YMMV / Prehistoric Earth

• Creator's Pet: With Luczynski's admittance to her and Drew being amongst his favorite characters, plus Nathanoraptor's own thoughts about her, Cynthia initially came across as this. The fact that Luczynski reportedly tried immensely hard to push her into being a secondary main character alongside Drew at the potential expense of Jack and Leon certainly didn't help her case. However, thanks to several subsequent developments she's undergone, her and Drew becoming an official couple, not to mention the heavily hinted possibility that she might be a mole working for the villains, and later confirmation as a mole...working for the heroes, she has successfully shaken off this initial impression. And even that wasn't enough to save her from still ranking fairly low in popularity amongst the readers or initially spending a couple years facing the possibility of getting Adapted Out of the subsequent reboot Prehistoric Park Reimagined.
• Don't Shoot the Message: While there are a few points that Luczynski brings up in his retrospective posts that several readers (including Nathanoraptor and A-LionGleek) admittedly consider valid points (to the point that the two aforementioned writers hope to try to avoid repeat instances of some of them in Prehistoric Park Reimagined), the somewhat unnecessarily harsh and borderline childish way in which he voices his grievances (among other things) has rubbed many people the wrong way and made it very difficult to immediately accept as much at face value.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Nathanoraptor has admitted that he himself ended up liking Leon and Yolanda much more than he initially expected over the course of writing their dialogue in "The First Steps." And judging by how Leon and Yolanda both ended up getting enough votes in the popularity poll to end up amongst the top 5 (with Leon in particular actually ending up #1 on that list!), it would appear that the readers share his opinion. Jack also qualifies thanks to his mixture of genuine comedy value and Hidden Depths making him quite endearing to the readers. In fact, he and Leon (plus Nikolai, Yolanda, and Alice) managed to rank amongst the top 5 most popular characters amongst the readership and thoroughly eclipse the popularity of Drew^note something that Luczynski unfortunately did not appreciate.
• Franchise Original Sin:
  • While Cynthia's introduction is largely considered the point where the story's quality started taking a nosedive, this isn't the first time Luczynski had struggled with writing female characters in this story. Some criticisms from previous chapters include Alice's first appearance being inconsistent with later portrayals, Linda having almost no importance during Devils of the Deep, and Colette deviating from her original characterization by Nathanoraptor. Some of these issues were previously excusable, as they happened early on and Luczynski was working with other authors' characters. But once Cynthia, created by Luczynski, entered the scene, all of the aforementioned issues compounded to the point that she came across as an insufferable and unlikeable character.
  • On a similar note, as much as fans (and Nathanoraptor himself) came to dislike Cynthia for how much Luczynski seemed to almost constantly try to shill and lionize her in the narrative at the expense of other characters, he'd already shown signs of similar favoritism beforehand in how he wrote Drew. To name a few examples, not only did Drew at one point be written in Life in Transition to have a trait similar to one of Luczynski's own somewhat solitary and content with being alone Real Life personality aspects that didn't match up with the outgoing and sociable characterization that Nathanoraptor had wanted Drew to have, but the character also ended up being written to provide assistance to Linda in Devils of the Deep for a problem that, as head vet, she should have been smart enough to figure out on her own as well as take part in behavioral observations for the mesothelae over the course of Alien Empire despite how his short attention span and low patience logically should have made him a very poor fit for such an activity that would have arguably made more sense to be done by resident rescue team animal expert Leon or chief researcher Khatin. Much like with the mishandling of female characters described above, this seemed forgivable enough at the time due to it still being fairly early on in the story and both Nathanoraptor and Luczynski having a few growing pains to undergo in regards to properly handling the planned large ensemble cast. However, as Luczynski continued to try to put increasingly high focus on both Drew and Cynthia and attempt to both downplay all the other members of the rescue team as well as prevent later planned crucial characters Will and Matt from ever existing in the story at all, his apparent favoritism for Drew and Cynthia and seeming refusal to view any of the other characters apart from them as anything other than 'just side characters' only became harder to miss and attracted heightened criticism.
• Fridge Horror: Several juvenile and baby triceratops are amongst the live animals in the smuggling operation's stash, and horns from adult triceratops are amongst the animal parts collected. With that in mind, it's not hard to surmise what happened to the babies' original herds...
