#dinosquad theory

[dinosquad-central]

Did… did she just jump on the first humans to get turned into dinosaurs and straight-up lie about not being able to turn them back so that she could have help stopping Veloci?

Because that… might actually make sense…

Anyone ever think the reason the squad are perfect dinos is cause moinaham used her psychic powers on them?

[dinosquad-central]

Genuinely the DinoSquad fandom is so nice. I’m so excited to hang out here with like the 5 other freaks who watch this show

Heck yeah! We’re happy to have you with us!

Tbh, I absolutely adore small fandoms.

Big fandoms have things like discourse and ship wars and people with vastly different interpretations of the same character picking fights with each other. We don’t have that here.

There are like five of us and we’re all so starved for anything related to our fandom that even theories and interpretations we don’t agree with we’re still excited to engage with because all dinosquad creations are good dinosquad creations. And that fosters a very pleasant fandom community. Small, obviously, but pleasant.

[silentstaresfanficandfanart]

Hey what the frick is dinosquad movie night

my boyfriend and i were having a dinosquad (and other show) marathon date and we saw SO MANY dinosquad related anime gifs. our current theory is some anime fan club on discord planned a dinosquad movie night but it fell through for some reason or it almost did either way the end result is theres SO MANY dinosquad movie night anime gifs on discord.

so like i was wondering if anyone involved in dinosquad movie night would please explain themselves i know at least one of you people if not more is an ensemble stars fan, there were two enstars gifs. several from one piece. one from a video game... i just am curious! :D

[al-gay-tor]

Things I want to see in a Dinosquad reboot

Veloci as a serious villain - the original show has a bad habit of trying to make Veloci look as ridiculous as possible and then doing a 180 and trying to make him seem like a serious threat. It just doesn’t work.

Minor villains - This is part of the reason I made my OC Valentino. Having minor villains would add some variety between episodes and help add to Veloci’s more serious main villain image.

Consistent character writing - anyone who has watched the show knows what I’m talking about.

Character development for anyone other than Caruso - I love Caruso but can we hit someone else with the 3 dimensional character beam please?

An enemy of my enemy episode - Forcing team Veloci and the Dinosquad to work together is a disaster waiting to happen and I for one cannot wait to see this mess implode.

Bring back Peter - This goes hand in hand with my minor villains point, plus Veloci can have a homoerotic evil advisor as a treat

Ms. M and Veloci backstory exploration - I know they explained their backstory in the show but they did a terrible job and I have elected to ignore their explanation.

Terri keeps her job - Remember when Terri was officially added to the Dinosquad? The show creators sure don’t.

Morally questionable Ms. M - I seen a few theories floating around here about Ms. M’s true nature and intentions. I think it would be interesting to see a more complex moral dichotomy between Ms. M and Veloci.

More focus on character dynamics - each episode in the show was focused on how much everyone fucking hated each other which was funny but not exactly ideal in a show that’s very power of friendship centered. A proper development and exploration into each characters friendship with the others would be nice.

Accurate dinosaur facts - For a show about dinosaurs it sure did know absolutely nothing about dinosaurs.

Dino-mania - Kittery point is very calm about dinosaurs suddenly being alive again. Where’s the hype, the news teams, the dinosaur hunters, the tourists??? I fully believe that the town would not just be this chill about something like this.

Edit: More Liam content- As a neurodivergent person I just think this would be really cool. He could bond with Buzz about cool bugs.

[rerarlo]

Magical meteor radiation is actually an interesting explanation for what happened with those two. Maybe the radiation massively de-stabilized their dna which lead to them not only rapidly adapting to their environment (aka turning into humans over time and the telepathy) but also being able to shapeshift. That de-stabilization could also account for the long lifespan as aging is (as i understand it and in an extremely over-simplified manner) the imperfect replication of cells eventually stacking up and leading to degradation. Which could be nullified by their genes going haywire. In a reboot this could also be a chance to eventually introduce other dinosaurs who survived as enemies or allies or simply one off characters. (Maybe they even shape shifted into other things like a T-Rex turning into a bird of prey or something) also I have not seen that old Dinosaur sit com at all or even heard about it- why was that child so violent??

Time to feed the DinoSquad Fandom a little.

Have a sketch-esk re-draw of the circling scene in the last episode and little character sketches for the scrungle Veloci and tired teacher Moynihan. I gave her wrinkled because i can.

[unnyhunny]

dino squad website (circa early 2008)

Hello, everyone! The Dino Squad website from early 2008 is accessible in the Wayback Machine, but as far as I’ve been looking, there isn’t a good post or guide to what’s actually in it.

Like everything in ‘08, this site uses Flash for pretty much everything it does (and PHP for everything else), which can make some things difficult, obviously. I can’t direct you in how to run Flash in 2021, but I wish you the best. The site I’m using is linked below, but there are several in the Wayback Machine that seem to work, although I haven’t noticed any differences yet. I have a few theories about this site, that I’ll get into when they’re relevant.

http://web.archive.org/web/20130210222200/http://www.dinosquad.com/

Feel free to explore! I’ll be leaving my notes down below.

When you enter the site, you’re greeted by this screen, alongside a stock alarm sound, and the Dino Squad theme.

This next part is hard to show, but I’ll do my best. This is actually a cube that you’re just in, and there are interactive elements in the room that, when you hover over them, they have special prompts that go to other areas of this flash site. Also, it is noticeably slow to scroll.

