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I\'m fairly certain the K-T extinction was not the result of the DM getting fed up with the players.
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* RocksFallEveryoneDies: Well, not everyone, but the Cretaceous mass extinction is shown happening.
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* XMeetsY: ''[[Series/CrocodileHunter The Crocodile Hunter Diaries]]'' meets ''Film/JurassicPark'', with TimeTravel.
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* CoolVsAwesome: In the series finale we have a standoff between a ''Tyrannosaurus'' and a woolly mammoth. Unfortunately it's cut short before any actually fighting happens.
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** ''Nyctosaurus'' went extinct before ''Deinosuchus'', which in turn went extinct before ''Albertosaurus''.
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* PteroSoarer: Largely averted by the ''Nyctosaurus'', which is fairly accurate for its time.
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* PteroSoarer: Largely averted by the ''Nyctosaurus'', which is fairly accurate for its time.time (it is never really shown doing anything other than flying however).
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* PteroSoarer: Largely averted by the ''Nyctosaurus'', which is fairly accurate for its time.
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moving to trivia
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* ScienceMarchesOn: ''[[StockDinosaurs Ornithomimus]]'' were not duck-like filter-feeders "more similar to DaffyDuck than emus" as portrayed in the program. This theory was made in the middle 2000's from the putative discover of a sort of "lamellae" on the horny beak of some ornithomimosaurs, similar to those seen in duck and flamingos (both filter-feeders). This theory become quite popular at the time among paleo-fans, and the show, incidentally, was produced just in those years: hence the duck-feeding thing seen in the program. But just a few years later, this hypothesis has been discarded: those lamellae are arguably simple "wrinkles" on the beak like those seen in other non-filter feeding birds. Anyway, the rest of ''Ornithomimus'''s anatomy doesn't show any specializazion for a flamingo way-of-life. It was more like modern running birds: ostrichs, rheas and emus.
** There's an ongoing debate on just how ''Microraptor'' "flew" (if at all), and [[http://www.livescience.com/18934-dinosaur-black-iridescent-feathers.html was the wrong color in the show.]]
** Young ''Triceratops'' did not look like miniature versions of the adults. The youngest individuals had little stubs for horns and a scalloped frill, while the horns pointed ''upwards'' in subadults. Forward-pointing horns and smooth frill edges only appeared in the adults.
** Early Cretaceous China likely had a more temperate climate than originally thought.
** There's an ongoing debate on just how ''Microraptor'' "flew" (if at all), and [[http://www.livescience.com/18934-dinosaur-black-iridescent-feathers.html was the wrong color in the show.]]
** Young ''Triceratops'' did not look like miniature versions of the adults. The youngest individuals had little stubs for horns and a scalloped frill, while the horns pointed ''upwards'' in subadults. Forward-pointing horns and smooth frill edges only appeared in the adults.
** Early Cretaceous China likely had a more temperate climate than originally thought.
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* WhatCouldHaveBeen: The ill-fated movie. The plot would have been slightly different to the series, with the park under the ownership of a rich American and opened to the public.The film would have been a HumanFocusedAdaptation in every sense of the word, with the focus on an American man struggling with his family, who would have been in the park when the dinosaurs break out. There would have been a scene in which the protagonist is chased down a corridor by Matilda.
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** Early Cretaceous China likely had a more temperate climate than originally thought.
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** A woolly mammoth that was recovered from near the time of its extinction, but was somehow coexisting with a [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife cave bear]] which was extinct way before mammoths; however this is [[{{Lampshade}} lampshaded]]/[[HandWave handwaved]] by Nigel who says to the cameraman "I'm sorry, I believed cave bears were already extinct...this is an exciting discovery!)
to:
** A woolly mammoth that was recovered from near the time of its extinction, but was somehow coexisting with a [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife cave bear]] which was extinct way before mammoths; however this is [[{{Lampshade}} lampshaded]]/[[HandWave handwaved]] by Nigel who says to the cameraman "I'm sorry, I believed cave bears were already extinct...this is an exciting discovery!) discovery!")
