Word: rex
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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With its 6-in.-long razor-sharp teeth, Tyrannosaurus rex certainly had the look of a fearsome hunter. But looks aren't everything. For decades paleontologists have chewed over the suggestion that T. rex's eyes were too small, its arms too short and its legs too slow for effective hunting. A few experts have gone so far as to say that despite the monster's huge jaws, its teeth were fragile and its jaw muscles were not strong enough to capture and kill other animals. Maybe the king of the dinosaurs was just a lowly scavenger...
...maybe not. An experiment described in the current Nature suggests that the huge carnivore did indeed have the most powerful bite in history. Researchers led by Gregory Erickson, a graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley, figured that if they could reproduce the T. rex bite marks found in fossilized Triceratops bones, they could deduce how much force had been needed to make them. So with the help of Stanford biomechanical engineers they crafted a false Tyrannosaurus tooth out of bronze and aluminum, then mounted it in a guillotine-like device and slammed it into the pelvic bone...
Their verdict: a feeding T. rex could have exerted up to 3,011 lbs. of biting force. (It would have used greater force while attacking.) A human's bite, by comparison, packs 175 lbs.; a lion's, 937; and an alligator's, just under 3,000. The research addresses only one aspect of the predator vs. scavenger question. But if scientists can find several bones with T. rex bite wounds that later healed--showing that the animals weren't already dead when they were chomped on--that might settle the debate for good...
Which isn't to say big studios ignore the DTV market. The majors have long seen DTV as a dumping ground for films they thought might flop theatrically; recently New Line demoted Theodore Rex, an excruciatingly whimsical comedy about future cop Whoopi Goldberg and her dinosaur partner, to a video release. Increasingly, though, the majors view DTV as an attractive alternative--a place to release franchise spin-offs, avoid $50 million marketing costs, make a bundle. Sequels to such mainstream fare as Land Before Time, Darkman, Children of the Corn and the Jim Varney Ernest series have been...
...people in Hollywood were listening, it roared. It stomped out tracks that would be followed by the Aladdins and the Darkmans. Now the form is nearing extinction. But on video-store shelves and on pay cable, these value-for-money thrill machines can live forever. Farewell and hail, Videosaurus rex...