We’re off on another adventure filled to the brim with disappointment. 20 films I’ve never seen before, all free to stream, all dinosaur-based.

Oh god.

Planet Raptor (2007) Tubi

Just how bad is the CG? Horrendous.

Sexy scientist? Yep.

Mumbo jumbo? Alien termite Ren fair raptors.

I got tricked by seeing a couple of names I recognized (Steven Bauer, Ted Raimi, Vanessa Angel) and ended up hate-watching this exercise in dull stupidity. A sequel to the possibly worse Raptor Island, this one pits a platoon of inept space marines against a medieval planet full of dinosaurs, lovingly rendered using PS2 graphics.

There’s some practical gore and a couple of puppet raptor close-ups that aren’t terrible, but the plot is as dumb as a wasp enema and the acting is limper than a Taco Bell lettuce shred. Angel, as Dr. Zipper McBlankstare, does nothing, and Raimi skulks around as suspiciously as he can muster. The rest of the red shirts make poor decisions and die by being nudged to death with rubber snouts.

Rubbish.

3/10

Dinosaurus! (Universal International, 1960), and Age of Dinosaurs (The Asylum, 2013)

Dinosaurus! (1960) Prime

Just how bad is the CG? No CG.

Sexy scientist? Nope.

Mumbo jumbo? Reanimated dinosaurs, caveman.

A gently bonkers entry in the ‘small child befriends giant monster’ genre, Dinosaurus! tells a simple story (island construction wakes up some beasts and a caveman) and liberally sprinkles in every racial stereotype you could imagine. Par for the course for a sixty year old flick, so I’m not complaining. The caveman is played fully for comic relief and the dinosaurs, a wrongly named Brontosaurus and a T-Rex, are charming puppets for some of the film, and charming stop-motion for the rest. It’s all rather charming. 60% daft, 40% dull, 100% perfect rubbish.

6/10

Age of Dinosaurs (2013) YouTube

Just how bad is the CG? A couple of half decent shots.

Sexy scientist? Nope.

Mumbo jumbo? Genetic clones.

Treat Williams and Ronny Cox are the genre veterans that might have possibly saved this, but the dodgy dinosaurs, spotty acting and clunky direction relegate it to the C-list. The multitudes of monsters are mostly rendered in weightless CG, but there are a couple of puppets used early on that are not at all bad, and the filmmakers certainly had some bronto-balls to try to pull off some bold set pieces. Ultimately, it’s not great but it’s loud and daft, and that’s all I’m asking for at this point.

6/10

Triassic World (The Asylum, 2018), and The Dinosaur Experiment (Nu Imagination, 2012)

Triassic World (2018) YouTube

Just how bad is the CG? Not utterly terrible.

Sexy scientist? Yep.

Mumbo jumbo? Cloning smart dinos for organs.

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom was all the rage, so The Asylum stepped up to the plate with this slice of hokum. Actually, for an Asylum flick, it’s not too bad. It’s played straight and everyone in it is very earnest. It brings nothing new to the table, as various morsels find themselves trapped in a lab with a clever lizard, and they don’t take long to turn on each other. Dr. Perky McTrankdart tries to keep it all together, but some terrible decisions quickly lead to messy nom noms courtesy of the sometimes practical gojirasaurus, all shot in gory close up. I didn’t hate it.

6/10

The Dinosaur Experiment aka Raptor Ranch (2012) Tubi

Just how bad is the CG? Not the worst.

Sexy scientist? Nope. Sexy everything but.

Mumbo jumbo? Resurrected dinosaurs.

There are only two phrases that are able to strike terror into the hearts of B-movie purveyors: ‘horror-comedy’ and ‘Uncork’d Pictures’. For this offering, the premise is simple; gather a random collection of cartoonish stereotypes in a backwater location, and let the animals loose. By now you should know what to expect, so let’s highlight some details. The name attached to this is the stalwart Lorenzo Lamas, who did about two days of filming as an X-files type. The lead is a Grammy and Nammy nominated Native American singer, Jana Mashonee, and she’s pretty good, but she ultimately serves the same purpose as every other female character, eye candy for the redneck horndogs and frat boy cyphers.

It’s rubbish, but it’s occasionally entertaining rubbish, and I’ll take that as a win.

5/10

Jurassic Thunder (High Octane Studios, 2019), and Jurassic City (Vertical Entertainment, 2015)

Jurassic Thunder (2019) Tubi

Just how bad is the CG? Shockingly bad.

Sexy scientist? Nope.

Mumbo jumbo? Comic books, zombies, weaponized dinosaurs.

Utter shite.

0/10

Jurassic City (2015) Tubi

Just how bad is the CG? Pretty bad.

Sexy scientist? Nope.

Mumbo jumbo? Cloning.

Stop me if you’ve heard this: secret lab breeds dinosaurs for nefarious purposes, dinosaurs get out, inept military types try to stop them, girls in hot tubs get eaten.

Another regrettable entry in a long list of regrettable entries, JC is at least competently shot and acted (for the most part), and there are a couple of shots of dinos that almost work, but for the most part the CG is horribly lit and composited, and the over-reliance on digital blood is annoying. There was one moment when a girl in a bikini and furry vest is tripping and hallucinates a giant, glowing bunny, instead of the raptor that is about to bite her head off, that made me laugh. However, that’s the only entertaining moment in a film that asks us to root for a multiple rapist and murderer. The opening credits looked good though, so there’s that.

5/10

Previous Murkey Movie surveys from Neil Baker include:

Prehistrionics, Part I
Jumping the Shark
Alien Overlords
Biggus Footus
I Like Big Bugs and I Cannot Lie
The Weird, Weird West
Warrior Women Watch-a-thon

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Neil Baker’s last article for us was Prehistrionics, Part I. Neil spends his days watching dodgy movies, most of them terrible, in the hope that you might be inspired to watch them too. He is often asked why he doesn’t watch ‘proper’ films, and he honestly doesn’t have a good answer. He is an author, illustrator, outdoor educator and owner of April Moon Books (AprilMoonBooks.com).