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* FeatheredFiend: ''Troodon'', ''Incisivosaurus'', and ''Mei'', though [[ArtisticLicensePaleontology the troodonts were depicted with no feathers]].
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* FeatheredFiend: ''Troodon'', ''Incisivosaurus'', and ''Mei'', though [[ArtisticLicensePaleontology the troodonts were depicted with no feathers]].only a thin feather coat]].
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Somewhere A Palaeontologist Is Crying is now Artistic License Paleontology. Bad examples and ZCE are being removed.
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* FeatheredFiend: ''Troodon'', ''Incisivosaurus'', and ''Mei'', though [[SomewhereAPaleontologistIsCrying the troodonts were depicted with no feathers]].
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* FeatheredFiend: ''Troodon'', ''Incisivosaurus'', and ''Mei'', though [[SomewhereAPaleontologistIsCrying [[ArtisticLicensePaleontology the troodonts were depicted with no feathers]].
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* EverythingsWorseWithWolves: In the same episode as the cave bear incident, when Nigel tries to keep the weakened mammoth Martha alive, a pack of wolves turn up out of freaking nowhere in the night, with GreenEyes of doom, shouting and barking, hoping to kill her. Nigel chases them away.
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* SavageWolves: In the same episode as the cave bear incident, when Nigel tries to keep the weakened mammoth Martha alive, a pack of wolves turn up out of freaking nowhere in the night, with GreenEyes of doom, shouting and barking, hoping to kill her. Nigel chases them away.
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[[quoteright:300:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/300px-prehistoric_park_title_card_494.jpg]]
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* WhatCouldHaveBeen: The ill-fated movie. The plot would have been slightly different to the series, with the park under the ownership of a rich American and opened to the public.The film would have been a HumanFocusedAdaptation in every sense of the word, with the focus on an American man struggling with his family, who would have been in the park when the dinosaurs break out. There would have been a scene in which the protagonist is chased down a corridor by Matilda.
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* MyCarHatesMe: Averted, barely. A couple of occasions have required Nigel to get his truck out of the way of some charging beast. Each time the vehicle only starts at the last minute because RuleOfDrama.
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That doesn\'t make any sense. How would saving a couple of dinos a month earlier prevent there being an extinction?
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That doesn\'t make any sense. How would saving a couple of dinos a month earlier prevent there being an extinction?
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** Well, he wants to save prehistoric animals from extinction. If he went back too far before the asteroid impact there would be no extinction to save them from.
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* EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs: The show has been described as the Series/CrocodileHunter with dinosaurs (and a whole lot of other creatures).
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* EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs: The show has been described as the Series/CrocodileHunter ''Series/CrocodileHunter'' with dinosaurs (and a whole lot of other creatures).
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** Also possible that the time portal isn't that accurate and they've no guarantee that they could pinpoint that time/space again.
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* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: Nigel has a whole team and base camp with him back in the Cretaceous, but we only see his last-minute rescue of the T. rex chicks. We can only assume everyone else got back safely off-camera.
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* EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs: The show has been described as the CrocodileHunter with dinosaurs (and a whole lot of other creatures).
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* EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs: The show has been described as the CrocodileHunter Series/CrocodileHunter with dinosaurs (and a whole lot of other creatures).
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** Maybe Nigel and Saba were worried that, if they used the time machine to "try again," [[TemporalParadox they'd run into themselves from the original timeline.]]
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\"Everything\'s Worse With Bears\" clean-up
* BearsAreBadNews: The [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Cave Bear]] in immediately chase Nigel just after the latter entered in his refuge.
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* EverythingsWorseWithBears: The [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Cave Bear]] in immediately chase Nigel just after the latter entered in his refuge.
