All-Ages Reviews - Super Dinosaur
It's a comic for kids called Super Dinosaur...
There's not really a lot I can say to add to that. Haha!
So…Super Dinosaur.
Super Dinosaur is an action comic written by Robert Kirkman (so I expect mounds of gore coming up in the next few issues...No, I haven’t gotten over "Invincible" yet!) and illustrated by Jason Howard. The title may sound ridiculous, but believe me, the comic embraces that silliness. It embodies a lot about the over-the-top action cartoons of the 80’s and early 90’s, and in fact reminded me most of the original Teenage mutant ninja Turtles cartoon, and I honestly think that’s what it was going for.
Super Dinosaur is actually the name of one of our main characters. The comic follows the “hollow earth” theory and tells us that dinosaurs are still alive and well inside the earth’s crust. A couple of scientists steal a T-Rex egg and mess with it to make the creature smaller (about 9 feet tall ultimately) and smarter than its dino counterparts. Beyond those two changes however, Super Dinosaur (henceforth called “SD” because that’s what the comic does) is still built like a T-Rex, so he has teeny tiny useless arms. The scientists make up for that by creating a harness for him that places larger mechanical arms on his shoulders with controls for the teeny arms to manipulate.
He high fived a T-Rex. What more is there to say?
The scientist who created the harness was hoping to use SD as a prototype for dino weapons which he could build into an army. Scientist #2 and SD himself disagreed and the two scientists parted. The evil scientist continued his experiments, creating human/dinosaur hybrids (of course he did, what else would he do?) to fight for him, leaving SD looking kind of backwards in comparison. Now SD and his companions fight against the other dino hybrids to save the world and protect the element they discovered in the Inner Earth, Dynore - which is almost as ridiculous a name as "unobtanuim", but not quite.
I think you can see now what I meant with the 80’s aesthetic. The dino hybrids all have really ridiculous names like “Terrordactyl” and “Breakeosaurus,” and between them and the ridiculous number of custom harnesses that SD sports it feels just like a cartoon designed to sell toys. You might think I’m poking fun, but I’m not. I actually find it kind of fun. This all feels very intentional, like Kirkman really wanted to recreate that style of action cartoon in this comic. I mean, the constant changing harnesses alone highlight that when, as a comic, it would be pretty unlikely to get a big toy line. This was a comic that said “what do kids like? Kids like cool gadgets/weapons and dinosaurs - LET’S COMBINE THEM!”
I mean seriously, how could anything that has a panel like this go wrong?
Genius
…no really, that’s not rhetorical. I’m asking you, Mr. Kirkman, how did this go wrong?
But perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s start with what I liked about this comic, and there is a lot to like.
First off is the art. I have no complaints at all about Howard’s art. The action scenes are exciting, the characters are expressive, everything’s easy to follow despite often have a ton of stuff in each panel. The designs are what really steal the show, though. The designs of all the dino hybrids (dino-men in the comic’s lingo) are pretty awesome. There’s even a squid monster who is one of the best designed creatures I’ve ever seen! The gadgets are all really well designed too, but it’s SD himself that I really love to watch. Howard had a challenge of every scene with SD to draw a T-Rex looking as a T-Rex should, with his teeny arms in the right spot and at the controls, and then to draw the huge robotic arms overtop in a way that makes a reader forget for a moment that they aren’t his real arms. And all that added to the ridiculous number of different robotic arms he has for each new scenario - he’s got a regular set, undersea set, cold weather set, heat resistant set, tank set, it just goes on and on, and it never stops being fun to look at.
Only $15.99 at Target, kids!
Some of the characters are fun as well. I like SD himself; he acts like a typical young boy, if a bit more naïve because he doesn’t have many life experiences. It makes sense, and yet is humorously out of place on a 9 foot tall talking dinosaur. It’s easy to sympathize with him and hope for him to succeed.
There are a few other standouts as well, but the only other character I really want to mention is Tricerachops. Stupid name aside, she’s one of the few really interesting dino hybrids. As the name would imply, she’s a triceratops, and an antagonist. She doesn’t seem strongly attached to any of the villains, however, and really seems to have her own agenda and latches on to whoever she thinks will make that a reality. There’s something to be said for the fact that she’s never sexualized either, a rarity for female characters in comics, yes, even in comics aimed at kids. She hasn’t factored into the story in any major way yet, but I’d really like to see more of her.
