This year, we see the 30th anniversary of the release of Jurassic Park: the original, and in my opinion, the best offering from the 6 movies in the franchise.
Last year, I brought you an overview of LEGO Dinosaur sets over the years. The sets are due for release in June, but 5 sets in the series have been revealed today, with one, 75961 Jurassic Park Visitor Centre, available to preorder from March 8, 2023. Scroll down for more details and pricing:
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It’s the mid 90’s, Ann (Knoller-in-Chief and fundamental emotional support for The Rambling Brick) and I are visiting some friends: she is a former work colleague of Ann’s. He is an audiophile, and has just bought a brand new CD Player, sound processor and a sub-woofer. We are listening to a demonstration CD including a collection of recordings, including amongst other things, the 1812 Overture – one of the gold standards up to this time for testing the bass response of your Hi-Fi system. Included on the CD is an audio extract from Jurassic Park – from around the 1 hour, 2 minutes and 10 second mark. The sound of running water – the rain – and a low frequency boom. Another. And Another. The glass of wine on the table starts to vibrate, and I am taken back to that night in the cinema a few years earlier. Lightning flashes, thunder sounds, and the Dinosaur roars before the track ends and the sound shifts onto the Blue Danube. At least I think it was the Blue Danube. It was a while ago and I was having a delightful evening.
But that scene: drama and danger, screaming and the shouting preceded by a low ground vibration remains one of the iconic scenes of the film. The T.Rex breaks through the no-longer-electrified fences, scaring the kids, eating the insurance company’s lawyer and knocking the car hither and tho. This new set, available in late April/early May, 2022 (pre order now on LEGO.com in some markets), has 4 minifigures and 1212 pieces. I am grateful to the LEGO Group’s AFOL Engagement team for sending me a copy for early review.
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The overnight announcement of the previously unannounced LEGO® Jurassic World Dominion sets left be remembering how I used to want nothing more than a toy Dinosaur. Since then, dinosaurs have become a mainstay of the LEGO range, never taking more than a couple of years off. I take a bit of time surveying the history of LEGO Dinosaur sets, from the mid 90s to the forthcoming Dominion releases.
Back in the day, I was dead keen on Dinosaurs. I couldn’t get enough of them. Except, living in a rural town in Australia in the mid-1970s, the best I could hope for was my Ladybird book of Prehistoric Animals and Fossils. Much of the included information is outdated or at least wildly inaccurate except, perhaps, for the fact that the Tyrannosaurus Rex ate meat.
This book strongly recommended trying to get some dinosaur models or toys and building a diorama using chicken wire, papier mache and a few sticks. Of course, these models were not readily available, and it was not until 1976, visiting Melbourne, that we found some plastic model kits. My brother got a brontosaurus(as it was then called) and I picked up an ankylosaurus.
After putting it together and painting it, I glued it to a piece of wood, along with a few pieces of pine bark and a cardboard panel cut from the box, giving some of the animal’s vital statistics. I probably kept it until I was about 30. I can’t find any images of it these days but 7-year-old me was really proud. This obsession with dinosaurs probably lasted until Star Wars was released. But that’s another story.
Fast forward to 1992 and the release of the first Jurassic Park movie, and I remember wondering through Toys R Us, feeling somewhat sad that there were so many dinosaur toys on the shelves. As I was still a struggling student, I avoided diving down that rabbit hole. Now, LEGO® Dinosaurs have a more recent history – with serious sets dating back to around the turn of the century. Join me as we take a look at the Dinosaur sets of the past, before looking at the sets due to be released in April 2022
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When the original Jurassic park film was released, a little over 25 years ago, it was one of the most impressive films I had ever seen, for the sheer scale of spectacle. Dinosaurs have always been impressive creatures, whatever your age, but the LEGO dinosaurs seen in the sets of recent years, while fun, have lacked a certain spectacle of scale. More a case of click in the legs, head and tail:”Rrrrrooooooaaarrrr, curse your inevitable betrayal.”
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