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** Well, he wants to save prehistoric animals from extinction. If he went back too far before the asteroid impact there would be no extinction to save them from. And by the way, thinking the only reason he saves animals that are going to die is "to avoid altering history too much" pretty much ignores the entire premise of the series!
to:
** Well, he wants to save prehistoric animals from extinction. If he went back too far before the asteroid impact there would be no extinction to save them from. And by the way, thinking the only reason he saves animals that are going to die is "to avoid altering history too much" pretty much ignores the entire premise of the series!
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* TheTerribleFluffy: The park's T.rex twins have the truly terrifying names of...Terrence and Matilda!
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* TheTerribleFluffy: FluffyTheTerrible: The park's T.rex twins have the truly terrifying names of...Terrence and Matilda!
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*TheTerribleFluffy: The park's T.rex twins have the truly terrifying names of...Terrence and Matilda!
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**Well, he wants to save prehistoric animals from extinction. If he went back too far before the asteroid impact there would be no extinction to save them from. And by the way, thinking the only reason he saves animals that are going to die is "to avoid altering history too much" pretty much ignores the entire premise of the series!
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* TimeTravel
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* TimeTravelTimeTravel: Is done with a pair of poles that create a portal between them. The animal is then lured into the portal.
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* EverythingsWorseWithWolves: In the same episode as the cave bear incident, when Nigel tries to keep the weakened mammoth Martha alive, a pack of wolves turn up out of freaking nowhere in the night, with GreenEyes of doom, shouting and barking, hoping to kill her. Nigel chases them away.
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* [=~Everything's Better With Dinosaurs~=]: The show has been described as the CrocodileHunter with dinosaurs (and a whole lot of other creatures).
* [=~Everything's Worse With Bears~=]: The [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Cave Bear]] in immediately chase Nigel just after the latter entered in his refuge.
* [=~Everything's Worse With Bears~=]: The [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Cave Bear]] in immediately chase Nigel just after the latter entered in his refuge.
to:
* [=~Everything's Better With Dinosaurs~=]: EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs: The show has been described as the CrocodileHunter with dinosaurs (and a whole lot of other creatures).
*[=~Everything's Worse With Bears~=]: EverythingsWorseWithBears: The [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Cave Bear]] in immediately chase Nigel just after the latter entered in his refuge.
*
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'''''Prehistoric Park''''' (2006) is a 6 episode {{Mockumentary}} MiniSeries from {{ITV}}, created by the same Impossible Pictures Ltd. that produced the famous ''WalkingWithDinosaurs'' franchise, to which this show can either be seen as a SpiritualSuccessor or a SpinOff. In turn, the hit ScienceFiction series ''{{Primeval}}'' can be viewed as a very loose successor to ''Prehistoric Park''.
The basic premise is simple: RealLife zoologist and adventurer Nigel Marven [[TimeTravel travels back in time]] to [[BringItBackAlive bring back]] various creatures from prehistoric eras, whom he and his team then place in the titular park. While episodic in nature, the series did have an overarching plot, as the issues of many animals took several episodes to resolve.
Although the show was filmed as if it told the story of a real park, it contained many obviously sci-fi inspired elements, such as the mysterious time portal, the workings of which were never explained.
The show is, in essence, similar to DiscoveryChannel's much less famous ''Series/DinoLab''.
----
!! The work provides examples of:
* AnachronismStew: A common mistake: including the Chinese dino-bird ''[[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Microraptor]]'' among the Yixian fauna when it was really from the slightly later Jiufotang Formation: however, both faunas were from the Early Cretaceous, only separated by few million years.
* ApeShallNeverKillApe: Averted, as a male ''Tyrannosaurus'' fights and kills a female ''Tyrannosaurus''.
* BadAss: Matilda the female ''T. rex'', and Martha the mammoth in the finale.
* BadassBookworm / ButtMonkey / HospitalHottie: Zoologist Nigel Marven, head-keeper Bob and head-vet Suzanne respectively; they are the main human characters in ''Prehistoric Park''.
* BigCreepyCrawlies: ''Arthropleura''. But unlike most examples of the trope, this one managed to win the sympathy of the Park workers, simply because it was just that big that it lost its creepy factor.
