Considering how huge an impact Jurassic Park had on the box office and the imaginations of moviegoers of all ages, in 1993 dinosaurs were huge (well, prehistoric too. (insert laugh).
So now was the perfect time to revive Tom Mason’s indie satirical comic Dinosaurs For Hire (previously published by Eternity Comics for Nine, which had been in black and white since 1988).
Archie the Tyrannosaurus, Lorenzo the Triceratops, Stegosaurus with an eyepatch, Reese, Pterodactyl (not technically a dinosaur, for those of you who are picky, this one has more canned laughs in it) Cyrano is the main cast, and all of them. will be introduced. is reintroduced in this first issue of the relaunched series from Malibu Comics.
This issue is joke-heavy and fast-paced, taking aim at the violent “heroes” of the biggest comic book publishers that were popular at the time, as well as talking about the video game “Rental Dinosaurs” and the anime “Dinosaurs.” It also contains many self-references. Fox shows (the former was brought to market, the latter not).
Like the dinosaurs at the beginning of this issue, not every joke hits. Often the “politically incorrect action on every page” promised/threatened on the cover ends up being a tasteless quip trying too hard.
Yet, I still found myself enjoying the raucous, and at times quite raunchy, action in Dinosaurs For Hire #1. It’s also a very interesting time capsule, containing incredibly old pop culture references and repeated references to the then-exciting developments in digitally assisted comic book coloring techniques.
And to be fair, this comic is great from an artwork standpoint as well. However, some shots of scantily clad women are only partially successful as satires of similar content in other comics. There are only so many times you can drive the point of satire into the ground before you become the target of the satire.
Creator Tom Mason also joked about not revealing the title character’s origin either, with a bonus strip in this issue called “Lil’ Dinosaur,” a humorous take on a newspaper from the dinosaur’s youth. It concludes.
It’s a lot of fun and very funny, even if the humor isn’t necessarily sophisticated or all that funny. It’s a shame that Dinosaurs For Hire is largely forgotten these days. Because back in ’93, certainly on evidence of this confident reboot (not to mention the fact that they were getting their own Sega Genesis game), it seemed like: They were on top of the world.
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