The Legion of Silly Dinosaurs: Pterosaurs!

 

In planning out the blog for this month, I semi-seriously debated whether to depart from a certain formula I have in place for balancing the movie reviews with toy/ collectible posts (plus fiction and "miscellaneous" content), in which I alternate between 3 to 2 or 2 to 3 for every full week of posts. What settled things in my mind was that if I didn't do a "2 to 3" week, I was probably going to end up skipping this feature for the month. So, I went ahead, and to kid myself into thinking this will be short, I decided to do a revisit of some earlier material, specifically the most famous dinos that aren't dinosaurs, the pterosaurs. To start off, here's a few pics I flat-out forgot to put in the 1/72 Dino Riders post last month, of a pteranodon-type pterosaur with the usual rider and weapons.

What most interested me about this one is that incorporates an idea I have thought about on and off myself. In fantasy and the pulp/ space opera style of science fiction, including the original Dino Riders toys and cartoon, characters riding winged creatures are almost always mounted on top like a rider on a horse (already a little tricky with a camel). It always seemed to me that there are a lot of reasons this doesn't make sense, even apart from the question of whether a conventionally biological flying creature could carry a human-sized payload. It would in every way work as well or better to suspend the pilot underneath, a configuration already used in hang gliders. There's less drag, especially in a prone position. It moves the pilot and the supports for the "saddle" away from the wing surfaces and the creature's center of mass. If the pilot is armed, there's far less risk of hitting the creature by accident. Finally, if the worst happens and the pilot gets ejected, there's a chance the creature could catch him with its hindlimbs before he falls to his death (assuming, of course, that it doesn't want him to). With that all in mind, this little thing isn't the best demonstration, in no small part because the frame and weapons are bulkier than they need to be, but remain an interesting departure from convention. Here's a closeup, and a pic with the patchisaur pteranodon.

"Up, up and... well, off the ground is a start."

Since this was a bit thin, I decided to include another guy, purchased not too long ago used. I've shown pics in certain forums where another user was able to trace this to a specific company somewhere in China, but I don't care to run it down again. What made it intriguing enough to buy is that it's large and detailed, yet still looks "off" on several points of anatomy. The strangest part is the teeth, which would more realistically be uniform in size and shape, yet, the wonky fangs do match well enough with Eudimorphodon, one of the earliest and most unusual pterosaurs we know anything about. Here's a few pics of him.

With that, I'm ready to wrap this up, but first, a reprise of the patchisaur pteranodon. I commented in the Deiner dino post that it was surprisingly innovative to show hair on a pterosaur in the 1970s, With that context in mind, the ubiquitous patchi is even more mindboggling. If, as I believe, it was first made along with the more notorious patchisaurs, it dates from very early '70s. Already, even at this level, we see insulating hair portrayed. But then we have the inexplicable feathers, which don't even match the underside of the wing. This is the beauty of bootleg/ knockoff dinosaurs. They can be silly, goofy and willfully inaccurate, but it's even more impressive when they do something right.

That's all for now, more to come!