Top 5 Dinosaur-themed Toys

We've all had our share of toys when we were kids, but there comes a time in your young life when you know the usual toys just won't do. And so in celebration of Dinosaur Week, I'm taking this opportunity to list down the top dino-themed toys!

Prepare for your faces to be rocked clean away by the coolest, the largest, the most expensive and the most mind-blowingly good dinosaur toys of our time! Get ready! I'm rating them now so you won't have to!

5. Jurassic Park

It's a movie about dinosaurs...it would be crazy not to make a toyline based on it! Jurassic Park spawned a series of realistic-looking (if not realistically-colored) dinosaur toys of all shapes and sizes, along with hapless human figures to serve as their meals. You wouldn't buy a Dr. Grant figure just for show, right?

The dinosaurs were realistically sculpted, often had soft skin to mimic 'dinosaur' skin (awesome!), and the big dinos were huge. Huge. The Bull T-Rex alone was like 2 feet long, and it can "eat" smaller figures and actually swallow them! Wicked!

4. Bone Age

I loved looking at old Kenner catalogs when I was a kid just to see one of my childhood holy grails: Bone Age, the toyline that was dinosaur and construction kit in one. The awesomeness of cavemen riding animated dinosaur skeletons were not lost to me, nor was the fact that these skeletons can be reassembled to form anachronistic planes, helicopters and missile launchers. They don't make toys like this anymore, I tell you what!

Why this toyline wasn't as popular as it should have been is weird, but the image of a T-Rex skeleton turning into a battle fortress will be etched into my mind forever.

3. Dinobots

The Transformers were responsible for a lot of things, not the least of which is introducing us to powerful dinosaurs that transformed into robots! Grimlock,Slag, Swoop, Sludge and Snarl made up the Dinobots, and their figures were some of the most iconic of the Transformers toyline. Who wouldn't find a dinosaur that turns into a giant robot with a sword cool? Sure they were basically bricks, but 25-plus years later, they still hold special places in TF fans' hearts.

2. Zoids

Zoids is a popular Japanese franchise centered around robotic-looking model kits of fantastic creatures, notably dinosaurs. The modern model kits were great, but some of the earlier releases were some of the most awesome pieces of engineering you've ever seen, with complicated designs and assembly and featured motorized walking actions.

Some of the best Zoids were also the biggest, with figures like the Seismosaurus being almost three feet in length, and King Gojulas absolutely towering over the rest of the toyline with ease. Got one of these as a kid? Consider yourself king or queen of the street. For reals.

1. Dino-Riders

Ahh, Dino-Riders. The toyline that not just tickled the minds of an entire generation of future dino-addicts, it set the bar to heights no other dinosaur-themed toyline can hope to reach, ever. If your mom bought you the T-Rex, she loved you. If she bought you the Brontosaurus, she really loved you. If she didn't buy you any Dino-Riders...you're doing something wrong!

Tyco tapped into a goldmine of ideas with the Dino-Riders, warring races using the awesome power of dinosaurs to wage war on each other. It's got everything: sculpts so good it's Smithsonian-approved, fun action features like motorized walking, and a wide selection of dinosaurs to choose from. Even now the image of dinosaurs strapped with laser guns and missiles still explodes people's minds all over the planet, and we owe it all to this sweet, sweet toyline. Harness the Power of Dinosaurs, indeed!


And there you have it, the top dinosaur toys as ranked by yours truly! Man, I miss my Dino-Riders toys...anyway, if you've got comments, suggestions, or just plain want to freak out with me on how awesome toys were back then, leave me a comment and let's talk about it! Thanks for reading!