DinoZaurs

DinoZaurs: The Series, also known as Prehistoric Warriors and DinoZone (ダイノゾーン) in Japan, is a Japanese anime which is a combination of traditional animation and computer animation.

After 65 million years, the Dino Knights awaken when their old enemies, the Dragozaurs, return to drain Earth's lifeforce. Along the way they pick up some human friends: Kaito, Rena, and Rick.

By no means a rip-off of Transformers.


 * Atlantis
 * Big Bad: Diamond Ryugu
 * Breaking the Fourth Wall: Tyranno talking to the viewers.
 * Conspicuous CGI: The Dino Knights and the Dragosaurs are both made of CGI on an otherwise traditionally animated anime.
 * Dark Is Evil / Good Colors, Evil Colors: There's not a lot of efford on the part of the Dragosaurs to look less malevolent.
 * Dragons Are Dinosaurs: "Dragosaurs" (except for Gigano, who pretty much looks like an asian dragon, and for Drago Wing, who is a bat, although given that they presumably belong all to the same species it sort of qualifies). May be considered a subversion, however; because they are actually an alien race they may not count both as dinosaurs and/or dragons.
 * The Dragon: Drago Wing
 * Equippable Ally: The aptly-named "Dino Weapons" can also change into weapons that attach to their fellow Dino Knights.
 * Everything's Better with Dinosaurs: Even though six of the "Dino" Knights are actually not dinosaurs at all.
 * Forgot I Couldn't Swim: Rena, on a trip to Africa. Kaito has to save her.
 * Last of Their Kind: The Dino Knights were once dinosaurs. And Dino Sabre and Dino Mammoth were once a Sabretooth Tiger and a Wolly Mammoth, respectively.
 * Make Me Wanna Shout: Kaito's scream is what revived the Dino Knights.
 * Mooks: Dragozaur Army Forces
 * Our Dragons Are Different: Gigano, an evil asian style dragon. Arguably the whole of the Dragosaurs, to which Gigano belongs; in this case, Our Dragons Are Alien Lifeforce-Sucking Vampires.
 * The Only One Allowed to Defeat You: Gigano to Tyranno.
 * Orphan's Ordeal: Averted. Rick's kindly grandfather mentions that Rick's parents are dead mostly to explain why Rick is living with him. Beyond that this troper can't remember it ever being brought up again.
 * Papa Wolf: The reason for Gigano's grudge against Tyranno stated in canon is that back during the first war for Earth, is that Tyranno defeated him in battle. Tyranno is the better fighter and stronger but never bothered to permantly rid himself of his Ax Crazy stalker. Then Gigano takes a swing at Kaito and Tyranno promply knocks his old rival over a cliff.
 * Psychic Dreams for Everyone: Averted in that Mammoth is specifically stated to be psychic. Played straight when Kaito, an ordinary human for the most part, has a prophetic dream about the rise of Dino Ramph.
 * Secret Keeper: Kaito. And then Rena. And finally Rick.
 * Shown Their Work: Even though they lumped non-dinosaurian prehistoric animals into the the title of "Dino Knights" the authors did knew quite some lesser known prehistoric species.
 * Soft Water: Kaito surviving a couple hundred foot fall into a raging river.
 * Stock Dinosaurs: Played straight with the main Dino Knights, but very much averted by the other ones.
 * Slap Slap Kiss: Kaito and Rena.
 * Taking the Bullet: A variation, when Kaito and Rena fall/jump down an airduct in some ancient ruins, it tosses them out into the middle of a near by field were Tyranno and Gigano are duking it out. Gigano, Evil Badass that he is, takes immediate advantagge of suddenly having a pair of disoriented easy targets sprawled on the ground at his feet and decides that now is a good time to kill Kaito. Cue Close up of Kaito's face tensing in expectation of a blow from a sword longer than his body... only to open his eyes again when he realizes Tyranno thrown himself on his hands and knees over the children shielding them, while letting Gigano have multiple free shots at his back.
 * The Vamp: The Big Bad sends one to use her feminine wiles to get close to Kaito so she can steal his Dino Dagger. Kaito doesn't seem overly interested in her wiles, either because of non-existent Ho Yay or beacause he's twelve, but is just too nice to tell her to get lost.