Even when she breaks her spine, it's still not sexual!
So then what’s the problem with this comic? Well, there’s a few issues I have with it, but the biggest and most obvious goes by the name of Derek Dynamo. Yeeeeaaaaah, remember when I said that SD was “one” of our main characters? This is a “Boy and his X” story where X equals 9-foot-t-rex-that-can-talk. I’m not against those types of stories, in fact I like quite a few of them, but this is our introduction to this character:
Well, I'm sold.
Not seeing the problem? Well, only a few pages later, he goes back home to find his scientist father engrossed in a ridiculously complex equation, but due to memory problems he’s having, he’s unable to finish it. So what does our hero do?
This took you several months to do...so I'll just fix it in five seconds.
Basically, after reading this comic, you would probably have a new appreciation for Wesley Crusher. This kid is obnoxiously good at everything he does. I don’t mind characters who are more capable than normal, in fact I kind of like it, but they still have to have flaws. I’m not kidding when I say this kid is perfect, he’s some kind of genius, a good fighter, and everyone just looooooooves him, even the bad guys! He goes beyond boring and goes right to annoying.
At one point he faces the dilemma of having to take a test, but oh no! There’s bad guys to fight! What to do? Clearly the answer is to go out to fight while mentally connecting to a robot which he will direct to answer the test questions while fighting. Because of course he can do both! And then the illusion falls and the super strict teacher finds out that he snuck out, surely he’ll get in trouble for that, right?
Heaven forbid he actually face consequences for the choices he makes...
And did I mention this fight was over a pit of lava, and is he wearing any protective gear? Of course not. And when SD has trouble with his fight, Derek just jumps in. No problem.
What do they need SD for again?
I generally like main characters, even when they’re boring, I’m pretty okay with them, but this kid just rubs me the wrong way. I feel like he’s meant to be like Johnny Quest with the scientist father and the random adventures, but Johnny Quest wasn’t a super genius or a badass fighter, that what he had his father and Race for. They didn’t give Johnny all the abilities because if he had them, there wouldn’t be any drama, you’d never fear for him. But let’s compare to another “Boy and his X” story: The Iron Giant. Hogarth is portrayed as being smarter than his peers, but he never boasts or brags, and he’s certainly no genius. Instead they spend their time developing Hogarth as an actual character, so he feels like a real person and we’re more invested in his adventure, cheer for him to win and worry for him when he’s in trouble.
…In Super Dinosaur, I find myself cheering for the bad guys, and that’s not good.
Smug bastard.
Speaking of the bad guys, there isn’t really much to them either. I’ve never read a book that had such blandly simple story that was so confusingly complex. Simple because each story seems to be a matter of bad guys are bad, the good guys fight them. Complex because we keep getting a parade of new baddies, each with his own story, but each weirdly similar to the last, and trying to keep them and all their motivations straight while still trying to nail down which one is the main baddie is a pain. With the noted exception of Tricerachops, the dino hybrids aren’t any better. There’s a bunch of them, but they’re all very similar looking and none of them really have strong personalities. They don’t have any standouts like say Rocksteady and Bebop from TMNT, so none of their fights have any real weight. They’re just bland minions and I don’t care about anything around them.
I was really disappointed with this book overall. It’s not that I expected a lot from something called “Super Dinosaur,” but I was really hoping for a book that was at least a fun diversion, especially given the writer. I don’t give Kirkman a hard time because I think he’s a bad writer, I give him a hard time because I know he’s a good one, and I expect better from him. It’s a good quality book on most levels, but there almost seems to be a laziness about how it’s written. Like Kirkman figured this was just for kids and he didn’t have to try.
This was never really in the running to be recommended to adults, I picked it up mostly because I dug the art style and character designs. I want to say I don’t recommend this book to anyone though, since it annoyed me so much, but if I’m being honest, I know that I would have loved this when I was 10. It wouldn’t have stuck with me long, and I probably would’ve taken the ideas and tried to improve on them, as I did with a lot of cartoons at the time, so the shortcomings wouldn’t have bothered me much. Still, there’s better things out there for kids. Unless there’s something about it that really draws you, I would give this one a pass. A lot of great ideas that just don’t come together in the end.
