Monsters Resurrected

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.

Monsters Resurrected (also known as Mega Beasts) is a Documentary of Lies that aired on the Discovery Channel from 2009 to 2010. The basic plot of each episode (there are six in total) involves a different extinct predator. Each episode usually has the creature hunting its prey, fighting other creatures and eventually being driven to extinction.

Tropes used in Monsters Resurrected include:

"At the end of "T-Rex of the Deep", the narrator asks, 'But what if the comet [that wiped out the dinosaurs] had missed?' However, if the dinosaurs were wiped out by an extraterrestrial object, it would have been an asteroid, not a comet."

  • Artistic License: Biology: Pretty much every scene involving the Elasmosaurus, or long-necked plesiosaur. Basically, the neck of the one in the show is as flexible as a big snake, while the neck of the real creature would only be about as flexible as a big stick.
  • Australian Wildlife: The giant monitor lizard Megalania, the catlike marsupial Thylacoleo, the huge wombat Diprotodon and the giant kangaroo Procoptodon.
  • Badass: Many creatures in the series may qualify as this.
  • Beware My Stinger Tail: Sauropelta.
  • Big Eater: The mosasaur. There's a reason it can dislocate its jaws.
  • Bloodier and Gorier: More so than your average documentary.
  • Documentary of Lies: To a ridiculous extent. See Somewhere a Palaeontologist Is Crying, below.
  • Downer Ending: Kind of a given, since every creature eventually goes extinct
  • Eats Babies: Many of the predators.
  • Everything's Better with Dinosaurs
  • Everything's Even Worse with Sharks: Cretoxyrhina, AKA the Ginsu shark. It eats mosasaurs.
  • Everything's Worse with Bears: And even worse with bear-dogs.
  • Feathered Fiend: Titanis, the terror bird.
    • Also, Deinonychus (although here it's shown featherless).
  • Follow the Leader: To Walking with Dinosaurs.
  • Foreshadowing: The movie theater in the Spinosaurus episode has a sign saying "Now Playing: Reign of the Dinosaurs".
  • Full Boar Action: Dinohyus (technically Daeodon), the "terminator pig."
  • Gorn: Almost to the point of Nausea Fuel. This is a much Bloodier and Gorier series than your average documentary. For the sake of Rule of Cool, perhaps?
  • The Hunter Becomes the Hunted: The mosasaur to the Ginsu shark and the Spinosaurus to Rugops (and vice versa).
  • Infant Immortality: Averted several times. There's the terror bird eggs that get eaten by wolves, the young mosasaur that is killed by sharks, the juvenile Paralititan attacked by a Rugops, the bear-dog pups that are killed by wild dogs and the Acrocanthosaurus eggs that are stolen by raptors.
  • Land Down Under: The home of Megalania, a giant monitor lizard.
  • Mega Neko: Smilodon, the saber-toothed cat.
  • Never Smile At a Crocodile: Sarcosuchus, but it serves mostly to get killed by the Spinosaurus.
  • Noisy Nature (may overlap with Most Annoying Sound for some): And HOW! Slash! Crunch! Stomp! It's as if the SFX guys put on their headsets and recorded themselves munching loudly on a full meal. Almost every movement of the beasts is synced to ground-stomping or flesh-tearing.
  • One-Hit Kill: Spinosaurus against the carcharodontosaur.
  • One Mike Limit: Subverted. The mosasaur episode features three paleontologists named Mike.
  • Prehistoric Monster: Several of the show's creatures are turned into this - it's in the show's title.
  • Raptor Attack: The naked Deinonychus.
    • It's also shown being a threat to Acrocanthosaurus, despite the fact it was much, much smaller. (The talking heads mention that it could have been a threat to Acrocanthosaurus eggs and hatchlings, but it's shown scaring off a pretty good-sized young Acrocanthosaurus.)
  • Rocks Fall, Everyone Dies: The Cretaceous extinction, which wipes out the mosasaur.
  • Roger Rabbit Effect: Each episode drops the main creature in a 21st century scenario for a scene.
  • Rule of Cool: What the show operates on.
  • Sea Monster: The mosasaur.
  • Sexy Discretion Shot: Subverted with the mosasaurs.
  • Seldom-Seen Species: Glossotherium, Hipparion, Dolichorhynchops, Cretoxyrhina, Dallasaurus, Rugops, Paralititan, Acrocanthosaurus, Paluxysaurus, Moropus, Canis edwardii, Ramoceros, Merychippus, Megalania, Diprotodon, Thylacoleo and Diprotodon. The narration suggests that Spinosaurus is one, but it's really a secondary stock dinosaur.
  • Shout-Out: The show's Spinosaurus resembles a Todd Marshall illustration (seen in the linked picture with the show's model!).
    • Dinosaur Train also referenced the illustration with their model of the creature.
  • Small Taxonomy Pools: Typically averted.
  • Somewhere A Paleontologist Is Going Into Depression: Let us count the ways:
    • Naked raptors.
    • Flexible-necked plesiosaurs.
    • Wrong forelimb posture on all of the theropods.
    • Chewing sauropods, and their nostrils are (wrongly) atop their heads.
    • Abelisaurid hands proportioned like those of typical theropods. They should be absurdly tiny with clawless stumps for fingers. Compare this (Skip to the 00:45 mark, you may have to sit through an advertisement) to this.
    • Referring to the "terminator pig" as Dinohyus, although it had been renamed Daeodon years before.
      • The European version corrects this at least. As the paleontologists' commentary couldn't be changed, the Narrator makes an effort to point out the correct name.
    • The skull of the show's Spinosaurus is modeled on that of Suchomimus, which didn't even belong to the same subfamily. Compare the show's model to the real deal.
    • And perhaps the most notorious example: Essentially, the Spinosaurus is portrayed as the ultimate predator of all time, able to effortlessly kill any other predator that lived in its time and region. In short, it is depicted as devouring a Rugops with one bite, killing a Carcharodontosaurus by slashing it across the face with its claws and effortlessly tearing apart the giant crocodilian, Sarcosuchus. And that isn't all, its size is practically Godzilla-portioned, as it is able to pick up a 30ft long Rugops in its mouth and the thing appears to be no bigger than its head. Spinosaurus didn't really grow larger than 60ft, meaning the one depicted in the episode would have been 300ft long or more.
  • Speculative Documentary
  • Stock Dinosaurs: What the show set out to avert. Dino fans praised it for focusing on the relatively obscure Acrocanthosaurus in one episode.
    • The stock creatures that do appear are Deinonychus, Elasmosaurus, Spinosaurus and Smilodon.
  • Stock Footage: Each 45-minute episode has about ten or fifteen minutes of CGI sprinkled throughout. However, there have been worse offenders.
  • Talking Heads
  • Tyrannosaurus Rex: Somewhat subverted. The king himself doesn't have an episode, but he appears in stock footage throughout.
    • Acrocanthosaurus, Carcharodontosaurus and Spinosaurus pretty much fill the same role.
  • The Worf Effect: It effects the Spinosaurus quite embarrassingly, given its portrayal as a Badass.
  • Weaksauce Weakness: Spinosaurus' sail is an extension of its vertebrae - if it tips over, it breaks its back and dies.
    • Another You Fail Biology Forever for the documentary, as the spines would not have included the spinal cord. The bleeding caused by an multi-ton animal breaking several of its own bones would be a far greater problem than the one the documentary presented.
  • Zerg Rush: The Rugops pack on Spinosaurus.
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