Iguanodon and Skorpiovenator (Jurassic World: Roarin’ Battle Pack by Mattel)

I initially wasn’t planning on acquiring either the Mattel Iguanodon or Skorpiovenator for my children’s dinosaur collection, but back in February 2024, Amazon Canada put the Roarin’ Battle Pack on sale for $26.94, which in this country is three dollars less than the retail price of a single toy in the Roarivores/Roar Strikers/Wild Roar size category. And, well, it just felt like too good of a deal to pass up.

The original version of the Skorpiovenator has already been reviewed here, so I’ll get this one out of the way first. The electronic roaring sounds are the same as they were before. The main colour is now medium brown with greenish-beige for the underbelly, the arms, and the lower jaw. The inside of the mouth is dull pink with off white teeth. Finally, the eyes are orange and the markings on the head, neck, and rib cage are light brown.

It’s a fairly decent and realistic colour scheme, but if I must choose, I think I prefer the blue and yellow of the original toy.

With fellow abelisaurs Carnotaurus, Majungasaurus, and Rajasaurus.

Now we turn to the Iguanodon. This one is sculpted in a quadrupedal stance with the head raised up and the tail held aloft. From nose to tail tip, it measures just under 31 cm long and stands around 10.5 cm tall, which makes it one of the largest Iguanodon toys to date.

With the Wild Safari and CollectA Deluxe figures.

The main colour here is a very pale greenish yellow with greenish brown applied to the bill, the bottom of the lower jaw, and the throat. Dull brown markings adorn the top of the skull, the back of the neck, and the upper part of the torso. There are also minuscule dots of brown scattered all over the body. The similarly minuscule eyes are black. As far as Mattel dinosaurs’ colour schemes go, this is one of the least vibrant and exciting ones, but so was the original version’s. I’m honestly not sure which is the better one.

The Iguanodon’s head is on a ball joint, allowing it to tilt upwards as well as rotate 360 degrees in either direction. The arms have universal shoulder joints and the legs rotate at the hips, but the toy sadly cannot be posed rearing up on two legs. Pushing down on the back causes the head and neck to lower and activates a series of loud bellows, growls, and grunts. An alright gimmick, but certainly not as satisfying as chomping theropod jaws or bucking ceratopsian heads or swinging thyreophoran tails.

The slide-up scan code is mounted in the toy’s back just past the hips and the JW logo is etched into the sole of the right hind foot. The skin features the usual pebbled scale pattern with grooves on the beak and thick wrinkles on the neck and along the flanks. There are also rows of scutes covering the upper arms and the shins and thighs, which is an unusual but kind of cool touch. The head, neck, body, and hind limbs have more or less the correct appearance for an iguanodont, although the former has some unfortunate shrink-wrapping going on.

The same can most definitely not be said about the front limbs, however. First, the arms are too short; the real Iguanodon boasted significantly longer arms than those of hadrosaurs. And second, the hands are a disaster, pure and simple. A proper Iguanodon hand should have a small fifth digit, larger fourth, third, and second digits fused together as a “mitten,” and finally, of course, a thumb with a large spike jutting out of it. Iguanodon has been famous for its thumb spikes ever since scientists determined that they weren’t on its nose instead. They were mentioned in every single dinosaur book I owned as a child. They are as integral to Iguanodon’s appearance as the head of Tyrannosaurus rex or the plates and spikes of Stegosaurus or the pointed crest of Pteranodon. This we all know full well.

But on this Iguanodon toy, each hand features a tiny thumb spike flattened against the hand, two large clawed digits for walking on, and then a fourth digit with a claw that is larger than the spike! Utter shambles, no two ways about it. We also all know full well by now of Mattel’s shoddy track record when it comes to sculpting correct feet on their sauropods and ornithischians, but again, given how famous Iguanodon is for its thumb spikes, I really do feel that it is inexcusable here. Someone could and should have done a better job.

Overall, the Mattel Iguanodon is a mixed bag. The colour scheme is nothing to write home about and the botched hands will undoubtedly drag it way down in the eyes of many older collectors. However, it is nevertheless an ornithopod toy, and such variety is always welcome in a line largely dominated by toothy theropods. It’s also fairly fun to play with, and I doubt very many children will be that upset by the hands. As for the Skorpiovenator, I agree with the conclusions reached in the original version’s review: it’s quite a solid toy, and the new colour is decent enough. Bottom line: this set is a definite bargain for the price I bought it for.