Up next will be The Intrepid Escapegoat!
There's not really a lot I can say to add to that. Haha!
So…Super Dinosaur.
Super Dinosaur is an action comic written by Robert Kirkman (so I expect mounds of gore coming up in the next few issues...No, I haven’t gotten over "Invincible" yet!) and illustrated by Jason Howard. The title may sound ridiculous, but believe me, the comic embraces that silliness. It embodies a lot about the over-the-top action cartoons of the 80’s and early 90’s, and in fact reminded me most of the original Teenage mutant ninja Turtles cartoon, and I honestly think that’s what it was going for.
Super Dinosaur is actually the name of one of our main characters. The comic follows the “hollow earth” theory and tells us that dinosaurs are still alive and well inside the earth’s crust. A couple of scientists steal a T-Rex egg and mess with it to make the creature smaller (about 9 feet tall ultimately) and smarter than its dino counterparts. Beyond those two changes however, Super Dinosaur (henceforth called “SD” because that’s what the comic does) is still built like a T-Rex, so he has teeny tiny useless arms. The scientists make up for that by creating a harness for him that places larger mechanical arms on his shoulders with controls for the teeny arms to manipulate.
He high fived a T-Rex. What more is there to say?
The scientist who created the harness was hoping to use SD as a prototype for dino weapons which he could build into an army. Scientist #2 and SD himself disagreed and the two scientists parted. The evil scientist continued his experiments, creating human/dinosaur hybrids (of course he did, what else would he do?) to fight for him, leaving SD looking kind of backwards in comparison. Now SD and his companions fight against the other dino hybrids to save the world and protect the element they discovered in the Inner Earth, Dynore - which is almost as ridiculous a name as "unobtanuim", but not quite.
I think you can see now what I meant with the 80’s aesthetic. The dino hybrids all have really ridiculous names like “Terrordactyl” and “Breakeosaurus,” and between them and the ridiculous number of custom harnesses that SD sports it feels just like a cartoon designed to sell toys. You might think I’m poking fun, but I’m not. I actually find it kind of fun. This all feels very intentional, like Kirkman really wanted to recreate that style of action cartoon in this comic. I mean, the constant changing harnesses alone highlight that when, as a comic, it would be pretty unlikely to get a big toy line. This was a comic that said “what do kids like? Kids like cool gadgets/weapons and dinosaurs - LET’S COMBINE THEM!”
I mean seriously, how could anything that has a panel like this go wrong?
Genius
…no really, that’s not rhetorical. I’m asking you, Mr. Kirkman, how did this go wrong?
But perhaps I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s start with what I liked about this comic, and there is a lot to like.
First off is the art. I have no complaints at all about Howard’s art. The action scenes are exciting, the characters are expressive, everything’s easy to follow despite often have a ton of stuff in each panel. The designs are what really steal the show, though. The designs of all the dino hybrids (dino-men in the comic’s lingo) are pretty awesome. There’s even a squid monster who is one of the best designed creatures I’ve ever seen! The gadgets are all really well designed too, but it’s SD himself that I really love to watch. Howard had a challenge of every scene with SD to draw a T-Rex looking as a T-Rex should, with his teeny arms in the right spot and at the controls, and then to draw the huge robotic arms overtop in a way that makes a reader forget for a moment that they aren’t his real arms. And all that added to the ridiculous number of different robotic arms he has for each new scenario - he’s got a regular set, undersea set, cold weather set, heat resistant set, tank set, it just goes on and on, and it never stops being fun to look at.
Only $15.99 at Target, kids!
Some of the characters are fun as well. I like SD himself; he acts like a typical young boy, if a bit more naïve because he doesn’t have many life experiences. It makes sense, and yet is humorously out of place on a 9 foot tall talking dinosaur. It’s easy to sympathize with him and hope for him to succeed.
There are a few other standouts as well, but the only other character I really want to mention is Tricerachops. Stupid name aside, she’s one of the few really interesting dino hybrids. As the name would imply, she’s a triceratops, and an antagonist. She doesn’t seem strongly attached to any of the villains, however, and really seems to have her own agenda and latches on to whoever she thinks will make that a reality. There’s something to be said for the fact that she’s never sexualized either, a rarity for female characters in comics, yes, even in comics aimed at kids. She hasn’t factored into the story in any major way yet, but I’d really like to see more of her.
