EPISODE 117 - Theodore Rex: LIVE!

[Maximilian 99]

When Kane fires a rocket into the sky to create a new ice age the timer is set for 100. At first I thought it was 100 minutes and then I realized when the countdown got to be 10 that it was seconds. What should have been one minute and forty seconds lasted 10-15 minutes with no one showing any sort of urgency.

 

The only explanation that I can give for the time inconsistencies is that Maureen Flannigan was hiding somewhere on set freezing time. <- Hell yeah, that's an Out of this World reference. If you're not imagining Burt Reynold's voice coming from a crystal, you need to reevaluate your life... maybe.

[clever username 35]

There is so much of the Toy Marker scene that needs to be explored.

 

Why is the Toy Maker still at large? The police know he makes these weapons and know exactly where to find him. Why is he not in jail? How many people and/or dinosaurs have been killed by this man's exploding insects? Those deaths could have been prevented with the Toy Makers capture.

 

 

Clearly, the future police are much more respectful of our God Given Second Amendment Rights then the police of our time.

[Cam Bert 8145]

Let's look at this world in which the dinosaurs live. Apparently living with dinosaurs is common place now. They have their own area of town, their own clubs, and manufacturers are making clothing, cars and apartments specifically for dinosaurs. They have developed their own religion which includes bizarre death telekinesis and funeral practices. Enough of them have been murdered to create said funeral practices and a special term for dinosaur murder. They have been around long enough that the idea of a dinosaur detective was made into a comic series based on the poster in Teddy's room. Also they are so common place that there is casual racism. It is safe to say they are fully integrated into this "once upon a time in the future" world.

What is mind boggling about this is that they were all created by Dr. Kane. Think about that for a second. If we assume he's the same age as Armin Mueller-Stahl then that makes him about 65. Let's also assume he wasn't a child genius but did not take a break in any of his studies. Based on average time to earn a Phd and the time it would take to create a successful clone we can safely assume he was at the youngest 27 when the first cloned dinosaur was created. This means the dinosaur clones have only been around for 38 years at the most and they've already accomplished a full religion, language, and industries! This leads me to two possible conclusions.

 

1. Kane made like a hundred dinosaurs clones in the first batch. He informed the world that would be cloning dinosaurs and that he engineered them to speak and have culture. Society seeing what was coming immediately went to work creating a place for the dinosaurs to exist. Once they were cloned, people quickly got over the novelty of them and relegated them to living and working in their own part of town.

 

or

 

2. This is more shocking but what if dinosaurs could always talk and had their own religion and customs! When Kane cloned the first one it came out talking and everybody was shocked. Everything we thought we knew about dinosaurs was thrown out the window. So the dinosaurs just kinda went on their already ingrained instincts and what we see in the movie is just the start of them trying to integrate into society.

[Bobby Mac 2]

 

Was Teddy actually hired in PR? I thought when he was talking to Shaft during the museum dinner party thing, they said he was a "publicity hire" or something along those lines, which would mean he was hired simply for publicity but wasn't being given real police work.

 

Yes - Teddy is not a police PR rep, but simply a token dino, a "publicity hire". A kind of "dino affirmative action". He's on the police force so that they can say they hire dino's too, and are therefore not "specist".

[Maximilian 99]

Let's look at this world in which the dinosaurs live. Apparently living with dinosaurs is common place now. They have their own area of town, their own clubs, and manufacturers are making clothing, cars and apartments specifically for dinosaurs. They have developed their own religion which includes bizarre death telekinesis and funeral practices. Enough of them have been murdered to create said funeral practices and a special term for dinosaur murder. They have been around long enough that the idea of a dinosaur detective was made into a comic series based on the poster in Teddy's room. Also they are so common place that there is casual racism. It is safe to say they are fully integrated into this "once upon a time in the future" world.

What is mind boggling about this is that they were all created by Dr. Kane. Think about that for a second. If we assume he's the same age as Armin Mueller-Stahl then that makes him about 65. Let's also assume he wasn't a child genius but did not take a break in any of his studies. Based on average time to earn a Phd and the time it would take to create a successful clone we can safely assume he was at the youngest 27 when the first cloned dinosaur was created. This means the dinosaur clones have only been around for 38 years at the most and they've already accomplished a full religion, language, and industries! This leads me to two possible conclusions.

