Dilophosaurus

Dilophosaurus was the largest meat-eater of the early Jurassic Period. It was made famous by the movie Jurassic Park, but the movie did not present an accurate picture of this dinosaur. Because it was the biggest and most ferocious of its time, it would not have needed to be poisonous (it was probably not a "spitter" like in the movie). It is also much larger than the movie version, though it should be noted that the movie's version Dilophosaurus were in fact juvenile (as said in Jurassic Park: The Game).

Dilophosaurus gets its name from the two thin crests of bone on the top of it's head. These were probably used as a display for courtship purposes (scientists don't believe it had a frill on its neck like the movie version). Dilophosaurus has been found in both the U.S. and China, which, although part of the same huge landmass, were still quite a long distance from each other.

As an early predatory dinosaur, Dilophosaurus did not have forward facing eyes to give it stereo vision. It may have used scent as an integral part of its hunting technique. It had long and slender, rear-curving teeth in long jaws and strong front arms which would have been effective in grabbing prey. It was fast - probably with a top speed of about 30-mph. It also had a long tail that could have been used as a whip in a fight. Footprints attributed to dilophosaurus appear in groups, so it may have hunted in small packs. It shares the same overall body configuration as its ancestor the Coelophysis.

Download the Jurassic Park Institute Dilophosaurus fact card

More real-life information: Dilophosaurus at Wikipedia.

Dilophosaurus is one of the least understood dinosaurs. Michael Crichton, Steven Spielberg and Mark "Crash" McCreery filled this data vacuum with their own imagination. Therefore the creature that appears in the Jurassic Park series has some characteristics for which there is either no scientific evidence or contradicts existing data

Sexual dimorphism
The pair of rounded crests on the skull of Dilophosaurus were possibly used for display. In the novel the crests have red and black stripes, one sex (maybe male) has darker crests than the other. One sex is also smaller than the other. Studies by Robert Gay show no indication that sexual dimorphism was present in the skeleton of Dilophosaurus, but says nothing about crest variation.

Venom
The connection between the ry and ry bones of the skull was very weak. This created a notch behind the first row of teeth. This conformation led to the early hypothesis that Dilophosaurus scavenged off dead carcasses, with the front teeth being too weak to bring down and hold large prey.

The Dilophosaurus in the Jurassic Park Series paralyzes its prey by spitting blinding venom in the eyes (like a ). It's said in the Jurassic Park novel that it's venom contains seven different enzymes, it's said that the Dilophosaurus is able to spit venom too, but the reach of the venom varies, in the Dinosaur Encyclopedia in the Jurassic Park DVD extras, it can spit distances of 20 feet, but in the novel it can spit up to 50 feet. In this way the creature is still a predator despite it's weak jaws and teeth. There is no evidence that Dilophosaurs had venom glands, but glands don't have structures that are hard enough to fossilize. These venom glands don't contradict existing data.

Neck frill
Steven Spielberg added another dubious feature to the Dilophosaurus: a retractable neck frill around its neck (much like a of Northern Australia). It is not considered accurate by paleontologists that Dilophosaurus had a frill. Bret Bennington said wrote about the frill in the American Paleontologist: "If Dilophosaurus did have a frill, we would know about it. There would be fossil evidence of bones or some other rigid structure required to hold the frill up and there would be markings on the bones of the neck indicating where muscles could attach that would be required to move the frill up and down. We don't see either of these."

One theory for the frill that since the Dilophosaurus on Isla Nublar were juvenile, it was a means of them to intimidate and/or hunt larger animals until they matured; after that, the frill would disappear (for its size as an adult would do the same thing as the frill in purpose) and would not be present in its adult years. However, this theory is yet to be confirmed as possible. Both this and the venom glands could also be explained by InGen splicing their DNA with that of an Australian frill-necked lizard and some kind of venomous snake.

Jurassic Park Franchise
features a juvenile Dilophosaurus which made up for its small size with a waving frill, and a highly corrosive venom that temporarily blinded its prey, eventually causing paralysis. While it is only seen in, it has been used on many different items of merchandise for The Lost World and. Though living on Isla Sorna it was never seen in the movie.

Jurassic Park novel
The Dilophosaurus is first seen during the Park Drive near the river. They see one animal, drinking from the river. It is a 10 foot tall carnivore, with a heavy tail, strong hind limbs, and a long neck. Its crests make a V shape above the animal's head. The crest have red and black stripes, like a parrot or toucan. Its body is covered with yellow and black spots, like a leopard. Its roar sounds like an owl.

Nedry's death
Dennis Nedry enters the Dilophosaurus territory to smuggle Dinosaur embryos out of the Park. But Dennis didn't check what kind of Dinosaurs lived in that area, not long after his arrival he is confronted by a large and dangerous predator.

Nedry's body is later found by Muldoon and Gennaro, with Muldoon remarking ''"They blinded him, then ripped him down the middle. Not a nice way to go. Maybe there's justice in this world after all." ''After the Dilophosaurus kills Dennis, it is hunted and killed by the raptors after they escape.

River Adventure
Because no frog DNA was used to clone the Dilophosaurs they don't reproduce in the first novel. However, in the first novel Grant sees a couple of Dilophosaurs (both male and female sex) at the river, which were performing a mating ritual. This seeming contradiction is never explained.