• Growing the Beard: While the story was fairly enjoyable during the earlier episodes, readers (and even Nathanoraptor himself) felt a sense of it not quite being able to fully reach its true potential due to a number of factors, be they related to the contents of the story itself or Creative Differences behind the scenes. However, things started improving during phases 2 and 3. The behind-the-scenes conflict started to cool down after an improved system for planning and writing the episodes was established. The story finally started to become more focused and start delivering on things hinted at earlier. All the characters were given a chance to get their time in the spotlight and prove themselves capable of carrying the story. Even Cynthia herself was Rescued from the Scrappy Heap thanks to finally being allowed the chance to develop naturally and show some of her more likable character traits. And of course, there's also the fact that Nathanoraptor took over as main writer while Luczynski handled the editing.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • Technically more of a case of 'awkward in hindsight', but the scenes in which Alice and Adrian interact in a quasi-romantic fashion together in some of the Phase 1 missions have since become a bit out of place after the originally intended arc between them got scrapped in favor of Alice's Will They or Won't They? arc with Will.
  • In the wake of the #BlackLivesMatter movement and all the related events that have since unfolded, Nathanoraptor has since come to regret including Kyle's 'black rage doesn't even begin to describe how I'm feeling at the moment' line. Not even his having the line be spoken in a sarcastic fashion in the finished product as opposed to being shouted as originally planned was enough to prevent Nathanoraptor from regretting this line's inclusion in the wake of this movement.
  • In a scene where Cynthia dismisses Leon as a lost cause immediately before his planned showcasing of his progress in training the allosaurus squad, Luczynski made Nathanoraptor tone down Jack's rebuttal due to supposedly finding the originally planned rebuttal to be an uncharacteristically mean thing for Jack to say. In light of how Luczynski himself reportedly had a very real tendency to tamper with characters' personalities to suit his desires, his reasoning behind his desire for Nathanoraptor to tone down Jack's rebuttal sounds more than a little hollow and hypocritical.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Scarlett Johansson portraying Linda Eberhart (at least that's how Nathanoraptor believes it could work). This certainly wouldn't be the first time she's played a somewhat kindly character who works at a zoo.
  • Turns out, Black Widow, Heimdall, and Spiderman have ended up working together at the exact same establishment; which is owned by the fake Mandarin, to boot!
  • To continue the MCU related hilarity, ABOMBINATION is the head of security!
  • And on yet more Marvel-related (though not necessarily MCU) hilarity, Will Simpson is the head of the park's research department and Cannonball is the leader of the rescue team!
  • And for that matter, we also have Kaa and Shere Khan working on the same team once more.
  • Nathanoraptor initially planned for the scenes immediately following Sharptooth's tranquilizing and defeat in Nightmare Labyrinthine to unfold in a style very similar to the 'monsters bowing to Godzilla after Ghidorah's defeat' scene from Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)...at least one or two months before said film was even released and confirmed to feature such a scene!
  • While admittedly somewhat saddening at the same time, the fact that Cynthia chose to leave Prehistoric Earth at the end without any guarantee that she'd return also became this with the initially heavily delayed (and for a time seemingly nonexistent) confirmation as to whether or not she'd successfully make the jump to Prehistoric Park Reimagined alongside Drew and the rest of the 'main cast' Prehistoric Earth staff members.
• Jerkass Woobie: Leon and Jack somewhat qualify depending on point of view. Jack qualifies in that he's a confirmed Stepford Smiler and secretly feels very lonely and friendless. Leon also qualifies in that he was bullied in school before ever making any friends, and can somewhat hold sympathetic value in autistic readers who may or may not know how he feels and understand him. While they both are very jerkassy to each other in Life in Transition, it is not hard to feel sorry for either of them or side with one or the other.
• Misblamed: In the three-month hiatus between "Alien Empire and "The New Rulers", several readers asked Nathanoraptor about why there was so much time between the finishing arcs. To paraphrase Luczynski's response in author's notes, Nathanoraptor is merely the co-writer; he does the editing. The one who does the actual writing of the chapters themselves is Luczynski. Subverted much later on when Nathanoraptor ended up being gradually given larger involvement with the actual writing itself.
• My Real Daddy: While Luczynski actually created the park that the story ended up centering around, his co-writer Nathanoraptor is the one credited with holding the story together and making it enjoyable. This perception only increased after Nathanoraptor took over the writing and Luczynski took over editing and giving final approval.
