Automoderated users, Autopatrolled users, Comment administrators, Confirmed users, Moderators, Rollbackers
23,028
edits
Prehistoric Monster: Difference between revisions
m
→top: Fixing links to disambiguation pages
m (clean up) |
Derivative (talk | contribs) m (→top: Fixing links to disambiguation pages) |
||
Line 6:
A subtrope of [[What Measure Is a Non-Cute?]].
Basically, if you are an extinct animal you'll be automatically qualified as a '''Prehistoric Monster'''. Even though you're small and would appear cute and harmless to modern humans. Even though you are closely related to modern animals that are commonly regarded as beautiful and majestic. Even though all extinct species ''were'' well adapted to their environment in the period they were around, otherwise they would have never appeared in our planet. Even though the only real difference between prehistoric and modern animals is that the former didn't have the fortune (or misfortune) to know [[Humans Are
This trope has been with us since the very first paleontological discoveries at the start of 1800: a lot of old paleo-art portrayed prehistoric worlds filled with nothing but monstrous creatures that fight each other, followed soon by popular writers and then film-makers that consolidated the trope (see [[Dinosaurs Are Dragons]] for more about this). The fact we don't exactly know how extinct animals behaved (and ''even looked'' precisely) has contributed to make them appearing mysterious, and we humans have the silly habit to qualify ''every'' unknown creature as a horrible "monster" (see Loch Ness and Yeti examples).
Line 14:
Even popular-science works such as documentaries or non-narrative books often do play straight this trope, probably for sensationalistic purpose. Many modern paleo-artists tend to do this in a subtle way, depicting their dinosaurs, pterosaurs, mammals, fish, invertebrates and whatnot as nasty as allowed by scientific accuracy: the fact that the skin texture/color and, above all, the [[Eyes Never Lie|appearance of the eyes]] are almost always unknown, all this allows imagination to travel freely, of course. Just for example, compare [[wikipedia:File:Compsognathus BW.jpg|this Compsognathus]] with [[wikipedia:File:Compsognathus longipes head.jpg|this one]], and guess which plays it straight and which averts it. When a watcher see such depictions, he usually has nothing to say against the [[Darker and Edgier]] varieties since they still remain ''anatomically accurate'' (useless to say that [[Rule of Cool]] plays a strong role in this psychological mechanism).
Some people might see this trope a bit more justified than [[What Measure Is a Non-Cute?]] however. This because modern animals are often [[Humans Are
Of course there are also popular works which tend to avert this trope, especially in the last decades, in part thanks to the influence from popular documentaries like Walking With: no doubt however the traditional "prehistoric = monstrous" thing is all but a [[Dead Horse Trope]] even today (think about the recent ''Primeval''). It's worth noting at this point that '''Prehistoric Monster''' may be considered a subtrope of [[Somewhere a Palaeontologist Is Crying]] only when anatomical inaccuracies are present as well. If extinct critters are portrayed in an unpleasant but still scientifically acceptable way ([[Science Marches On|at least in respect to the knowledge of the time the work was created]]), it may be qualified more as a subtrope of [[Rule of Cool]].
| |||