Dilophosaurus

Dilophosaurus is a carnivorous dinosaur (specifically, a coelophysoid theropod) from the early Jurassic period of Arizona. Dilophosaurus was once thought to be a carnosaur due to its 20 ft size since back then the carnosaurs were the big ones and the coelusaurs were the little ones. Dilophosaurus measured around six meters (20 ft) long and may have weighed half a ton. The most distinctive characteristic of Dilophosaurus is the pair of rounded crests on its skull.

More real-life information: Dilophosaurus at Wikipedia.

Dilophosaurus is one of the least understood dinosaurs. Michael Crichton and Steven Spielberg 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 are red (page 300), 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 premaxillary and maxillary 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 poison in the eyes (like a Spitting cobra). 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 fossilise. 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 frill-necked lizard). 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."

Jurassic Park Series
Jurassic Park 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 Jurassic Park, it has been used on many different items of merchandise for The Lost World and Jurassic Park III.

Jurassic Park novel
In the novels, it is far more accurate, not having the frill and appearing as an adult, but still spits venom. Interestingly, another coelophysoid theropod, Procompsognathus, is also venomous in the novels.

Nedry's death
Dennis Nedry enters the Dilophosaurus territory to smuggle Dinosaur embryo's out of the Park. But Dennis didn't checked what kind of Dinosaurs lived in that area, not long after his arrival he is confronted by a large predator. The following is a direct excerpt from the novel:

''The dinosaur stared at him and then snapped its head in a single swift motion. Nedry felt something smack wetly against his chest. He looked down and saw a dripping glob of foam on his rain-soaked shirt. He touched it curiously, not comprehending. . . . It was spit. The dinosaur had spit on him.''

''It was creepy, he thought. He looked back at the dinosaur and saw the head snap again, and immediately felt another wet smack against his neck, just above the shirt collar. He wiped it away with his hand.''

''Jesus, it was disgusting. But the skin of his neck was already starting to tingle and burn. And his hand was tingling, too. It was almost like he had been touched with acid.''

''Nedry opened the car door, glancing back at the dinosaur to make sure it wasn't going to attack, and felt a sudden, excruciating pain in his eyes, stabbing like spikes into the back of his skull, and he squeezed his eyes shut and gasped with the intensity of it and threw up his hands to cover his eyes and felt the slippery foam trickling down both sides of his nose. Spit. The dinosaur had spit in his eyes.''

''Even as he realized it, the pain overwhelmed him, and he dropped to his knees, disoriented, wheezing. He collapsed onto his side, his cheek pressed to the wet ground, his breath coming in thin whistles through the constant, ever-screaming pain that caused flashing spots of light to appear behind his tightly shut eyelids.''

''The earth shook beneath him and Nedry knew the dinosaur was moving, he could hear its soft hooting cry, and despite the pain he forced his eyes open and still he saw nothing but flashing spots against black. Slowly the realization came to him. He was blind.''

''The hooting was louder as Nedry scrambled to his feet and staggered back against the side panel of the car, as a wave of nausea and dizziness swept over him. The dinosaur was close now, he could feel it coming close, he was dimly aware of its snorting breath.''

''But he couldn't see. He couldn't see anything, and his terror was extreme. He stretched out his hands, waving them wildly in the air to ward off the attack he knew was coming.''

''And then there was a new, searing pain, like a fiery knife in his belly, and Nedry stumbled, reaching blindly down to touch the ragged edge of his shirt, and then a thick, slippery mass that was surprisingly warm, and with horror he suddenly knew he was holding his own intestines in his hands. The dinosaur had torn him open. His guts had fallen out.''

''Nedry fell to the ground and landed on something scaly and cold, it was the animal's foot, and then there was new pain on both sides of his head. The pain grew worse, and as he was lifted to his feet he knew the dinosaur had his head in its jaws, and the horror of that realization was followed by a final wish, that it would all be ended soon.''

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."

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.

Jurassic Park film
thumb|300px|right|The dilophosaurus attacks Dennis Nedry A 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 Dilophosaurs DNA was combined with the DNA of a frill lizard and a spitting cobra, along with or without the DNA of a frog.

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.

Jurassic Park inspired games
Dilophosaurs 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 much damage an they're easy 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.

A male Spitter is encountered in the Stage 1 level Site B Farmer 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.

Dilophosaurs 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.


 * Dilophosaurs 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 Dilophosaurs 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.