancy, since the figure itself already is tagged with its JP logo. This tag is only a nuisance, since it's so small it gets easily lost and as such makes complete Quetz figures harder to find. The other capture gear is more useful. The leg piece restrains both legs, but not the claws. The head piece works well and totally subdues the figure's head, with no way of getting rid of it (in fact, it's really a tight fit and not always easy to remove). There's no capture gear included to restrain the wings however, so basically the Quetzalcoatlus can just fly away. Maybe the wings-folded-in system was designed to take care of that, but since the Quetz can just fold them out, that doesn't seem to be the case.

Playability: this figure provides for more playability options than most other Pterosaur figures. It has poseable claws and legs, its mouth can be opened, its neck twisted 360 degrees (though there's no real reason to do that other than sadism). The flapping mechanism works fine, and the folding of the wings is an interesting additional option, though of limited use. Added to this are the three pieces of capture gear, one of which serves no real purpose, while the other two do an effective job restraining specific areas of the body, but overall won't stop the creature from escaping.

Realism: Quetzalcoatlus was not a creature seen in the first JP movie, or its sequels, so the Kenner designers got to be imaginative on this one. They were bound to get a few things wrong as such, but nothing major. The shape of the beak is inaccurate, since Quetz had a more typical elongated 'spiky' beak, like the various JP Pteranodon figures. The shape and size of the crest on this figure are not far off, though the crest on the end of the head is also wrong. The length of the torso and the shape of the wings are off, while its neck is too short, but the overall size of this figure compared to human figures is reasonably accurate.

Repaint: no, this sculpt is new. It would be partially repainted for the TLWS1 toy line, as the Giant Pteranodon figure (body, legs and wings, but not the head). The Quetz's head sculpt and capture gear would not be repainted.

Overall rating: 8/10. An excellent new Pterosaur figure, with a cool head sculpt and a lot of playability, though it has some minor downsides. This figure is well worth getting, but it's quite rare and usually fetches high prices, especially for MIB and complete samples, so be warned.