Jurassic Park 2009: Dino Trackers: Dino Diver VS Spinosaurus

Year of release: 2009

Accessories:

-Hydraulic Impulse Dino-“Tranquilizer” Speargun

Description: the Diver wears an all black suit (including black flippers), covered in light blue stripes and (mostly triangular) shapes, with an orange vest over it, as well as several black belts and orange highlights. On his right leg he has a knife holder with a knife in it (non removable), not coloured differently so a bit hard to notice. His face is partially covered with breathing equipment (with orange filters), though he’s got nothing covering his eyes (brown eyes and eye brows). He’s got a black air tank on his back. He shows signs of a dinosaur attack on his left leg and right arm, revealing bare skin. His weapon appears to be some sort of missile launcher (though its title, as stated above based on the information on the figure's packaging, is a bit longer than that). It’s coloured in a slightly metallic dark blue paint job, with a dark pink missile sticking out of it on both ends. Pushing the end of the missile sort of launches it, though it doesn’t work very well.

The Spinosaurus is positioned in a crouching move, its right arm resting on the ground, possibly stalking potential prey. Its left arm is raised upwards and its mouth is opened wide. Except for its top body parts (top of the head, neck, uppermost part of the back, sail and top of the tail), which are coloured purple, the figure's body is all pink. However, a lighter shade of purple is mixed in with the pink on the side of the neck and tail, the flanks and the arms, making those body parts look darker then they are. A row of small dark purple spots runs on either side of the creature's body from the neck over the flanks to about half way the tail. The Spinosaurus has white teeth and a red tongue and inside of the mouth, small yellow eyes with black pupils and a black JP logo on both upper legs. Its claws are not painted.

Analysis: JP 2009, like the JP III and JPD2 lines, features some aquatic action with this Diver figure and its buddy of old, the not-so-often-used-as-some-other-sculpts crouching Spinosaurus. The Diver himself differs little from its last incarnation, except for the blue stripes and less detailed paint job. Also, the American flag which graced his left arm the previous times is now absent, leaving his affiliations unknown: maybe he's gone AWOL, or he's turned mercenary. His trusty weapon, a sort of missile launcher, unfortunately is still by his side and continues to leave much to be desired, being neither very effective nor good looking or easy for this figure to handle. The rocket this time is purple, which also makes it look a bit goofy.

His Spinosaurus companion got it worse though, and features a completely wacky pink paint job, like some sort of bizarre prehistoric variation on the 'My Little Pony' theme. Whatever the designer who painted this fellow was smoking, stay away from it for your own good. Pink and purple just aren't good choices for big carnivore figures, or even their miniature counterparts, as this figure proves by looking just totally stupid. Also, the lack of detailing, particularly the unpainted claws, is a bit of a bummer. It would come as no surprise if it turned out this Spinosaurus is crouching down because it offers itself up for a mercy shot from the Diver's gun to put it out of its overly festive misery. If only Hasbro had done the same beforehand to the toy designer who came up with these idiotically brightly coloured dinosaur paint jobs for the JP 2009 toy line...

Repaint: yes. This set is identical to the Military Diver set of the JP III line (Wave 2). The Diver has been repainted once for JPD2 (along with his missile launcher), while the Spinosaurus has already been repainted several times for Camo-Xtreme, and JPD2 and would be used twice for this toy line. The missile launcher was also used for the Deluxe Electronic T-Rex set of this toy line.

Overall rating: 4/10. The Diver is okay, but not very different from its predecessors and sadly less detailed. His weapon is still lame. The Spinosaurus is a fairly decent sculpt but features an absolutely awful silly paint job. This set is not rare and can still be found with little effort. Since this set was a Toys'R'Us exclusive that could change over time, but probably not for the next decade or so.