Jurassic Park film
thumb A juvenile Dilophosaurus blinded and killed Dennis Nedry as he attempted to deliver stolen embryos to Dodgson's man on the boat at the East Dock. In the less gruesome of the two versions, Nedry's death in the film is shown as him being blinded by the Dilophosaur venom, and then stumbling into his Jeep where he is met possibly by a second Dilophosaur, which pounced on him from the passenger seat. The camera then cuts to the outside of the Jeep as it rocks back and forth as Nedry screams. In the novel, he suffered a much more gruesome death, he actually held his intestines in his hands before realizing where he'd been hit.

The frill and the ability to spit venom could be easily explained as a side effect. As John Hammond's movie theater explained, the dinosaurs had their DNA combined with the DNA of frogs and there's a possibility that Dilophosaurus DNA was combined with the DNA of a frilled lizard and a spitting cobra, along with or without the DNA of a frog. Curiously, the sizes of Dilophosaurus and Velociraptor were swapped, with the film's Dilophosaurus closer in size to the real-life Velociraptor, while raptors were around the size of real dilophosaurs.

The Lost World: Jurassic Park
Dilophosaurus is also depicted on the screen saver and in the trailers of The Lost World, confirming its presence on Isla Sorna, but they were never seen in the film.

Jurassic Park inspired games
All of the games used the juvenile Dilophosaurus seen in the first film to depict adult Dilophosaurs.


 * Dilophosaurus appeared in the NES game Jurassic Park. It jumps from behind trees, objects, walls and spits poison.


 * Spitting Dilophosaurs are an enemy in the SNES game Jurassic Park. Their spit doesn't cause a lot of damage and they can be easily killed.


 * Spitters are an enemy in the game Jurassic Park Interactive.


 * Dilophosaurs are encountered in Area 1 and 4 in the arcade game Jurassic Park.


 * Spitters appear in Chaos Island: The Lost World. They are the only dinosaurs in the game with ranged attack.


 * Few Spitters are encountered in the Stage 1 of the arcade game The Lost World: Jurassic Park.


 * Seen in Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis as a two-star small carnivore, the game's Dilophosaur shares all of the characteristics of the one in the movie, from the frill to the small stature. It can spit venom at prey but does not, however, spit venom at the visitors, despite the spaces between the bars on the fence. If not in the fence though, they then can hunt visitors, as well as cleaners, even though the cleaners will most likely never be killed by the dinosaurs, no matter how many times they've been hit by venom. This is most likely a game play error. The Dilophosaurus (the weakest of the small carnivores) will only attack and kill small herbivores such as Dryosaurus, Homalocephale, and Gallimimus and is unable to take down large or armoured small herbivores. They can be placed along with Velociraptor in one enclosure.


 * In the PC game Jurassic Park Dinosaur Battles Dilophosaurus is a opponent. It is a fast opponent, advanced Dilophosaurs have strong piercing attacks.


 * Dilophosaurus is an enemy in Jurassic Park III: Island Attack, in the level The Laboratory the player has to defeat a pack of Dilophosaurs in a boss fight.


 * The creature is nr. 008 of the Carnivore Twos that can be created in Jurassic Park III: Park Builder.


 * In Jurassic Park III: The DNA Factor Dilophosaurus is one of the 12 encountered dinosaurs on Isla Sorna.


 * In the arcade game Jurassic Park III Dilophosaurus appears in Areas 1 and 4.

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 * Dilophosaurus is featured in the DVD game Jurassic Park: Explorer. A player earns a dinosaur when he/she wins a minigame, when the earned dinosaur is a Dilophosaurus this video will be shown. The video shows that the animal is 7 meters (23 ft) long, as it was in reality, but it still has the neck frill (since the game is about InGen-made dinosaurs, not "natural-made" dinosaurs).
 * Dilophosaurs appears in Jurassic Park: The Game, when Nima is investigating near Nedry's Jeep. She is scared off and eventually is injured/poisoned by a group of Troodons. It also attacks Billy later. They act like they are worried of the Troodons, despite the fact that they are somewhat larger, although their venom is less dangerous and promises a much more merciful death than the Troodon's venom.
 * They are heard in the background of the first compy level in the PSX The Lost World: Jurassic Park game.

Toy lines
Dilophosaurus appeared in almost every JP toy line except the Chaos Effect toy line even though Dilophosaurus did sort of appear as part of the Dilophospinus, and later was going to appear in the unreleased Chaos Effect Night Hunter toy line.

Trivia

 * It, along with Procompsognathus and Troodon, are the only known venomous dinosaurs in the franchise.
 * The Dilophosaurus in Jurassic Park is possibly a juvenile. This may be reinforced by Nedry saying " T hought you might've been one of your big brothers." However, he may simply be talking about a different species such as a Tyrannosaurus.
 * The Dilophosaurus is the only dinosaur to appear in the movies that did not use CGI, only animatronics.
 * In Jurassic Park: The Game, the skin pattern on the Dilophosaurus resembles a snake pattern, which is how it appeared in the novels.
 * Dilophosaurus may have roved in packs, since 3 fossils were found together.
 * Publicity material for Jurassic Park: The Game states that the Dilophosaurus seen in the film and the game are juvenile, with an adult size expectancy of 20 feet.
 * However, in the game itself, Laura Sorkin notes in her journal that all the Dilophosaurus on the island are undersized, something she attributes to Henry Wu's messing with the genetic code.
 * It's possible that Dilophosaurus could be the same animal as Coelophysis.