Having already covered two of the line’s highlights with the Edaphosaurus and Eryops it’s time to look at one of the more mundane toys in Diener’s series of rubber erasers, the Dimetrodon. Like the two previously reviewed toys the Dimetrodon hails from the Red Beds of Texas, which makes in a fitting toy to round out this trio, but since Dimetrodon has been done to death its makes this rather generic toy hard to get excited about.
Generic is the operative word here, as this Dimetrodon bears little resemblance to the actual animal it represents. It’s just a typical lizard body with reptilian head that could’ve been tacked onto any other basic lizard or dinosaur toy. I suppose all that really matters is that it has the sail but considering how excellent the Edaphosaurus turned out it’s a shame that the Dimetrodon didn’t receive any extra love. I’m not trying to get persnickety about a cheap 50 year old eraser though and the rest of the Diener prehistoric animals are similarly crude and outdated in an admittedly charming way. That’s why we collect them!
The fine detail work is admirable though, with individually discernable teeth within the toy’s slightly open grimace, nostrils, eyes sunken within a furrowed brow, and ear openings. Thick folds of skin run along the neck, and the body has a pebbly, toad-like texture. The tail has worm-like grooves running down its length. The sail is supported by thick spines and the skin in between them has fish-like rays carved into it. The toy is practically flat but capable of standing thanks to the feet on either side being fused together.
My copy of the Dimetrodon, like all of my Diener toys, is salmon pink but these toys came in many monochrome colors including brown, gray, red, blue, green, yellow, and purple. A version of the Dimetrodon exists with a hole on the underside so you can stick it on a pencil. Some Diener toys came in two sizes but I’m not sure if the Dimetrodon did. I can only find images of the large one. It measures 3” (7.62 cm) long which puts it between 1/24-1/60 in scale when scaled down from the 6-15’ length (1.7-4.6 meters) of most Dimetrodon species. Does anyone actually care about the scale of these things though?
The Diener Dimetrodon isn’t anything special but will have nostalgic charm to those that grew up in the latter half of the 20th century. I had a few of these as a kid, including one that I bit a chunk of the sail off for “dino-damage” effect and I’m happy to have one in my collection again.
All articles on the Dinosaur Toy Blog are written without the use of ‘AI’
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