Denver, the Last Dinosaur (1988)

“Denver, the last dinosaur, He's my friend and a whole lot more. Denver, the last dinosaur, Shows me a world I never saw before.”

One of the joys of writing for Of a Mesozoic Mind is that you get to revisit media properties that you haven’t laid eyes on in twenty plus years; seeing them for the first time through the lens of an adult can sometimes be disappointing or surprising or, in the case of Denver, the Last Dinosaur—exactly what you expected. Outside of humming the theme song a few times over the last three decades (okay, more than a few times…it’s pretty spectacular), I hadn’t really thought much about Denver—it never did rank quite as high as Dinosaucers or Dino-Riders or More Dinosaurs in the shaping my paleo-loving soul during my adolescence. So what was the true essence and message of Denver, the Last Dinosaur? What place does it deserve in the ecosystem of dinosaur pop culture? Does anyone care?

The first one is easy. Denver, the Last Dinosaur is quintessential ‘80’s Saturday morning animation to the core: a ridiculous premise, stock characters, skateboards, bullies, magic time traveling eggshells, rad sunglasses, lots of neon, guitar solos, and—most importantly—an earworm of a title song. This, in itself, is not a bad thing—it’s actually a quite good thing, if you ask me. However, it’s probably not worth an entire retrospective on the series. Thus, I wanted to dive deep into the first episode (a two-part hour-long pilot) to set the proverbial table for potential first time viewers or for those debating whether or not to revisit this forgotten relic.

The second question is a bit trickier. I can say—quite decisively—that it does feature the second best dino-rocking outside of Charmer’s Mesozoic Mind. So there’s that. To truly understand Denver’s place amongst pop Dinosauria, we need to review the episode that launched this adorable Corythosaurus and his rag tag band of human friends into our living rooms in 1988.

As expected, the premise of the show is beyond absurd—but not a huge variation on the common “prehistoric animal survives until present day because of [insert geological/scientific reason here]” trope. Net net, a Corythosaurus somehow was trapped (or born?) in a magic egg and buried for millions of years near the location of what we now know as the La Brea Tar Pits. Okay, maybe it’s more of a variation than I thought. However, since Denver is a Corythosaurus (or, at least, that’s our best guess), not only was he trapped in the egg for the standard 65 million years from the end of the Cretaceous—he had another ten million tacked on for fun (since our best guess is that Corythosaurus went extinct approximately 75-76 million years ago. At least we know he’s not claustrophobic.

When running from a gang of afterschool special bullies, the main squad of human protagonists stumble upon a partially-buried egg in a vacant lot adjacent to the pits. Our dream team consists of the nerdy but affectionate animal-lover Wally (I’m fairly confident Stuart from Beavis and Butthead is based on Wally), the intelligent and uber-logical “Spock” of the crew – Jeremy, the cocky daredevil Mario (he should know better than to have an ego in ‘80’s cartoons—it only leads to trouble), and the cool but “can’t quite place him” ethnic friend—Shades. Guess what, he likes sunglasses. Along the way, we are introduced to secondary characters like the tomboy mechanic Casey and Wally’s easy-on-the-eyes, quasi-bimbo older sister, Heather. As far as a middle school (ish) cartoon posse in the late 1980’s goes, it’s not a bad offering from our good friends at World Events Productions. In a moment not supported by biology books worldwide, the eggs shatters and out pops Denver in his full glory—coherent, looking very teenager-y, and ready to rock! Science, baby, science. And yes, just so you are clear, he fully understands English. In fact, Heather even asks the gang—“and he understands us?” With the very fabric of the story hinging on the answer—the gang replies back, matter-of-factly, with a single, solitary word—“yes.” Sure, Mr. World Events, there’s absolutely no need to explain any further and dig a bigger hole into the silliness that is Denver—so we’ll just move on. Heather seemed okay with the one word response—and if Heather’s okay, I’m okay too!

Oh yeah, how could I forget? A fragment of Denver’s egg allows the boys to transport back in time and visit prehistoric Earth—complete with wry narration and inaccurate depictions of dinosaurs. Stegosaurus living amongst Tyrannosauruses—why not? That’s only a misstep of 90 million years or so. How did this show get endorsed by the National Education Association? The concept of the time-traveling eggshell is important because…well, I have no idea. But it doesn’t need a reason because it’s the 1980’s, dammit.

The story continues as Denver is the target of rock music promoter, Morton Fizzback. Morton—think Kingpin meets Rodney Dangerfield—is a visionary and knows a real, living dinosaur should front a rock band. Naturally. Upon Denver’s subsequently kidnapping, the kids are seen back in the comfort of Wally’s home playing ping pong. What? Are you kidding me? Your newest best bud (that is a dinosaur, remember?), mere hours into his life in the crazy Cenozoic Era—is stolen away and you partake in table tennis? To paraphrase Billy Madison, “you get your ass out there and find that f##king dinosaur.” When Heather alerts them about an upcoming show by the “Rockin’ Dinos”, they immediately notice that it’s their buddy Denver on the advertisement and a rescue plan is forged.

At the arena, Denver is forced on stage to perform as the crowd chants his name—and he kills it! He does his best Chuck Berry while blasting out his eponymous intro tune and becomes an instant rock god. Kudos to the evil Morton Fizzback for penning one of the greatest songs of the decade, by the way. The kids show up and try and save Denver—but run into Morton and his goons. Unfortunately for Boss Fizzback, not only does he suffer from having uninspiring henchmen and a high likelihood for early onset diabetes, he is crippled by a debilitating case of paranoia. Thinking that the kids will alert the authorities but not wanting to run away from the millions he could make parading around a dinosaur that can shred, Morton decides to sell Denver for “scientific experimentation” to the notorious Professor Funt. The kids lose again.

I seriously question the Professor’s paleo chops as he refers to Denver as “Pre-Jurassic”. Predictably, Denver is locked in a cage as the ego-driven Funt invites the best and brightest scientific minds to bask in the glow of his grand discovery. While he awaits his impending dissection, Denver meets a wandering little Asian girl—which begs the question, “who lets their six year old aimlessly walk the halls of an empty science lab alone”? The answer—grandpa-san. The girl’s geriatric grandfather, Professor Chin—a rival scientist of Funt—decides to be humane and free the friendly Corythosaurus. When Funt returns, all that is left to show his skeptical contemporaries is a stuffed dinosaur doll. Burn.

Denver returns to Los Angeles and sees the gang playing basketball. Seriously? Do I need to paraphrase an Adam Sandler film again? Remind me never to let these kids watch my pets. After a few more mix-ups and comic hijinx, the pilot episode ends with Denver and his friends reunited, Professor Funt likely wallowing in his failures, and Morton Fizzback and his goons in a shipping crate headed for Australia. All in all, not too shabby, Denver.

Finally, as for the question of “does anyone care”? I do. And that’s enough to get me to write this piece. And enough for you to read it, apparently.

And now..a moment of Zen...