• Pandering to the Base: The viewpoint some might have over the inclusion of Will and Matt at the moment they made their first appearance. Luczynski didn't want them to be included in the story at all, but Nathanoraptor convinced him into putting them in at the cost of developing Cynthia (or so Luczynski claims) due partially to reader demand and partially to their importance to Alice's character.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: After initially starting out as a flat Creator's Pet of Luczynski's that Nathanoraptor had to fight to keep from upstaging more interesting characters, Cynthia managed to become far more appealing to the readers (and to Nathanoraptor himself for that matter) after being allowed to show off some of her other personality traits beyond the ones displayed in her introduction, and also being allowed to develop some much needed substance by virtue of her serving as a Red Herring for The Mole, and later being revealed as Good All Along.
• Romantic Plot Tumor: Luczynski considers the romances between Leon and Yolanda, Jack and Colette, and Will and Alice to be 'pointless romances' that took away focus that could have been given to the development of the park and difficulty in caring for the animals now that they're in present time instead of their home time periods in the past.
• The Scrappy: Cynthia, when she was first introduced, was not liked by the readers, with many citing her lack of substance compared to the other (arguably more interesting at the time) characters and her being immediately shoved into a then unearned prominent role as failings. Even Nathanoraptor has stated he did not like the character. However, in Phase Three, she largely got Rescued from the Scrappy Heap. But even so, she still noticeably took several years after her introduction to be confirmed to successfully make the jump to subsequent Continuity Reboot Prehistoric Park Reimagined alongside the other 12 members of Prehistoric Earth's 'main cast'.
• Strangled by the Red String:
  • In a sense, Collete and Jack. While the relationship is admittedly teased more than once prior to hooking up and shown to be quite compatible in its own way through what development IS shown, a relative lack of focus on their relationship's development (and that of Collete herself as a character) between the first moment of Ship Tease between them and the moment they hook up can give off a rushed feeling. Then again, as Nathanoraptor himself explains, its entirely likely that a considerably larger amount of interactions occurred between them off-screen due to each mission having at least two weeks or so unfolding in between.
  • Arguably, Cynthia and Drew themselves qualify far more strongly for this interpretation. As rushed as Jack and Colette's own relationship and development may seem, they were at least able to engage in a couple scenes together before their offscreen hookup that showed how they indeed genuinely had chemistry. Cynthia and Drew, on the other hand, have their interactions largely consist of Cynthia shamelessly being her usual self, Drew himself being explicitly annoyed by her behavior, and a few rounds of cringeworthy stereotypical flirty banter before they then suddenly become an Official Couple during phase 2 with very little build-up and pretty much ZERO scenes showing any development between them that would show any signs of them developing any proper genuine affection in spite of their initial rocky start.
• Unexpected Character: As Liliensternus has only previous appeared in Walking With Dinosaurs: The Arena Spectacular, the appearance of a pair in Degrees Of Greatness definitely counts as this.
• Unintentionally Sympathetic: While he and Jack are both intended to come across as rather unsympathetic during their clashes in Life in Transition by virtue of the both of them being in the wrong, neither of them being willing to admit to as much on their own respective ends, and all around acting like complete jerks towards each other, Leon also almost comes across as more of a victim understandably reacting to defend himself against Jack's Jerkass behavior due to seemingly being completely outmatched by Jack in all areas over the course of their clashes, mostly acting like a jerk in response to Jack acting like a jerk towards him first, and the fact that Jack's first moment of jerkass behavior occurs seemingly immediately after Leon has expressed a reasonable concern in a somewhat fair and comparatively polite fashion.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Technically more of a case of 'unintentionally TOO unsympathetic'. While he and Leon are both intended to come across as rather unsympathetic in their interactions over the course of Life in Transition, the fact that Jack arguably comes across as far more meanspirited towards Leon then Leon does towards Jack in comparison, seems to always get the last meaningful word in and have more of an overall advantage against Leon over the course of their clashes, is the one responsible for instigating the majority of the clashes, and engages in his first act of Jerkass behavior in that 'episode' seemingly in response to what can somewhat be interpreted as a comparatively polite expression of a reasonable concern on Leon's part leaves an uncomfortably large amount of room open for interpreting Jack as acting like too much of a bully in this episode.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Will and Matt. First introduced in The New Rulers and teased by Nathanoraptor to have major importance to Alice's character arc later in the story. So far though, they have made only a select few appearances, made scarcely any impact on the plot since introduction, and have yet to reach the point where they showcase the promised importance, until Phase 3 that is.
  • Khatin had very little (if any) major appearances or moments in the story after he first helped Squishy overcome his initial loneliness at the park. He was initially planned to have a more prominent role, but behind the scenes strife and an overabundance of characters and arcs to juggle resulted in him getting Demoted to Extra.