* BigDamnHeroes: Happens several times in the last episode. Martha the mammoth saves the young elephant from Matilda the ''T. rex''. Nigel leads Matilda away before the fight escalates. Then, just as Matilda is about to catch up with Nigel, the ''Deinosuchus'' lunges out of the water at Matilda, barely missing, giving Nigel enough time to reach safety and lock Matilda into a paddock.
* CarnivoreConfusion: Averted, as this being a zoo, even the most ferocious carnivores are taken care of.
* CoolGate: The time portal.
* TheCretaceousIsAlwaysDoomed: In the first episode Nigel goes back 65 million years to collect two Tyrannosaurs, hours before the asteroid hits. It's true that he collects animals that are about to die anyway to avoid altering history too much, but would it have hurt to have gone at least a month before the asteroid hit?
* EatsBabies: ''Tyrannosaurus'' and ''Deinosuchus''.
* [=~Everything's Better With Dinosaurs~=]: The show has been described as the CrocodileHunter with dinosaurs (and a whole lot of other creatures).
* [=~Everything's Worse With Bears~=]: The [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Cave Bear]] in immediately chase Nigel just after the latter entered in his refuge.
* FeatheredFiend: ''Troodon'', ''Incisivosaurus'', and ''Mei'', though [[SomewhereAPaleontologistIsCrying the troodonts were depicted with no feathers]].
** Averted by ''Microraptor'' and ''Ornithomimus'', which are portrayed as being quite harmless and are safely transported and kept at the park.
** From the true birds' side, ''Phorusrhacos''.
* GiantFlyer: Pterosaurs, though these aren't technically of the giant variant. Despite this, the show didn't miss the opportunity to play out the classic scene of a sea monster lunging out of the water and dragging one down. This paleoart-trope is played straight ''and'' subverted at the same time in the Supercroc episode: the giant sea reptile is not the classic [[StockDinosaurs ichthyosaur/elasmosaur/mosasaur/pliosaur]] but the giant alligator ''[[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Deinosuchus]]'' (note that this may be TruthInTelevision, since modern saltwater crocodiles ''do'' live in the sea as well).
* InfantImmortality: Averted. A juvenile ''Ornithomimus'' is killed by a ''Tyrannosaurus'' and a juvenile ''Parasaurolophus'' is killed by a ''Deinosuchus''.
* MeanwhileInTheFuture: The format of the episodes. While Nigel are millions of years in the past trying to catch a prehistoric creature, the park crews in the present are trying to put together and suitable habitat for the creatures he had captured.
* MegaNeko: ''Smilodon''.
* NeverSmileAtACrocodile: ''Deinosuchus''.
* PlotHole: When Nigel and Saba arrive in prehistoric times too late to save the ''Smilodon'' cubs, they just mourn. Hello, time machine, anyone? This applies to other episodes too, like the first, when Nigel has to act really quick to avoid getting killed by the asteroid impact at the end of the Cretaceous. He could easily have gone back in time to a few days/weeks/months earlier.
* PrehistoricMonster: Averted, though many large predators do appear to be quite nasty.
* RhinoRampage: ''Elasmotherium''.
* RocksFallEveryoneDies: Well, not everyone, but the Cretaceous mass extinction is shown happening.
* RuleOfCool: The purpose of the keepers was just to "resurrect" the coolest animals. One of the most remembered scene is, obviously, the two most iconic prehistoric giants (''T. rex'' and the woolly mammoth) ''fighting each other''. This time ItMakesSenseInContext...
** A woolly mammoth that was recovered from near the time of its extinction, but was somehow coexisting with a [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife cave bear]] which was extinct way before mammoths; however this is [[{{Lampshade}} lampshaded]]/[[HandWave handwaved]] by Nigel who says to the cameraman "I'm sorry, I believed cave bears were already extinct...this is an exciting discovery!)
