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Walking with Dinosaurs

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Walking with Dinosaurs was a six-part television series produced by BBC and aired first in the UK in 1999. The series intended to show the life and times of these fascinating reptiles right from their earliest beginnings in the mid - Triassic, right up to their Cretaceous-Paleogene Boundary cataclysmic demise at the end of the Cretaceous, 66 million years ago (in the series, the extinction was said to be 65.5 million years ago, since at the time of the production, it was believed that it occurred a bit later). Produced by director Tim Haines, the series used advanced CGI and animatronic technology, and is now renowned as being one of the best prehistoric documentaries made to date.

Episodes[]

New Blood[]

Arizona, 220 000 000 BC The first episode, set in the Arizona of the late Triassic, tells of a time when the dinosaur group had yet to gain a sure footing in the Mesozoic ecosystem. the episode highlights the lives of a group of Coelophysis, a reasonably well known early theropod, which is presented as being a relatively adaptable and flexible creature, opportunistic hunter, and occasional cannibal (this assumption is now known to be false, with recent scientific study revealing that what had appeared to be the bones of a younger specimen within that of an adult, were in fact two separate skeletons that had perished on top of each other, and been compressed into one). The episode then details the decline of the other animals such as the Placerias, who are gradually being ousted from the Triassic ecosystem by such large grazers as the sauropodomorph Plateosaurus, following the demise of an adult Postosuchus - then the top of the food chain - through attack by a rival as well as various clips detailing the life of a pair of cycodonts and their desperate bid to raise a family, the episode concludes with the return of the rains, whilst a group of migrating Plateosaurus return to the plain, bringing 'new blood' to the starved landscape.

Featured Prehistoric Animals (in order of appearance)

Time of the Titans[]

Colorado, 152 000 000 BC The second episode jumps forward to the late Jurassic period, when dinosaurs have well and truly taken over. It is set in Colorado, which, back then, was filled with giant conifers and, in a time without grass, fern prairies. The central creature is the sauropod Diplodocus, a long-necked herbivore. The episode follows a female throughout her life, from her mother laying eggs at the forest edge. She hatches, escapes an Ornitholestes, and follows her siblings into the forest. She grows quickly, encountering Allosaurus, Stegosaurus, and Brachiosaurus, before finding an adult herd.

Featured Prehistoric Animals (in order of appearance)

  • Diplodocus ("double beam") - a 115 ft long sauropod that hatched from eggs the size of a grapefruit.
  • Anurognathus ("tailless jaw") - a small pterosaur that is shown to feed off insects that rest on the bodies of Diplodocus.
  • Unknown ornithischians (possibly Nanosaurus and/or Dryosaurus) - small herbivores appearing in three short scenes.
  • Ornitholestes ("bird robber") - an egg thief related to the reptiles that would evolve into birds.
  • Stegosaurus ("roof lizard") - a 29.5 ft long herbivore with back plates that served as armor and 4 tail spikes (thagomizers) the size of baseball bats.
  • Damselfly.
  • Dung beetle.
  • Allosaurus ("other lizard") - a 27 ft long, carnivorous theropod, called the "Lions of the Jurassic".
  • Brachiosaurus ("arm lizard") - a gigantic sauropod reaching 43 ft tall, and 70 ft long, and sharing the plains with Diplodocus.

Cruel Sea[]

Oxfordshire, 149 000 000 BC Still in the Jurassic (Oxfordshire), we see the oceans of prehistory and a group of young Ophthalmosaurus having to face sharks, the largest predator of all time and a blast from mother nature.

Featured Prehistoric Animals (in order of appearance)

  • Eustreptospondylus ("well-curved vertebra") - one of the few dinosaurs to inhabit the European islands.
  • Liopleurodon ("smooth-sided tooth") - a predatory sea reptile that weighed 150 tons and reached 82 feet long.
  • Cryptoclidus ("hidden collar-bone") - an agile sea reptile with four flippers.
  • Unnamed ammonite.
  • Jellyfish.
  • Leptolepis (identified as "fish") - a small teleost.
  • Ophthalmosaurus ("eye lizard") - a dolphin-like sea reptile.
  • Rhamphorhynchus ("beak snout") - a small pterosaur that fed on fish, eggs and insects.
  • Hybodus ("humped tooth") - an ancient shark-like fish (incorrectly called a shark)
  • Unidentified dead turtle.
  • Bark beetle.
  • Squid.
  • Mesolimus.

