I’ve recently watched the second It Ends on Oak Street trailer and noticed that, like many other films regarding dinosaurs, has some glaring flaws. For one, even though feathers are all the rage nowadays, dinosaurs still roar (even though we now think many large carnivores, like Tyrannosaurus Rex, used low pitch “booms” to better patrol territory), and still have overbites (an idea that is largely rejected due to analysis of the wear of dinosaur teeth, which matches better with an animal with protective lips than a crocodile with worn down enamel).
Many of those above problems can likely draw from a single source: the Jurassic Park franchise. Despite bringing paleontology, genetic engineering, and other science to the forefront of cinema, it seems to distort public opinion of dinosaurs.
However, the Jurassic films continue to mostly utilize their iconic movie versions of the dinosaurs rather than their accepted modern counterparts. I actually watched an interesting video regarding the depiction of Giganotosaurus in Jurassic World Dominion (who took inspiration from the Concavator, the Giga’s distant cousin, for the back ridge): it may be inaccurate, but it’s what got many people into the discipline of paleontology and other science in general in the first place.
Should we tolerate these depictions of dinosaurs (and by tolerate I mean accept that Hollywood seems like it won’t ever change its view of dinosaurs)? How long until we get a truly accurate dinosaur depiction in film? Are our current depictions good enough for current?
(Bonus insight: I did notice that there is a glaring difference in the mention of God between the two dinosaur films I mention above. Jurassic Park’s lovable mathematician Ian Malcolm famously quotes “God creates dinosaurs. God destroys dinosaurs. God creates man. Man destroys God. Man creates dinosaurs.” Meanwhile, this trailer for It Ends on Oak Street poked fun at the dilemma of suffering, with one character starting “God won’t let us die,” and another responding “what about the people outside?” It’s just interesting to see how, over the course of thirty years, the depiction of God in cinema has greatly changed).
Joking aside (I hope I didn’t come off as mean), we have come a long way from those older views of dinosaurs. I, too, thought that dinosaur were big ol lizards. But, that appears to be no longer the case. Actually, if you up look up any image of a chicken (or birds in general), you should hopefully see the resemblance between their free toed feet and that of theropods. Feathers, lips, and even no roaring are recent paleontology developments in this field.
Generally, what I was hoping was that these kinds of discoveries would be seen more often in media. Unfortunately, even the dinosaur documentaries still have dinosaurs roaring!
For me, Jurassic Park is PEAK. Real Paleontology is boring and largely made-up nowadays. Everyone tries to make a name for themselves by “splitting” the same species at different growth stages so they can name something and advance their careers. People accept as fact totally fabricated ideas because they seem cool. Take Therizinosaurus, all we have are it’s hands… Yet everyone depicts it as a long-necked biped covered in feathers and a beak. That is completely made-up. And don’t even get me started on Spinosaurus…
We may only have the forelimbs[1] of Therizinosaurus, but if the forelimbs are sufficiently similar to the forelimbs of eg Suzhousaurus, it’s reasonable to think the rest of Therizinosaurus will be similar too. If palaeontologists proposed that Therizinosaurus had features that weren’t found in specimens that matched the parts we have available, then that would be made up.
If you found a skull that looked like a skull known to be from an elephant, would you object to someone suggesting that the new skull was also from an elephant?
Wikipedia hints there are some hind limb bones too. ↩︎
Assuming is the problem I have when it comes to Paleontology. I see too much bias and splitting and purely made-up ideas. There’s skin fragments/impressions of Tyrannosaurus rex. No feathers. Yet there are so many who WANT feathers on T. rex to the point that they add them anyway, assuming they must be present elsewhere. The evidence we have is ignored, they need to make up what they want to see. They justify this by saying Yutyrannus had them… So? T. rex, according to the evidence, did not.
Who exactly is adding feathers to T Rex because they want them to be feathered?
It’s not these palaeontologists - they’re going with the evidence. Nor can I find any other palaeontologists who are adding feathers - they all seem to be asking the question and concluding that T. rex’s lineage either didn’t have feathers or lost (almost all of) them or only had feathers when young. I can’t find a single scientific source that says T rex had feathers. They only say that other tyrannosaurids had them.
Man, that’s too bad. I know that the Jurassic films had resident paleontologists to help with some things, and we can see in the progression of the first few films new ideas in paleontology (I.e. raptors with feathers and T-Rex scavenging in JP 3).
And why, WHY, did they leave the scene in Project Hail Mary where Grace placed two tubes on the same side of the centrifuge rotor!!???
Aside, I know of one biochem lab that received one of the microscopes used as a prop in Jurassic Park. Barely used but they got it cheap… so sometimes those movies help science.
If you are discerning, you may find documentaries on dinosaurs that have had expert guidance. For example, Prehistoric Planet - Wikipedia is a series that had eminent paleontoligists, such as Steve Brusatte, as consultants.
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