[the floor]

[the wall directly facing the logo, presumably the entrance]

[the wall on the right]

[the wall behind]

[the wall on the left]

[the ceiling]

On the left hand side, there is a Music Player, that goes through memorable tracks from the Dino Squad soundtrack, like “Dino Squad” (the main theme), “Transformation” (the transformation sequence song), and “BaBaBa!”, a song that I don’t remember ever being in the show, and sounds similar to the transformation theme, but acapella. Also, Rump is there, for some reason?

[the music player]

Now, this is where it gets really interesting. There was an ability to make accounts through the site, and gain “Ooze Power” through, presumably, doing well on the mini-games, some bones (?), and a badge system that, when clicked, doesn’t do anything.

[the user profile]

From left to right, the dino silhouettes are: Buzz, Caruso, Fiona, Max, Roger, and...Moynihan? Veloci? It’s impossible to know, but it’s presumably Veloci, because Moynihan wasn’t revealed to be a raptor until the final episode (or second to final episode? I’m a fake fan). 

On trying to click on any of the games, a log-in option comes up -- you need to log in to play the minigames, which means that I can’t play any of them, because it’s impossible to make an account now (I tried).

[the log-in page]

When I try to register, there’s the outline of the Dino Squad logo, but no site content shows up besides that. This is a running theme, so I’ll only show the emptiness once. Also, it’s important to note that I think the tube at the top of the window is ooze, which is a delightful touch.

[the empty screen]

The interactive elements of the room are either mini-games or character/story info sheets, so I’ll go through them one by one, starting with the character/story info.

Character/Story Information

Right by the door, there is a green monitor that offers you the ability to “Get the 411 on the DinoSquad, their vehicles and weapons.” Unfortunately, they won’t be quite able to deliver.

[characters hover-over text]

Here is the character select screen. Did you know that it’s Rodger, not Roger? I didn’t. Unfortunately, of the characters listed here, only Caruso and Victor have their original info, which will be displayed first without comment below.

[character select screen]

[caruso’s info sheet. if someone else wants to transcribe this, be my guest, but there’s just too much text for me to do time-wise.]

[victor’s info sheet.]

On another green monitor, Dino Video would be available, where you could “Watch the latest DinoSquad shows and video clips online”. Unfortunately, it brings up a menu with two choices, and neither of them work.

[dino video hover prompt]

[menu options for dino video]

Next, we have the Dino Dictionary, with “Crazy facts about the Dinosaurs that roamed and ruled the earth for over 160 million years.” Unfortunately, these links are dead, too, but they’re shown as options in the archive file web, so they might be viewable.

[dino dictionary hover text]

[dino dictionary menu options]

Next are the character hovers. These would, on click, take you to their page. Only Victor’s and Caruso’s work.

[veloci hover text]

[max hover text]

[caruso hover text]

[fiona hover text]

[rodger hover text]

[buzz hover text]

Next, we have some tips for going green. This is the same reference center that the Dino Dictionary uses, so it likewise doesn’t work.

[Go Green! hover text]

Moynihan and Rump’s text comes next. I can’t imagine what the log entry for Rump would have been.

[moynihan hover text]

[rump hover text]

That was all of the informational parts of this website. Now, it’s time for some fun.

Mini-Games

Or it would be, if they worked.

For all of the following, it just prompts the login page on-click, so I can’t really do anything or show what it might have looked like, unfortunately.

The first game is Dino Dodge, where you “Test your skills at this crazy game! Catch the bones, badges, and ooze, but dont [sic] get hit by the Dino-skulls!”

[Dino Dodge hover text]

Next, My Squad. This is where you’d click to party up and stuff, I’m guessing, but it just brings me to the Login page, and I can’t do anything with it.

[my squad hover text]

[what the squad page could have looked like. under it, with the circles and icons, could have been a way to display your most awesome badges.]

Next, and possibly the saddest part of these, is RaptorQuest. “Your Squad will need all the ooze power possible to complete these 3D missions to save the world from evil primordial ooze.” I don’t know what this could have entailed, but it sounds like all of the ooze power from playing the games mattered here, and that there were 3D missions that could have had something of a storyline are gone? I’m in mourning.

[RaptorQuest hover text]

After RaptorQuest is Oozefest, a game where you “Load up on ooze and fire away at Victor Veloci and his side-kick to send them back to their primordial state in these three Dino-levels!” Presumably, oozing them is a bad thing in this game, although how well that holds up to canon is debateable.

[oozefest hover text]

My Badges is next.

[my badges hover text]

The final game is Hyperdino. My immediate guess is that this would play like the Manhole Game-and-Watch game?

[hyperdino hover-text]

[manhole game]

Some Interjections

1. This website was made very early on, and was probably only using the pilot characterization.

Most importantly to this being that Fiona’s penchant for speed is what is most notable about her here, when that was really only in the pilot/dino-cycle part, near the very start of the show. The logo isn’t necessarily a giveaway, but the Max/T-Rex picture at the top is one that I don’t see much except on early promo art.

2. Did they make new art for this website, with this room, or was this an early base idea?

3. Why was there an option to advertise, and where would the ads be shown?

4. Victor has many weapons and vehicles, but doesn’t have the wonderful Dino Dirigible yet?

5. This site (and its Flash) isn’t backed up besides the WayBack Machine.

It’s not in BlueMaxima’s Flashpoint, but I couldn’t extract the whole swf file from the html -- just the landing page, with Max and the alarm. If there’s a way to back this all up as one swf, that’d be spectacular, but from what I can tell, it’s using a mix of swf files and other files to deliver content.

Thank you for reading, and I hope exploring the site is/was fun! If you find anything I didn’t, please reblog and add!