Jurassic Park Series 2: Pachycephalosaurus

Year of release: 1993-1994

Accessories:

-Three pieces of capture gear

-Collector’s Card # 42

Description: this Pachycephalosaurus stands in a completely neutral pose. Its body is almost totally symmetrical, except for some small details, like the position of the fingers (no less than five of them on each hand, more than most other dinosaur figures). Most notably, there is the round button embedded in the left upper leg. When pressed, this activates the dinosaur’s attack action: the head will move downward, as if it’s giving a head butt. The animal resembles a kangaroo with its large feet and arms, but it has a bizarre head covered with bumps and little spikes, and of course a large bald head dome. A row of bumps can be found on the neck, while several more of them run over its back and tail.

This figure sports a very fiery paint job, mostly because of the abundance of red and the bright yellow scheme on its head. Its back and the upper part of its tail are black, with small black stripes running out of it. It also has a black circular pattern with more black stripes on both upper legs, and additional black stripes on its neck. The sides of its face, around its small orange eyes (with cat like red pupils) are also black, while the top part of the head (snout, head dome, all the bumps and spikes and a stripe under each eye) is yellow. The creature's underside (throat, belly, inner part of both legs and lower part of the tail) is beige. The remaining parts of this figure (flanks, arms, rest of the legs, head, tail and neck) is dark red (including the button on its left leg). Pachy has black claws on both fingers and toes, and a yellow JP logo is found on the upper left section of its tail, with the number .14 next to it.

Three pieces of capture gear come with this set to restrain this dinosaur. There's the tag, the small cuff with the JP logo on it, which fits around the figure's legs, arms or tail. Second, there's the limb restraint, in the shape of an X, which subdues arms and legs simultaneously. Lastly, there's the head gear, which mostly covers the face (more importantly, the eyes and the spikes and bumps on its snout), with straps going over its neck to keep it a tight fit. The head restraint is made of a softer material than the other capture gear.

Analysis: this is a very cool addition to the existing line of figures, sporting a good paint job, hinting at the aggressive personality of this dinosaur, a don't-mess-with-me attitude, underscored by the Pachy's fierce head butting action. This attack option, though a Pachycephalosaurus cliché, works fine, though with some figures the button gets stuck, making the attack action harder to perform. The button is well “hidden”, it doesn't get in the way but it's still easy to find (unlike on the repaint Pachys, which feature buttons sticking out of the leg, as if there's something wrong with them). The head butting knocks over any smaller figures it comes into contact with (it's especially well suited for human figures), though it's best to lower its arms when using it, because they tend to get in the way otherwise.

This dinosaur comes with three pieces of capture gear. Like with the other dinosaur figures of the JPS2 toy line, there's the tag (which seems an obligatory item, as if the JP logo on the dinosaurs itself isn't sufficient). The Pachy's tag is rather small, and as such a nuisance since it often gets lost and makes complete loose samples harder to find. The other accessories at least serve a function. The leg restraint secures both arms and legs, making sure the beastie doesn't run off, or uses its arms to hurt people. The head piece covers the eyes, so the creature can't see what's going on around him, as well as the sharp little spikes on its snout. However, its doesn't stop the Pachy from head butting, which is still effective enough to deal severe blows to figures at close range, despite the softer material of the head piece. At least the animal can't see what he's hitting.

Playability: this figure provides for some fine playability. It’s fully poseable (arms, legs and head can be moved, and even the tail can be twisted around though it does look stupid), and stands in as neutral a position as you could hope for. The head butting action works well in most cases. The capture gear does add something in the case of the head and limbs restraints, but the tag is basically pointless (as it is for most dinosaur figures that come with one). There is no dinosaur-breaks-free-of-restraints action involved though.

Realism: this figure is clearly recognizable as a Pachycephalosaurus, mostly because of its grotesque head. Pachycephalosaurus wasn't featured in the first movie, but would be in The Lost World film. This figure looks somewhat different from the Pachy seen in that movie though: that one was smaller by comparison and had a different colour scheme. This figure is also small for Pachy standards (adult Pachycephalosaurs were at least twice as big), but it does look quite accurate in all other regards.

Repaint: no, this dinosaur was a new addition to Kenner's existing range of figures. It would be repainted twice, once for The Lost World Series 1, and again for the JPD1 'Pachycephalosaurus with Dinosaur Trainer' set. In both cases the JPS2 Pachy's capture gear was absent: the TLWS1 Pachy came with brand new accessories, while the JPD1 version had no capture gear at all.

Overall rating: 9/10. This is a very good and pretty accurate figure with a solid but predictable attack action, a sweet paint job and a decent set of capture gear. It's one of the more common JPS2 dinosaurs, but since it's been only released in the USA (though it also seems to have had an extremely limited release in Europe) it's not easily available in most territories. You may have to search for it, but it's definitely worth tracking down.