 

1. Kane made like a hundred dinosaurs clones in the first batch. He informed the world that would be cloning dinosaurs and that he engineered them to speak and have culture. Society seeing what was coming immediately went to work creating a place for the dinosaurs to exist. Once they were cloned, people quickly got over the novelty of them and relegated them to living and working in their own part of town.

 

or

 

2. This is more shocking but what if dinosaurs could always talk and had their own religion and customs! When Kane cloned the first one it came out talking and everybody was shocked. Everything we thought we knew about dinosaurs was thrown out the window. So the dinosaurs just kinda went on their already ingrained instincts and what we see in the movie is just the start of them trying to integrate into society.

You might be thinking too hard. But I think you sucked me in because now I'm wondering how long it takes for a dinosaur egg to hatch. If tyrannosaurus rex were mammals their gestation period would be close to a decade. I read a biology book once so, that's an accurate estimate.

[VictoriaOosterhout 2]

Omissions: This is ostensibly a kids movie, yet when they go to meet Molly Rex after her show, the camera lingers on her while she gets undressed! I mean, they did the whole "hitching up the dress to remove a stocking" shot. What's with the sexualization of female dinosaurs?

 

Also, I'm willing to accept the fact that Teddy and Molly are in luv the moment they meet (because of glands, or whatever), but Teddy still leaves a woman he met an hour ago stay in his apartment overnight, which is an odd, overly-trusting decision for a dinosaur who is a wannabe detective/cop.

 

Even more chilling is that the red-eyed goonies knew A) The 2 people that Whoopie and Teddy cared about most and B ) where to find them. Ok, so, maybe the goons followed the kid back from the hockey courts to his house, but how would the goons know that Molly was at Teddy's house? Teddy fell in love with Molly an hour before they kidnapped her. They had no way of knowing that she mattered the most to him.

[Elektra Boogaloo 3371]

It's actually spelled "Hummie Mann." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hummie_Mann So his name doesn't really fit the species thing since it's with two Ns. I only know this because, oddly, it came up when I googled something else man the other day and I was like, "Wait! That's a person?!?"

 

I'm been thinking about the naming conventions of "Theodore Rex" and "Howard the Duck." Tyrannosaurus rex is the species name, meaning tyrant lizard king. Theodore Rex is like being named Teddy King. I don't see how all the dinosaurs can have the surname Rex. We can't all be kings. That would get really confusing.

 

Howard the Duck is less specific. "Duck" is a common name that can refer to a number of species. It might be more accurate to call him Howard the Anas platyrhynchos (Mallard Duck). But probably less catchy. But also the duck is what he evolved from so wouldn't it be more accurate to call Paul something like Paul the Primate? There wasn't a word for "humans" until we evolved into them.

 

And in "Theodore Rex" world, I think he would be Paul Sapien since the species name for humans is homo sapiens. Or maybe Paul Homo? I'm not sure how they decided which part of the scientific name to use and which to discard.

[Cam Bert 8145]

You might be thinking too hard. But I think you sucked me in because now I'm wondering how long it takes for a dinosaur egg to hatch. If tyrannosaurus rex were mammals their gestation period would be close to a decade. I read a biology book once so, that's an accurate estimate.

That means closer to 28 years. Doubly impressive.

Wait now this is making me reconsider everything in Jurassic Park....

[souprman 10477]

Holy shit you guys!

 

I haven't listened to the ep and I'm only 30+ mins into the... film? But I am SO FUCKING INTO THIS!!!! I'm going bonkers. I barely had the vaguest memory of this existing and never saw a frame of it in the day. It's just so beautiful guys.

 

Question: Can a movie ever have enough bits where a character is alternately clever with, and then completely unaware of, his own tail? I think it's pretty clear the answer is: NO. No it cannot.

 

Okay back to this... thing?

[Cameron H. 23786]

Omissions: This is ostensibly a kids movie, yet when they go to meet Molly Rex after her show, the camera lingers on her while she gets undressed! I mean, they did the whole "hitching up the dress to remove a stocking" shot. What's with the sexualization of female dinosaurs?

 

Also, I'm willing to accept the fact that Teddy and Molly are in luv the moment they meet (because of glands, or whatever), but Teddy still leaves a woman he met an hour ago stay in his apartment overnight, which is an odd, overly-trusting decision for a dinosaur who is a wannabe detective/cop.