** The main example had to be, however, the ''Triceratops'' vs. ''Tyrannosaurus'' fight in the first episode.
* ScienceMarchesOn: ''[[StockDinosaurs Ornithomimus]]'' were not duck-like filter-feeders "more similar to DaffyDuck than emus" as portrayed in the program. This theory was made in the middle 2000's from the putative discover of a sort of "lamellae" on the horny beak of some ornithomimosaurs, similar to those seen in duck and flamingos (both filter-feeders). This theory become quite popular at the time among paleo-fans, and the show, incidentally, was produced just in those years: hence the duck-feeding thing seen in the program. But just a few years later, this hypothesis has been discarded: those lamellae are arguably simple "wrinkles" on the beak like those seen in other non-filter feeding birds. Anyway, the rest of ''Ornithomimus'''s anatomy doesn't show any specializazion for a flamingo way-of-life. It was more like modern running birds: ostrichs, rheas and emus.
** There's an ongoing debate on just how ''Microraptor'' "flew" (if at all), and [[http://www.livescience.com/18934-dinosaur-black-iridescent-feathers.html was the wrong color in the show.]]
** Young ''Triceratops'' did not look like miniature versions of the adults. The youngest individuals had little stubs for horns and a scalloped frill, while the horns pointed ''upwards'' in subadults. Forward-pointing horns and smooth frill edges only appeared in the adults.
* SeldomSeenSpecies: ''Nyctosaurus'', ''Elasmotherium'' (instead of the "classic" woolly rhino, ''Coelodonta''), ''Eosipterus'' (the pterosaur from episode 3), ''Incisivosaurus'', ''Mei'', ''Toxodon'', ''Crassigyrinus'', ''Pulmonoscorpius''.
* ShoutOut: Aside from being the name for the young ''Triceratops'', Theo is also the name of Nigel's RealLife son.
* StockDinosaurs:
** ''Tyrannosaurus'', the "main" dinosaurs of the show, named Terence and Matilda.
** ''Triceratops'', named Theo.
** ''Parasaurolophus'' appears in the sixth episode, in the classic "main prey" role (but this time the duckbill is food for the giant alligator ''Deinosuchus''). Many more hadrosaurs lived in the same habitat in RealLife (''Corythosaurus'' and ''Maiasaura'', to name merely two examples), but they were probably judged "not as cool".
** ''Ornithomimus'': They have a major role in the story, and are portrayed in a non-conventional way: as duck-like filter feeders (this was a popular theory at the time among scientists, but now [[ScienceMarchesOn is largely discredited]]). The genus chosen is ''Ornithomimus'' (again they did the research, since it was the only ostrich-mimic dino which really lived alongside ''T. rex'').
* ToServeMan: The ''T. rex'' ''immediately'' choose to chase Nigel just after seeing him, despite all the ''[[StockDinosaurs Ornithomimus]]'' available in that moment... (To be fair, Nigel would've been easier to catch than an ''Ornithomimus'', although a ''Tyrannosaurus'' probably wouldn't know that and, in any case, he wouldn't have provided as substantial a meal.)
* TyrannosaurusRex: The man himself, but his smaller cousin, ''Albertosaurus'' also makes an appearance.
* TheMagicGoesAway: But Nigel is here to rectify that.
* TimeTravel
----
The basic premise is simple: RealLife zoologist and adventurer Nigel Marven [[TimeTravel travels back in time]] to [[BringItBackAlive bring back]] various creatures from prehistoric eras, whom he and his team then place in the titular park. While episodic in nature, the series did have an overarching plot, as the issues of many animals took several episodes to resolve.
Although the show was filmed as if it told the story of a real park, it contained many obviously sci-fi inspired elements, such as the mysterious time portal, the workings of which were never explained.
The show is, in essence, similar to DiscoveryChannel's much less famous ''Series/DinoLab''.
----
!! The work provides examples of:
* AnachronismStew: A common mistake: including the Chinese dino-bird ''[[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Microraptor]]'' among the Yixian fauna when it was really from the slightly later Jiufotang Formation: however, both faunas were from the Early Cretaceous, only separated by few million years.
