I just returned from the new touring show Walking With Dinosaurs: The Live Experience. Ninety minutes of life-sized animatronic robot dinos, lots of smoke, and puppetry—yeah! It’s the closest thing you’ll get to seeing real live dinos. Best ones of the show: Brachiosaurus and Torosaurus.
The show is definitely light on the science and heavy on the spectacle—but who cares! Action moves to suit the younger dinophiles. The look of the dinosaurs is also pretty mainstream and lacks some of the more interesting modern theories (for instance, no feathers on the raptors), but the combination of artistry and engineering alone on the dinosaur figures should appeal to all ages. The figures move with near biological accuracy. Much work went into making these creations appear authentic. The video below gives you an idea of the development work involved in the creation of these beasts.
Like the cgi television show, Walking With Dinosaurs, the live show spans the three major periods of dinosaur evolution (Triassic, Jurassic, and Cretaceous) and features a few of the more familiar dinos from each locked in (relatively) slow-moving battle for supremacy. (And if my digital camera had not given up the ghost only days ago, I would have pictures!)
Both geeklets (8 and 4) were riveted. I thought my 4-year-old was going to wet his pants. He also impressed several fellow spectators around us as he shouted out the correct names of each emerging dino before the on-stage ringmaster did (I’m so proud). Now, if I can only convince him that Daddy can’t make one, we’ll be all set…