Even when she breaks her spine, it's still not sexual!
So then what’s the problem with this comic? Well, there’s a few issues I have with it, but the biggest and most obvious goes by the name of Derek Dynamo. Yeeeeaaaaah, remember when I said that SD was “one” of our main characters? This is a “Boy and his X” story where X equals 9-foot-t-rex-that-can-talk. I’m not against those types of stories, in fact I like quite a few of them, but this is our introduction to this character:
Well, I'm sold.
Not seeing the problem? Well, only a few pages later, he goes back home to find his scientist father engrossed in a ridiculously complex equation, but due to memory problems he’s having, he’s unable to finish it. So what does our hero do?
This took you several months to do...so I'll just fix it in five seconds.
Basically, after reading this comic, you would probably have a new appreciation for Wesley Crusher. This kid is obnoxiously good at everything he does. I don’t mind characters who are more capable than normal, in fact I kind of like it, but they still have to have flaws. I’m not kidding when I say this kid is perfect, he’s some kind of genius, a good fighter, and everyone just looooooooves him, even the bad guys! He goes beyond boring and goes right to annoying.
At one point he faces the dilemma of having to take a test, but oh no! There’s bad guys to fight! What to do? Clearly the answer is to go out to fight while mentally connecting to a robot which he will direct to answer the test questions while fighting. Because of course he can do both! And then the illusion falls and the super strict teacher finds out that he snuck out, surely he’ll get in trouble for that, right?
Heaven forbid he actually face consequences for the choices he makes...
And did I mention this fight was over a pit of lava, and is he wearing any protective gear? Of course not. And when SD has trouble with his fight, Derek just jumps in. No problem.
What do they need SD for again?
I generally like main characters, even when they’re boring, I’m pretty okay with them, but this kid just rubs me the wrong way. I feel like he’s meant to be like Johnny Quest with the scientist father and the random adventures, but Johnny Quest wasn’t a super genius or a badass fighter, that what he had his father and Race for. They didn’t give Johnny all the abilities because if he had them, there wouldn’t be any drama, you’d never fear for him. But let’s compare to another “Boy and his X” story: The Iron Giant. Hogarth is portrayed as being smarter than his peers, but he never boasts or brags, and he’s certainly no genius. Instead they spend their time developing Hogarth as an actual character, so he feels like a real person and we’re more invested in his adventure, cheer for him to win and worry for him when he’s in trouble.
…In Super Dinosaur, I find myself cheering for the bad guys, and that’s not good.
Smug bastard.
Speaking of the bad guys, there isn’t really much to them either. I’ve never read a book that had such blandly simple story that was so confusingly complex. Simple because each story seems to be a matter of bad guys are bad, the good guys fight them. Complex because we keep getting a parade of new baddies, each with his own story, but each weirdly similar to the last, and trying to keep them and all their motivations straight while still trying to nail down which one is the main baddie is a pain. With the noted exception of Tricerachops, the dino hybrids aren’t any better. There’s a bunch of them, but they’re all very similar looking and none of them really have strong personalities. They don’t have any standouts like say Rocksteady and Bebop from TMNT, so none of their fights have any real weight. They’re just bland minions and I don’t care about anything around them.
I was really disappointed with this book overall. It’s not that I expected a lot from something called “Super Dinosaur,” but I was really hoping for a book that was at least a fun diversion, especially given the writer. I don’t give Kirkman a hard time because I think he’s a bad writer, I give him a hard time because I know he’s a good one, and I expect better from him. It’s a good quality book on most levels, but there almost seems to be a laziness about how it’s written. Like Kirkman figured this was just for kids and he didn’t have to try.
This was never really in the running to be recommended to adults, I picked it up mostly because I dug the art style and character designs. I want to say I don’t recommend this book to anyone though, since it annoyed me so much, but if I’m being honest, I know that I would have loved this when I was 10. It wouldn’t have stuck with me long, and I probably would’ve taken the ideas and tried to improve on them, as I did with a lot of cartoons at the time, so the shortcomings wouldn’t have bothered me much. Still, there’s better things out there for kids. Unless there’s something about it that really draws you, I would give this one a pass. A lot of great ideas that just don’t come together in the end.
Up next will be The Intrepid Escapegoat!