Dennis Nedry Track & Chase Pack Hardly Too Cool for School Jurassic Park '93 Classic Target Exclusive Item No.: No. HTP61 Manufacturer: Mattel Includes: Dennis Nedry, backpack, rocket, claw, motorcycle, velociraptor Action Feature: Press back for roar, bendable wings, scan foot for app-scannable DNA Retail: $23.99 Availability: ca. August 2024 Other: Kenner pastiche
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I had my eye on the long-pegwarming Dennis Nedry Track & Chase Pack for months, certain that I would prevail on clearance. I was wrong - moms are the only thing on this planet more tenacious than cheapskate collectors, and they will beat you to the punch on markdown LEGO, dinosaurs, and just about anything else. Maybe you'll get lucky sometimes, but I went to eBay to get this one - and as luck would have it, it's still 33% cheaper than I would have paid at Target back in 2024. I can live with that.

Toys like this are really interesting to me in that they thumb their nose to a certain kind of collector. The set is largely inspired by Kenner and Hasbro toys of the 1990s and early 2000s, nearly the opposite of the collector-friendly Hammond Collection. If you were a Kenner kid, a lot of your toys were off-model, weird, or wholly original Kenner ideas. The original Dennis Nedry Kenner figures were largely unconcerned with such matters as "casting," so it's wild to see Mattel reimagine Wayne Knight as a muscled-out biker who could have been one of the Dreadnoks. Even more interesting, it's got Wayne Knight's head. This sort of toy should not exist, and yet, it does.

I felt $24 was a little much for this item as a joke purchase, and I was right. But as something to admire? $24 was good.

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The headliner is, of course, Dennis Nedry himself. I assume all the parts come from other figures, like his arms are from the first Mattel Mercenary figure and the head seems similar to one of the Hammond Collection heads. The torso is from the Destruct-a-Saurs Pteranodon Copter Attack set, which you and probably nobody else you know has. I'm not sure about the pants.

But what inspired Nedry's backpack and laser with mask? Those are inspired by the 1993 and 1994 Kenner action figures, although those squirted water. This one is merely decorative, cast in silver plastic. It easily slides over his head and connects to his back. The figure itself is bananas - they took actor Wayne Knight's head from the movie accurate part of the line and slapped it on a sleeveless, muscled body wearing jeans. He has a watch, and he could beat you down pretty easily. The face sculpt is quite good, plus he has clear plastic glasses. The costume is similar to the "New Series II" version, albeit sleeveless and with bare hands. The JP tag is no longer present, and Mattel's orange vest isn't quite a match for the Kenner toy... but you can see their inspiration.

If Nedry's body shares a sculpt with another figure, I'm not aware of it. I assume it's new, and it's pretty good. Not only can he hold and wear his gear, but he can stand just fine. He can also easily sit on and grab the handlebars of his motorcycle. I tried him on the Reimagined Moto Chase bike too, and Nedry also fits like a dream there.

This is a gleefully silly figure. I genuinely hope there's a video somewhere on some press junket where somebody shows it to Wayne Knight, because I want to see what he says about it. I'm writing this in the past, after getting it in the mail, and I'm having fun with it. It's a real toy, made like a real toy, and I think it's going to make as many people mad as it will delighted. That's a winner.

The bike seems to be a retool of the Jurassic World Dominion pack with the Yangchuanosaurus, Blue, Owen, and this bike. This version adds some sockets for the weapons, adds removes the gun compartment, and colors it like The Lost World Kenner Dino-Snare Dirtbike. The rocket launcher gets some decent distance, while the capture claw is pretty neat. It's jointed in a few spots, and the yellow claw can telescope in and out as well as rotate. The wheels on the bike do indeed go round and round, spinning far better than most other toy vehicles I've purchased in recent memory. Nicely done, Mattel.

The Velociraptor isn't a Kenner item per se, but it is from Hasbro's generally overlooked Jurassic Park III line, which comes from the generally overlooked Jurassic Park III movie. The deco applied to one of Mattel's many raptor toys comes from the electronic Re-ak A-Tak Alpha Velociraptor, which was one of many fairly ugly figures in that line. There are so many raptor toys that I'm not positive how many share this mold, but it's a good one. The wrinkles in the skin are nice, I appreciate the jointed neck and jaw, plus the arms and legs rotate nicely. She stands well, and I really like the intense blotches of color on the skin. I'm generally sick of raptor toys, but if they have distinctive coloring I'm suddenly interested. If we ever get a blue Chaos Effect Raptor again, I'll be there.

I can see why this set was slow to sell - it's a very silly mix of parts and colors from the first three movies. Jurassic World toys sell to kids, and to people who think they're serious collectors but haven't yet come to terms that they're probably here to have a fun time too. I'd recommend this to anybody out there with a 3 3/4-inch action figure collection, just because it feels like some crazy idea you wish you had as a kid. Nothing is super-articulated, nothing is trying to be movie-accurate. It's just weird, and I like weird. I doubt they'll make another silly Nedry figure, so I don't have to worry about it being replaced. It seems unlikely we'll get another Jurassic Park III-colored Raptor like this either. I'm going to stick to mostly just getting these weirdly colored guys, and I think I'm going to be the better for it.

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