To many, Walking with Dinosaurs is widely regarded as the gold standard for documentaries about prehistoric life. Unfortunately, most of the information in it has become outdated due to new discoveries.
Luckily, talented artists have taken this as a challenge to begin making remakes of the series. Already, at least five different remakes have popped up on deviantart. While the episodes are little more than pictures of the cast in the case of most of them (as most of the artists have not gotten around to actually writing episode scripts), those pictures are more often than not SPECTACULAR. Think of these as a form of documentary "fan fiction", and you're pretty close to the mark.
Here are links to rickraptor105's series
, snugglesthedinosaur's series, randomdinos' series, PCAwesomeness' series,WDGHK's series and Jurassczilla's series.
These artworks provide examples of
- Amazing Technicolor Wildlife: VERY MUCH THE CASE for dinosaurs. Downplayed for mammals, but most have spectacular color patterns to compensate.
- Book Ends: Episode 1 of WDGHK's version of WWD ends with a pair of Herrerasaurus harassing a herd of Riojasaurus, to show the age of the dinosaurs has dawned. The final episode ends with a pair of Ankalogon hunting a herd of Barylamba, signalling the beginning of the mammals' reign.
- Fix Fic: Downplayed: most of the series, when they reach the WWB portion, feature episodes that take place in the Miocene, which was not given any focus in the original series. Played straight with most remakes of WWM, which was by far the most error-prone of the original trilogy.
- Internal Homage: Episode four of rickraptor105's WWB remake, Global Domination, has been noted to be one to the episode Giant of the Skies from the original WWD: both follow the journey of a giant flyer (Tropeognathus/Osteodontornis), while taking time to focus on animals native to the lands it visits.
- Raptor Attack: Averted with the raptors who show up, who are always accurately feathered.
- Sequel Hook: WDGHK's ends by jumping ahead four million years after the extinction of the dinosaurs, where life has finally bounced back following the extinction. It depicts a pair of mesonychids known as Ankalagon harassing a herd of pantodonts called Barylambda, mirroring the opening of the series where an Eoraptor menaces a herd of Ischigualastia. A Thoracosaurus can be seen in the nearby lake, with the intention of the scene being to show how the story of life is about to begin anew.
- Shown Their Work:
- All dinosaurs that should have feathers are depicted with them.
- Whenever it appears, Spinosaurus is drawn with the correct leg design.
- All theropods have inward-facing hands.
- All episodes are written in chronological order.
- At the end of WDGHK's series, as opposed to featuring a world where birds rule over mammals, the ending shows how mammals have already taken the dinosaur's place as ruler by depicting two Ankalagon, early predatory mammals the size of lions, menacing a herd of Barlyambda, polar-bear-sized browsers that fulfill the same role as hadrosaurs.
- Works that feature Gastornis portray it as not a carnivore feasting on small horse-like mammals but a herbivore, with the role of top predator instead given to terrestrial crocodilians.
- When it is featured, Ambulocetus is portrayed as fully aquatic instead of semi-aquatic.
- Strictly Formula: Averted/Downplayed: While some authors will only focus on six different environments, as was the case in the original, others will focus on a much wider range of environments.
- Usually, though, the artists will have a maximum of 10 animals per episode, to that they can give avoid making too many background animals.
- Also, the Kem Kem Beds have been featured in almost all of the series made so far, with the only ones that don't feature it being ones that only have episodes that focus on time period prior to when the Kem Kem Beds were layed down. Justified, as the formation has a very unique ecosystem.
