The Lost Dinosaurs Of Egypt (just seen it).

[Luis Rey <luisrey@ndirect.co.uk>]

>

It was entertaining to say the least and some of the animations were decent
(a bit on the cardboard side sometimes) and well located in mangrel
environments. I still wonder why they keep making dinosaurs with boxed
heads... and seeing a frontal attack from Spinosaurus to a wounded sauropod
and the slender head of the predator struggle with the enormously thick
neck of the Paralititan was something that I would never describe as
'believable'. If it wasn't believable in Jurassic Park it wasn't going to
be here. Carcharodontosaurus (also featured) would have been a better
candidate for a sauropod attack (but it was kept waiting in the wings).
On the other hand, the treatment of the expedition as an extension of
Stromer's work was nicely done and there were some very dramatic moments.
There's a true sense of history throughout all the program. Good also to
see paleontologists losing their temper in their field desperation. What I
would say is the highlight of the show was the discovery of those forgotten
Stromer photographs at the museum in Munich ... it also highlights the
neglect and sad state of paleontology in Germany (and Europe) these days
(source of much debate in the Vertpaleo list recently).
And yes, predictably whatever Egyptian institutional involvement in this
was completely overlooked. It would have also been useful to tie all the
discoveries with the some other African research (Sereno's Moroccan
Carcharodontosaurus or Philip Taquet's Ouranosaurus from Niger).

By the way there was no 'camel scene'... did we miss something vital?

Luis Rey

Visit my website on http://www.ndirect.co.uk/~luisrey