Mesozoic Mind

Hello, and welcome back to Mesozoic Mind. Let's begin again, to close out winter with an ice age palaeodoc! L.A. 10,000 BC is another one of those forgotten documentaries from the early 2000's. Naturally its from Discovery Channel. Man, I really need to branch out more and watch other docus not owned by a certain conglomerate now.... The docu's premise is of using Hollywood stuntmen (Greg Fitzpatrick, Cheryl Lawson, and Richard Bucher) to demonstrate how ancient Indeginous people would have survived and even hunted the megafauna in Reality show-style challenges. Wow, the 2000s were something else.  We first see three people, played by the stuntmen, having bad days as the narrator talks up how no matter how bad it seems to get these days, the past was way more difficult when all the megafauna were still around... and then its completely forgotten. It's a shame, as I feel like a potential set up of snooty rich folk getting a taste of real survival would be a novel premis...

 Season's Greetings and Happy Holidays folks! As a christmas day gift, I'll give you all a follow up to last week's post, where I show you sonething made new fashioned out of something old: concepts for new episodes of Dinosaur Planet that fix the balance issues I voiced last time! I'm setting them on landmasses that weren't in the original series' lineup These two episode concepts were actually concieved in 2020 before I even got the idea to start the blog. I've decided to update them with what I know now. They're a what if? excersise, and I will write the episodes as if I were in 2003, using sources and information from at least before that year and nothing after, though there won't be much concern for budget from both Meteor Studios and Evergreen Films, as it is my imagination. Before we get started, I'd like to offer a special thanks to Deviantart user ThalassoAtrox , for inspiring me to write these after seeing a rundown of Dinosaur Planet ...

Happy holidays, folks! We're bringing out the big guns for this holiday special with a celebration of a great palaeo-documentary close to my heart and has turned 20 years old this month, Discovery Channel's Dinosaur Planet , from 2003! Dinosaur Planet is one of my all time favourite palaeo-documentary, and for good reasons. They were some of the first docs I saw as a kid, seen via Youtube and while I didn't watch them in full until much later, I loved the introes alone. Also, I had much fun with the Dino Viewer on Discovery's website, seeing both the run cycles and the "dun-dun" sound switching tabs on it made. Oh what joy it brought me, now lost to to mists of time as many a species through time were, an ironic fate considering the subject matter. As for the series itself, it's in the WWD-style format of being a nature documentrary presentation which I always love, building off the formula When Dinosaurs Roamed America did. The designs of the fauna crea...

Hello and welcome back to Mesozoic Mind. I've decided I'm going back to doing what I do best: obscure documentaries few have heard of. In this case, we once again return to the early 2000's with another Discovery Channel doc, titled  Mega Predators *.  * Just note I'm not sure if its 2001 (which I've seen given elsewhere) or 2004, which I've seen elsewhere, hence why no date is given here. If anyone could clarify which is which, that would be great. This documentary produced by one Rubin-Tarrat Productions focuses on predators of the Cenozoic and what made them deadly hunters. In many ways,  Mega Predators  feels like a predecessor to the much-reviled awesombro Discovery series  Monsters Resurrected . The focus on carnivores and how they hunt and kill prey. The random scenes of them in the present killing people. The hyperbolic treatment of them as monstrous killers and how they would hurt us: you will find them all there in Mega Predators , hell even a few spec...

At Mesozoic Mind I have written (or at least tried to write about) very obscure documentaries few have heard about or remember, as a way to stand out. However, today's subject is a very, very obscure one, as in "literally never heard of it before" and "No one else ever did": Dino Wars . This was a Discovery Channel doc from 2005. The only evidence for it was this schedule screenshot found by someone in the Discord server I frequent trawling for other Lost Media related to Dinosaur Planet , and finding this schedule there. "Cold Case"? Ugh, the irony here.... And this is all we have. No screenshots, no press releases, no DVD releases nor clip let alone that was once on Youtube at some point, nothing on Internert Archive. No known species in it. No nothing. Literally nothing else is known save the date, November 5, 2005. No wonder everyone forgot it so soon. It's Lost Media. I didn't even know about it until last year thanks to that Discord user...

We made it to 75 posts and 10,000 views and beyond everyone! To celebrate that and the launch of the new Mesozoic Mind Discord server (oh yeah, that's now a thing), here is a two-in-one: a new instalment of Palaeo-Redo, and a new Random Palaeo-Work idea of the Day. First up is Palaeo-Redo , this time if my selected work were made by me or updated. This time, what better to commemorate the start of my blog writings then my first big breakthroughs, Dino Lab  and  Cameron and his Dinosaurs . My idea for Dino Lab  (both I and II) is to make it a full series about six episodes long set on a whole campus, with both indoor and outdoor facilities to conduct the experiments with the dinosaurs, not just indoor ones that just raise all sorts of welfare concerns I have with the present version. Each episode and the experiments within them would focus on a different topic. Senses Locomotion Feeding and Hunting Sociality Communication Internal Organs The expanded runtime woul...

Hello, and welcome back to Mesozoic Mind . Have you ever noticed a reccuring thing in your favoyrite genre but no one ever discusses? I have, and I'd like to do that. Dinosaurs (andotherprehistoriclife) living in our modern, anthropocene world is very common in palaeo-media. The most common way is either time-travel, the Lost World trope of isolated lands, or genetic ressurection, or even whatever phlebotinum is at hand, magic or scientific. However, it usually reserved for hard fiction: books, games, and movies all apply, but never documentaries, based in rigorous science and truth, which stick to their respective time periods for portraying life. Right? Right ? RAAIIIIGHT ? Palaeo-documentaries have actually had a long history of showing prehistory in our time, which primarily occupies the 2000's onwards, particularly during the latter period of it. It's always entertaining to watch prehistory walk about our cities or chase us dumb apes, but what is the meaning of it? The...