 

Even more chilling is that the red-eyed goonies knew A) The 2 people that Whoopie and Teddy cared about most and B ) where to find them. Ok, so, maybe the goons followed the kid back from the hockey courts to his house, but how would the goons know that Molly was at Teddy's house? Teddy fell in love with Molly an hour before they kidnapped her. They had no way of knowing that she mattered the most to him.

 

I totally agree with what you're saying. While I don't find anything morally objectionable about her staying at his house, this is supposed to be a kid's movie! Plus, the movie had already set it up that he is going to walk her to her home. Why not just have him walk her to her apartment? They could have had a chat as they walked and a kiss on the cheek when they got to her place. I mean, once he her left alone at his place and her first instinct was to take a bath while she waits for him to get back, all I could think was, "Oh, Teddy...You're not emotionally equipped for this...."

[TorgoLives 1]

Teddy's clothes baffled me for the whole Movie. Paul, Jason, and June touched on Teddy's clothing a little bit, but I think I have it figured out.

 

At first he's wearing a sweater, a vest, and another sweater on top of that. Then his "undercover" outfit is a different sweater with a hoodie and a leather jacket. I couldn't figure out why he was wearing so many layers, and thick heavy layers at that. At first I thought maybe all the clothing was to hide seams in the dinosaur costume, but then I realized that being a reptile, Teddy is cold blooded and requires those extra layers to keep him warm.

 

Also at some point Teddy says to Coltrane "The only time you soft skins pay attention to other creatures is to shoot them eat them or wear them". Why then is Teddy okay with wearing a leather jacket?

 

Hate to say it but the cold-blooded theory doesn't work. Cold blooded animals -like reptiles - rely on the environment to regulate their body temperature. That's why you'll often see reptiles basking in the sun. Warm blooded animals - like humans- are capable of of self regulating, through sweating, shivering, physical activity ect.

The idea of clothes is to trap the heat already being created by the warm-blooded body. They would do nothing for a cold-blooded creature.

 

So...maybe it is to hide the seams?

[Rodney 5]

I've got a theory on the disguise machine, and a few omissions.

 

My theory - If there was a ninja section of town, maybe there were also opera singer, racist mexican, racist scottish, etc. parts of town. You can't tell me that they toymaker's outfit wouldn't have been an exact message for something that came out of that machine.

 

Omissions:

 

We see the 2 elephants running around the complex before they're frozen and it's clearly a mother and baby. So are they the breeding pair or is that baby not going to be frozen and be left to die.

 

Speaking of the freezing - the scientist made a compound such that animals and people can be frozen and unthawed without a problem. Then his plan is to freeze the pairs, and have everyone else die off in an ice age. Why the need to freeze the pairs? Wouldn't they survive the ice age? How long were they going to be frozen for?

 

In scene where they had the clone autopsied, the doctor went on and on about how he sequenced the DNA and was able to uncover that it was marked as property of EDEN. THEN he also points out how a fingernail of the clone is also very obviously marked. If I were a taxpayer for this police department I'd be very unhappy.

 

Lastly, after a movie with the most varying level of threats from the bad guys, it ends with whoopi walking around nonchalantly while 4 or 5 red-eyed clones shoot at her. There was no sense of danger from her at all.

[Cameron H. 23786]

At the end of the movie, Teddy gets promoted to Detective First Class. As he is walking away with Whoopi he tells her that with his new position he has the power to pick his own partner--heavily implying that he wants it to be her.

 

So...does that mean Teddy now outranks Whoopi???? She gets shot six or seven times in the line of duty and he gets all the credit for cracking the case...

 

That's some bullshit.

[VinsanityV22 500]

Hey Paul! Just wanted to say Crash Test is freakin' hilarious! I just made a VIMEO account recently to get access to their music store because I need a sweet audio track for a new demo reel I'm cutting together. This is the first thing I've bought On-Demand, and it's awesome!! WHY DIDN'T YOU MENTION THAT ANDY DALY IS THE VOICE OF THE BUS!?!

 

And I fear it's a gateway for more comedy specials, lol. Sure $3.99 here is fine, but then I get another, and another, and before you know, I may be out 12, 16 bucks! You're gonna kill me, bro! lol. Seriously though, this is great. I'm gonna end up with tons of comedy specials and cartoons (I'm an animator and I love me some cartoons) on my Vimeo library now.

 

Seriously that was awesome! Such a fun special

 

"This is just like Magic Mike... only a little bit sadder" rofl

[souprman 10477]

 

Also at some point Teddy says to Coltrane "The only time you soft skins pay attention to other creatures is to shoot them eat them or wear them". Why then is Teddy okay with wearing a leather jacket?