  • For that matter, Linda, Kyle, and Nikolai also somewhat fall under this. Just like with Khatin above, they were initially planned to have more prominent roles that ended up downplayed or scrapped due to behind the scenes issues and an overabundance of characters and arcs to handle within the story.
  • In a way, Adrian. He is best friends with Leon and Drew, but has since become very out of focus and later ends up very abruptly going full Chuck Cunningham immediately after his one single appearance in A Glorious Dawn in favor of Jack unofficially taking his place. That being said though, Nathanoraptor has since stated that several developments that unfolded while the story itself, plus several chapters that were later being written for release, were in development caused them to give Jack the more prominent role initially considered for Adrian on account of just how much more interesting Jack ended up becoming to the authors.
  • Arguably Collete as well. While not quite to the same extent as the previous examples, she's by far been given the least to do in this story compared to Yolanda, Alice, and Cynthia. Just like with several of the other above mentioned characters, she was initially planned to have a much more prominent role, only to end up getting the short end of the stick later thanks to behind the scenes strife and an overabundance of characters and plot points for the writers and story to handle.
  • Very nearly happened to all the planned prominent human characters not named Cynthia or Drew due to Luczynski considering them all 'side characters' to Cynthia and Drew's story. It was only thanks to Nathanoraptor's own efforts and demand from the readers that several of the other planned prominent characters still managed to have any degree of prominence at all.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • As much of a relief as it can be considered at the same time, the fact that Leon and Jack's initial enmity only amounted to arguments and verbal clashes can also leave readers feeling a sense of wasted potential. Jack and Leon's eventually putting aside their differences and becoming friends could easily have had further dramatic weight behind it if they'd at any point physically come to blows.
  • Adrian and the Denhams are able to escape from the fire during their time in the Jurassic Period remarkably quickly; almost anticlimactically. Then again, considering how the swamp fire in "Alien Empire" was already plenty drawn out and epic, this comparatively more swiftly Open-and-Shut Case may not necessarily be a bad thing.
  • Early on in the story, it seemed as if Nikolai and Kyle could perhaps end up having a brief rivalry. Ultimately, the apparent setup for this plot point went nowhere. Nathanoraptor has since admitted that this was plot point was dropped as a result of their already being too many other planned important story arcs and plot points for him and Luczynski to juggle around with during Phase 2.
  • At the end of Alien Empire, Jack and Nikolai are shown seeming to show the beginnings of developing a companionable dynamic. This same dynamic ends up never brought up again. As explained by Nathanoraptor, this was a result of behind the scenes strife and an overabundance of characters and planned plot points for him and Luczynski to handle.
  • Considering just how vague several characters' backstories end up being in the story itself, some might wonder just what the park staff's lives were like prior to their work at Prehistoric Earth, or possibly before their work at Novum. And for that matter, just how did Drew, Adrian, and Leon ever even meet and become friends in the first place?
  • The idea of some of the staff members having animal partners is never quite fully explored due to a mixture of a lack of focus on some of the animals, some of the animals not having much personality, and most of the ideas either never coming to fruition or being left largely without focus. This is something that Nathanoraptor has admitted he hopes to do proper justice in Prehistoric Park Reimagined.
  • Lucznski believes that the idea behind the human antagonists could have worked out better if they'd remained planning on trying to destroy the park due to considering the park a wasted usage of the time portal like he and Nathanoraptor had initially considered instead of having them be involved in a smuggling operation similar to the one in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom.
  • Arguably, Luczynski considers almost the entirety of the story as it currently is as a case of this, for he believes that it would have worked better as the Animal Planet style documentary focused on the adventures in the past and difficulty in caring for the animals once they're in modern times that he'd envisioned it to be instead of the (in his opinion) generic drama show in a zoo filled with pointless romances, dumbass plots, wasted potential, and disproportionate focus on 'side characters' that didn't deserve any that Nathanoraptor 'turned it into'.
• Vanilla Protagonist: Drew himself, despite being the leader of the rescue team and eventually receiving a couple arcs of his own, was easily overshadowed in popularity by his scholarly and desperate for approval best friend Leon, the brainy and no nonsense Action Girl Alice, her excitable and thrill seeking Plucky Comic Relief brother with Hidden Depths Jack, the grizzled and tough as nails security guard captain Nikolai, and sweet natured Kindly Vet Yolanda (among various other characters) by virtue of his more comparatively one note and singularly focused personality as the short attention spanned and excitable leader of the rescue team.

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