* ApeShallNeverKillApe: Averted, as a male ''Tyrannosaurus'' fights and kills a female ''Tyrannosaurus''.
* BadAss: Matilda the female ''T. rex'', and Martha the mammoth in the finale.
* BadassBookworm / ButtMonkey / HospitalHottie: Zoologist Nigel Marven, head-keeper Bob and head-vet Suzanne respectively; they are the main human characters in ''Prehistoric Park''.
* BigCreepyCrawlies: ''Arthropleura''. But unlike most examples of the trope, this one managed to win the sympathy of the Park workers, simply because it was just that big that it lost its creepy factor.
* BigDamnHeroes: Happens several times in the last episode. Martha the mammoth saves the young elephant from Matilda the ''T. rex''. Nigel leads Matilda away before the fight escalates. Then, just as Matilda is about to catch up with Nigel, the ''Deinosuchus'' lunges out of the water at Matilda, barely missing, giving Nigel enough time to reach safety and lock Matilda into a paddock.
* CarnivoreConfusion: Averted, as this being a zoo, even the most ferocious carnivores are taken care of.
* CoolGate: The time portal.
* TheCretaceousIsAlwaysDoomed: In the first episode Nigel goes back 65 million years to collect two Tyrannosaurs, hours before the asteroid hits. It's true that he collects animals that are about to die anyway to avoid altering history too much, but would it have hurt to have gone at least a month before the asteroid hit?
* EatsBabies: ''Tyrannosaurus'' and ''Deinosuchus''.
* [=~Everything's Better With Dinosaurs~=]: The show has been described as the CrocodileHunter with dinosaurs (and a whole lot of other creatures).
* [=~Everything's Worse With Bears~=]: The [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Cave Bear]] in immediately chase Nigel just after the latter entered in his refuge.
* FeatheredFiend: ''Troodon'', ''Incisivosaurus'', and ''Mei'', though [[SomewhereAPaleontologistIsCrying the troodonts were depicted with no feathers]].
** Averted by ''Microraptor'' and ''Ornithomimus'', which are portrayed as being quite harmless and are safely transported and kept at the park.
** From the true birds' side, ''Phorusrhacos''.
* GiantFlyer: Pterosaurs, though these aren't technically of the giant variant. Despite this, the show didn't miss the opportunity to play out the classic scene of a sea monster lunging out of the water and dragging one down. This paleoart-trope is played straight ''and'' subverted at the same time in the Supercroc episode: the giant sea reptile is not the classic [[StockDinosaurs ichthyosaur/elasmosaur/mosasaur/pliosaur]] but the giant alligator ''[[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife Deinosuchus]]'' (note that this may be TruthInTelevision, since modern saltwater crocodiles ''do'' live in the sea as well).
* InfantImmortality: Averted. A juvenile ''Ornithomimus'' is killed by a ''Tyrannosaurus'' and a juvenile ''Parasaurolophus'' is killed by a ''Deinosuchus''.
* MeanwhileInTheFuture: The format of the episodes. While Nigel are millions of years in the past trying to catch a prehistoric creature, the park crews in the present are trying to put together and suitable habitat for the creatures he had captured.
* MegaNeko: ''Smilodon''.
* NeverSmileAtACrocodile: ''Deinosuchus''.
* PlotHole: When Nigel and Saba arrive in prehistoric times too late to save the ''Smilodon'' cubs, they just mourn. Hello, time machine, anyone? This applies to other episodes too, like the first, when Nigel has to act really quick to avoid getting killed by the asteroid impact at the end of the Cretaceous. He could easily have gone back in time to a few days/weeks/months earlier.
* PrehistoricMonster: Averted, though many large predators do appear to be quite nasty.
* RhinoRampage: ''Elasmotherium''.
* RocksFallEveryoneDies: Well, not everyone, but the Cretaceous mass extinction is shown happening.