He's also similarly totally fine with walking through a museum full of dinosaur bones. If any human walked into a building that seemed to house exclusively human bones staged in various ways, would they then proceed to have a light hearted conversation about anything?

[Cameron H. 23786]

He's also similarly totally fine with walking through a museum full of dinosaur bones. If any human walked into a building that seemed to house exclusively human bones staged in various ways, would they then proceed to have a light hearted conversation about anything?

 

[Elektra Boogaloo 3371]

To make matters worse, J&M—the film’s international distributor—decided to try and recoup some of their investment by suing Stefano.

Jonathan: Stefano had nothing to do with why J&M was upset. It was just a case where the guy with the deepest pockets catches the bullets.

Stefano: So even when the film ended, it didn’t really end. I was the last man standing on this thing. And by the way. I personally paid back every investor that I brought in. I didn’t want to leave any loose strings.

Jonathan: I always felt awful about that. Really bad. It’s just shouldn’t have been. We all set upon the road with different expectations, but there again it just seemed like he caught hell at the worst time.

Stefano: Two dramatic events happened during this time in my life. One was T-Rex not coming out. And the other was my dad passing at 58.

Jonathan: That was such a tragedy, my god. And Stefano is such a great guy.

 

I feel terrible for this Stefano Ferrari, the investor in the film. His story would be a much better movie than T-Rex.

[souprman 10477]

There is so much of the Toy Marker scene that needs to be explored.

 

When the exploding butterfly murder weapon is reconstructed, the investigator immediately ID's the creator as the Toy Maker who runs Dragon Tail Dead Storage company as a cover for his arms business which is located in the Ninja Grid. (side note, Dragon Tail is yet another dinosaur tail joke)

 

Why is the Toy Maker still at large? The police know he makes these weapons and know exactly where to find him. Why is he not in jail? How many people and/or dinosaurs have been killed by this man's exploding insects? Those deaths could have been prevented with the Toy Makers capture.

 

Then there is the question of the dead storage company itself. What is this business? You see bodies hanging in capsules; is this what people do with their dead in the future? Why not bury them? At the end of the movie, you see an award ceremony in a park, so we know there is available land. What is being done with these bodies?

 

The most disturbing part of this scene is Teddy's and Coltraine's brutal torture and murder of the Toy Maker. First they have him handcuffed to a pole, where Teddy blows bad breathe into his face. When this is ineffective, Coltraine punches him in the face, likely giving him a concussion. They move on to Teddy sitting on the Toy Maker, crushing the Toy Makers body, while simultaneously farting on him. The weight of a dinosaur would cause massive amounts of internal bleeding. The movie then cuts to Toy Maker hung upside down. Teddy threatens to eat the Toy Maker and lunges at him. The Toy Maker finally breaks and tells them all the info they need to solve the case.

 

As they leave, Teddy's tail accidentally wacks the Toy Maker in the head. The Toy maker stops moving.

 

My boyfriend and I disagree on what happened to the Toy Maker. I think Teddy snapped The Toy Makers neck and he's dead. My boyfriend thinks Teddy just knocked him unconscious. But since Teddy and Coltraine left the Toymaker tied up, upside down, with major head trauma, and internal bleeding, he's still going to die.

 

Teddy and Coltraine have the following exchange:

 

Teddy: Oops.

Coltraine: Ah, so what? Come on.

Teddy: Ok.

 

This is how the heroes of a children's movie respond to torturing a man and leaving him for dead.

I was also baffled by how pleased the Toymaker was after his toy blew up (never mind how anyone survived being in such close proximity to a giant fireball.) He pops his head up out of the rubble, looks around, and smiles and nods at his now completely fucked up factory. Why are you so goddamned happy you just blew up all your intricate shit dude?!

[souprman 10477]

As I was watching this I kept thinking how a lot of this looks kinda cool, it was of course continually undercut by pure dreck. But some of the odd low/high camera angles and garish colors reminded me of Coen Bros or Terry Gilliam style techniques. When they got to the night club scene I was reminded of the Circus-Circus scene in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which was filmed at least 5 years after Theo Rex and clearly was trying to hew as close as possible to the original drawings by Ralph Steadman.

So my thought was perhaps the club scene in Theo Rex was inspired by Steadman's drawings?

But then I remembered thinking the Skeksis in Dark Crystal also looked a bit like Steadman's work as well.