Giant of the Skies[]

Brazil — North America — Europe, 127 000 000 BC In the early Cretaceous period, Ornithocheirus rules the skies and one male attempts to return to the place where he was born to mate. He's got a long way to go. He doesn't mate and dies.

Featured Prehistoric Animals (in order of appearance)

  • Ornithocheirus ("bird hand") - a pterosaur with a 40 ft wingspan.
  • Tapejara ("old being") - a Brazilian pterosaur.
  • Dakotadon ("Dakotan tooth", identified as North American Iguanodon) - an ornithopod that inhabited North America.
  • Gastonia ("Gaston’s animal", identified as Polacanthus in international version and as Gastonia in US version) - an armored herbivore dinosaur from North America.
  • Wasp.
  • Saurophthirus (unnamed) - a parasite related to fleas.
  • Unknown pterosaur (possibly Caulkicephalus) - a pterosaur that gets its fish stolen by the Ornithocheirus.
  • Plesiopleurodon ("near-sided tooth", unnamed) - a carnivorous plesiosaur.
  • Iguanodon ("iguana tooth") - a large herbivore armed with two thumb spikes and was among the first to chew their food.
  • Polacanthus ("many spines") - an armored traveling companion of Iguanodon.
  • Utahraptor ("thief from Utah") - a 20 ft long dromaeosaur that weighed half a ton.
  • Iberomesornis ("bird from central Spain") - a small forest bird.

Spirits of the Ice Forest[]

Antarctica, 106 000 000 BC In the middle of the Cretaceous, Antarctica was filled with lush forests that included no night summers and pitch black winters, but what evolved to live there?

Featured Prehistoric Animals (in order of appearance)

  • Leaellynasaura (named after the daughter of the scientists who discovered the species) - a herbivore the size of a small turkey that's able to survive the harshest winters.
  • Koolasuchus ("crocodile of Kool") - a hibernating amphibian that attacks like a crocodile.
  • “Polar allosaur” (possibly Australovenator)- a smaller relative of Jurassic theropods.
  • Muttaburrasaurus ("lizard from Muttaburra") - a 4 ton herbivore with a trumpet-like nose.
  • Steropodon - an egg laying mammal that ate eggs.
  • Weta.
  • A modern tuatara.
  • Fly.

Death of a Dynasty[]

Montana, 65 500 000 BC As the end of the Cretaceous, a female Tyrannosaurus raises the offspring and protects them from smaller predators. Severely injured in a collision with an Ankylosaurus, she dies at the foot of a volcano. Her babies, along with many other non-avian dinosaurs and large reptiles, die after the fall of a giant comet.

In the epilogue, events are transferred to the present day and the modern African savannah is shown.

Featured Prehistoric Animals (in order of appearance)

Specials[]

After the success of the success of the series, BBC produced 4 specials. The first was called "The Ballad of Big Al" which showed the life of an Allosaurus named Al. The other 3 made up "Chased by Dinosaurs" which starred Nigel Marven.

The Ballad of Big Al[]

Shows the 6 year life of an Allosaurus named Al in a world of danger. main animals:

Chased By Dinosaurs[]

This spin-off shows Nigel Marven traveling throughout several periods of time seeing dinosaurs not shown in Walking with Dinosaurs.

The Giant Claw

In the first part, Nigel travels to Mongolia, 75 million years ago to find "The Giant Claw" dinosaur. Main animals:

Land of Giants

In the second part, Nigel foes to Argentina 125 million years ago to find one of the largest dinosaurs ever. Main animals:

Sea Monsters: A Walking with Dinosaurs Trilogy[]

Nigel travels to seven different epochs to find the 7 deadliest seas of all time.

Walking with dinosaurs - the live experience[]

Following the success of the walking with series, an independent theatre and animatronics group , with full endorsement on the part of the BBC, has now created a live show, which is at this moment completing its US tour, and is set to arrive in the United Kingdom in late June 2009. the show, which includes eleven species of fully automated dinosaurs, has been met with great approval in both Australia and the USA, with even Tim Haines, the director of the original TV documentary, jumping the bandwagon and offering his full endorsement, despite original skepticism.