* RuleOfCool: The purpose of the keepers was just to "resurrect" the coolest animals. One of the most remembered scene is, obviously, the two most iconic prehistoric giants (''T. rex'' and the woolly mammoth) ''fighting each other''. This time ItMakesSenseInContext...
** A woolly mammoth that was recovered from near the time of its extinction, but was somehow coexisting with a [[UsefulNotes/PrehistoricLife cave bear]] which was extinct way before mammoths; however this is [[{{Lampshade}} lampshaded]]/[[HandWave handwaved]] by Nigel who says to the cameraman "I'm sorry, I believed cave bears were already extinct...this is an exciting discovery!)
** The main example had to be, however, the ''Triceratops'' vs. ''Tyrannosaurus'' fight in the first episode.
* ScienceMarchesOn: ''[[StockDinosaurs Ornithomimus]]'' were not duck-like filter-feeders "more similar to DaffyDuck than emus" as portrayed in the program. This theory was made in the middle 2000's from the putative discover of a sort of "lamellae" on the horny beak of some ornithomimosaurs, similar to those seen in duck and flamingos (both filter-feeders). This theory become quite popular at the time among paleo-fans, and the show, incidentally, was produced just in those years: hence the duck-feeding thing seen in the program. But just a few years later, this hypothesis has been discarded: those lamellae are arguably simple "wrinkles" on the beak like those seen in other non-filter feeding birds. Anyway, the rest of ''Ornithomimus'''s anatomy doesn't show any specializazion for a flamingo way-of-life. It was more like modern running birds: ostrichs, rheas and emus.
** There's an ongoing debate on just how ''Microraptor'' "flew" (if at all), and [[http://www.livescience.com/18934-dinosaur-black-iridescent-feathers.html was the wrong color in the show.]]
** Young ''Triceratops'' did not look like miniature versions of the adults. The youngest individuals had little stubs for horns and a scalloped frill, while the horns pointed ''upwards'' in subadults. Forward-pointing horns and smooth frill edges only appeared in the adults.
* SeldomSeenSpecies: ''Nyctosaurus'', ''Elasmotherium'' (instead of the "classic" woolly rhino, ''Coelodonta''), ''Eosipterus'' (the pterosaur from episode 3), ''Incisivosaurus'', ''Mei'', ''Toxodon'', ''Crassigyrinus'', ''Pulmonoscorpius''.
* ShoutOut: Aside from being the name for the young ''Triceratops'', Theo is also the name of Nigel's RealLife son.
* StockDinosaurs:
** ''Tyrannosaurus'', the "main" dinosaurs of the show, named Terence and Matilda.
** ''Triceratops'', named Theo.
** ''Parasaurolophus'' appears in the sixth episode, in the classic "main prey" role (but this time the duckbill is food for the giant alligator ''Deinosuchus''). Many more hadrosaurs lived in the same habitat in RealLife (''Corythosaurus'' and ''Maiasaura'', to name merely two examples), but they were probably judged "not as cool".
** ''Ornithomimus'': They have a major role in the story, and are portrayed in a non-conventional way: as duck-like filter feeders (this was a popular theory at the time among scientists, but now [[ScienceMarchesOn is largely discredited]]). The genus chosen is ''Ornithomimus'' (again they did the research, since it was the only ostrich-mimic dino which really lived alongside ''T. rex'').
* ToServeMan: The ''T. rex'' ''immediately'' choose to chase Nigel just after seeing him, despite all the ''[[StockDinosaurs Ornithomimus]]'' available in that moment... (To be fair, Nigel would've been easier to catch than an ''Ornithomimus'', although a ''Tyrannosaurus'' probably wouldn't know that and, in any case, he wouldn't have provided as substantial a meal.)
* TyrannosaurusRex: The man himself, but his smaller cousin, ''Albertosaurus'' also makes an appearance.
* TheMagicGoesAway: But Nigel is here to rectify that.
* TimeTravel
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