Then I remembered this scene from F&LiLV and now I don't know what to think.

[souprman 10477]

Okay last thing - Favorite parts of this grep:

 

#dinolivesmatter - 'Zouks

 

"He doesn't do shit". -JDR

[Maximilian 99]

At the end of the movie, Teddy gets promoted to Detective First Class. As he is walking away with Whoopi he tells her that with his new position he has the power to pick his own partner--heavily implying that he wants it to be her.

 

So...does that mean Teddy now outranks Whoopi???? She gets shot six or seven times in the line of duty and he gets all the credit for cracking the case...

 

That's some bullshit.

It's horseshit that you're such a specieist. How can you watch this movie and not give a damn about dinosaurs? To quote Molly Rex, "Dinosaurs feel." Sure Whoopi has been in the force for a long time and helped a clumsy dinosaur solve a case. If it weren't for Whoopi, Teddy would have tried to shoot the bad guys dead with a gun instead of using his brain and saving the day. Being more human than human, Whoopi realizes how important Teddy being promoted to detective first class is for dinosaur kind.

[Cameron H. 23786]

It's horseshit that you're such a specieist. How can you watch this movie and not give a damn about dinosaurs? To quote Molly Rex, "Dinosaurs feel." Sure Whoopi has been in the force for a long time and helped a clumsy dinosaur solve a case. If it weren't for Whoopi, Teddy would have tried to shoot the bad guys dead with a gun instead of using his brain and saving the day. Being more human than human, Whoopi realizes how important Teddy being promoted to detective first class is for dinosaur kind.

 

 

Whoa now, I will not stand for this libel! I'll have you know some of my best friends are talking, anthropomorphic dinosaurs, not to mention that my favorite TV show of ALL TIME is Dinosaucers--which may or may not have been based on actual events from my life.

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gy7fO2i9y94

 

 

You best check yourself before you Rex yourself!

[DougMcArthur 26]

So, after how much they talked about the dumb tail gags, I decided to make a supercut. Enjoy.

 

[Sun Tzu Said That 32]

Hate to say it but the cold-blooded theory doesn't work. Cold blooded animals -like reptiles - rely on the environment to regulate their body temperature. That's why you'll often see reptiles basking in the sun. Warm blooded animals - like humans- are capable of of self regulating, through sweating, shivering, physical activity ect.

The idea of clothes is to trap the heat already being created by the warm-blooded body. They would do nothing for a cold-blooded creature.

 

So...maybe it is to hide the seams?

 

The entire point is moot because dinosaurs are not cold-blooded. If this wasn't common knowledge prior to Jurassic Park, it certainly was after.

 

On a different note, I want to talk about how much Teddy's eyes bother me. Why are they so ridiculously huge and blue and human and completely out of place on his face? The Henson workshop gave their dinosaurs on the show Dinosaurs large eyes, but they were actually factored into the design of their characters so the proportions and coloring at least made some sense.

 

Also, in the scene where they go get chewed out by the chief, Teddy's right eye doesn't seem to want to cooperate and I guess they just sorta went with it anyway.

 

 

At the end of the movie, our bad guy seems happy to get Teddy into his facility because it means he finally gets his "pair of Rexes." Why didn't he already have a pair of Rexes frozen? He can ostensibly recreate extinct animals and probably also clones at any time, so why couldn't he just create a pair for his ark? No one would know. Was Teddy planted on the case as a cop by Summers specifically so Teddy could be frozen? If so, where was the female Rex supposed to come from? The murdered Rex was on New Eden's payroll already and had a female Rex for a roommate. Why wasn't he coerced into bringing his roommate to the compound for whatever reason? If the two weren't open to being a couple, I imagine they could be forced into it through the magic of "glando" manipulation.

 

And is it just me or does Molly Rex look to miss her cue on jumping out of her pod before being unfrozen?

 

Edited with one final thing to add:

 

How commonplace ARE dinosaurs exactly? When Coltrane and Teddy get to the kid's street hockey thing, you hear the kids gasping saying "look at the dinosaur oh wow." We see lots of humans among dinosaurs in other places in the movie but in this scene it's treated as if there are still people who are just never exposed to them at all.

[OoofMaGOOF 348]

Holy cow, people on Facebook are FURIOUS about a picture they made with Jason's quote about cats. Really people? He said he hates cats, not that he wants to burn any house with a cat in it to the ground.