A one-shot 2011 BBC TV Documentary about the history of Dinosaur Media. Discusses several stock tropes present in dino-movies, and reflects on their cultural importance in a lighthearted, tongue-in-cheek way.
Thoroughly talks about:
- Gertie the Dinosaur
- The Lost World
- King Kong (1933) and its remake
- Godzilla movies
- Gorgo
- One Million Years B.C.
- The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms
- The Valley of Gwangi
- Jurassic Park and sequels
… and also features a stock of other, often pretty obscure productions.
Appearing tropes:
- Computer-Generated Images: The latest method of bringing dinosaurs and other monsters to life. The program also has a brief Take That! moment at it, or more specifically at the '05 King Kong Remake, saying that the movie suffered from an overdose of over-the-top CGI scenes.
- Cultural Translation: Gojira's brash, American recut. Also the later 1998 remake.
- Family-Unfriendly Death: The T. rex's defeat at the hands of King Kong. Some of the Talking Heads found it too disturbing.
- People in Rubber Suits: Godzilla, Gorgo, and tons of other, forgettable monsters the Narrator just calls "Crapasauruses".
- Prehistoria: The "inventive" new setting that dethroned the Lost World, but brought about a gigantic Anachronism Stew. Again, the cave-women made audiences gloss over this.
- Prehistoric Monster: What Gertie, Gorgo and Ray Harryhausen's creatures were definitely not.
- Raptor Attack: The program goes on to point out that real-life raptors looked nothing like their Jurassic Park cousins, but even so, faux-raptors are still cool and scary.