Inaccuracies and Outdated Material[]

While some facts in this docuseries may have been true for its time, the growth of knowledge regarding the subjects have helped better understand the animals than how they were depicted in 1999; some information, even for the time, was still wrong, and will also be listed below.

Outdated[]

  • All theropods in the series have pronated wrists, facing downwards. It is now known that theropod hands would've faced inwards rather than down.
  • Throughout the first episode, non mammalian synapsids (or stem-mammals) are referred to as reptiles. While this was true at the time however it is now known that mammals evolved separately from reptiles, meaning the synapsids shown in the show were not reptiles.
  • Plateosaurus and Postosuchus are portrayed as quadrupeds, an outdated reconstruction. The two are now known to be bipeds.
  • When pterosaurs in the series land on their ground, their wings fold to the side, rather than backwards. This orientation is now understood to have broken their bones if they were to fold this way.
  • Cryptoclidus is shown resting on rocks in a similar manner to seals and turtles. This is an outdated idea and it is now believed that they were fully marine.
  • The show's Utahraptor lacks any form of feathers, however it is now known that feathers were present in all Dromaeosaurs.
  • The species of Ornithocheirus featured in the show, O. mesembrinus, has been reclassified to its own genus; Tropeognathus.
  • The final episode portrays the dinosaurs slowly going extinct from volcanic activity, however it is now known that life was thriving at the end of the Cretaceous.
  • Tyrannosaurus is stated to be 5 tonnes, however large specimens show maximum sizes of 8-10 tonnes.
  • Dromaeosaurus lacks feathers, which it most certainly had in real life.
  • Anatotitan is an invalid genus and synonym of Edmontosaurus annectens.
  • The Cretaceous-Paleogene extinction is now understood to have happened around 66 million years ago rather than 65.

Inaccuracies[]

  • Many animals in the show are "shrink-wrapped", meaning they are portrayed with very little fat or muscle content, whereas they would have had much more meat on their bones in real life.
  • Leaellynasaura is shown with a tail much shorter than its real life tail.
  • Large pterosaurs such as Quetzalcoatlus were not the only pterosaurs to survive until the end of the Cretaceous. The nyctosaurids and possibly the pteranodontids also survived up until the end of the Cretaceous.
  • Steropodon is live acted by a coati, despite being a monotreme. Although it is possible that it had some similarities to a coati, it is highly unlikely it would've looked exactly like one.
  • Placerias was not the last dicynodont. Dicynodonts would survive for another 14 million years after the extinction of Placerias.
  • Utahraptor is only known from North America, but is shown living in Europe.
  • In the international version, the North American ankylosaurs from the 4th episode is identified as Polacanthus, however Polacanthus did not live in North America, instead being restricted to Europe. In the US version, the animal is identified as Gastonia, an ankylosaur that did live in North America at the time.
  • Brachiosaurus was not the largest land animal ever, larger sauropods from the Cretaceous were significantly larger than Brachiosaurus.
  • Hybodus was not a true shark despite being called one.
  • Ornithocheirus only had a wingspan of about 5 meters, rather than 12, which is how big the show's version is.
  • Thrinaxodon lived during the early Triassic and had gone extinct by the events of the first episode.
  • Liopleurodon is heavily over sized and stated to be around 25 meters in length. The real animal is only believed to have been 5-7 meters in length.
  • Anurognathus is only known from Europe, but is shown living in the Morrison formation.
  • Stegosaurus's neck is slightly shorter than their real life counterparts.
  • Dragonflies evolved in the Jurassic, whereas the show states they evolved before the dinosaurs.
  • Didelphodon was not a true marsupial but instead a relative.
  • The tuatara did not evolve until the Miocene, but is shown living in the Cretaceous, 106 million years ago.

Trivia[]

  • The sequence of the Ophthalmosaurus jumping out of the water & diving back in was a footage of a Bottlenose Dolphin taken from the 1984 BBC Documentary “The Living Planet” with David Attenborough.
  • The scene where the tuatara emerges from the burrow hunting for a weta was stock footage from the 1987 PBS NATURE Program “Land of the Kiwi”. The same footage was also seen on the 1994 EYEWITNESS episode “Reptile”.
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