There’s a very thrilling documentary hitting theaters this Friday entitled “Dinosaur 13,” about the most complete T. rex fossil ever found and the intense battle that ensued over who owns it.
It’s crazy stuff that will really make you think…and make you miss the greatest dinosaur franchise of all time, “The Land Before Time.”
The original “Land Before Time” was a 1988 theatrical release helmed by Don Bluth that became such a smash hit it spawned 12 direct-to-home-video sequels between 1994 and 2007.
That means there are 13 of these movies — the same number in the title of the new documentary’s title.
With so many iterations, we were intrigued enough to determine which one was the best.
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1. 'The Land Before Time' (1988)
Oh, come on. You knew this was coming. Nothing ever tops the original, and the same goes here. While the sequels have their merits, they can’t quite touch the level of craft on the first and the feeling of meeting our dinosaur friends for the first time.
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2. 'The Land Before Time III: The Time of the Great Giving' (1995)
The raptors in this sequel are so genuinely terrifying that any kid from the ’90s will tell you they still have the occasional nightmare about them. T. rex who?
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3. 'The Land Before Time V: The Mysterious Island' (1997)
That island sure was mysterious, and it taught us the important lesson of not judging a dinosaur by the size of its teeth, as it turned out one of the T. rexes wasn’t so bad after all.
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4. 'The Land Before Time X: The Great Longneck Migration' (2003)
Our leading man, Littlefoot, finally gets a dad! And he’s voiced by Kiefer Sutherland. Double win!
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5. 'The Land Before Time II: The Great Valley Adventure' (1994)
The first sequel is also one of the best, introducing us to a baby T. rex named Chomper, who has the pleasant capability of being bilingual, speaking both T. rex and herbivore.
The film also does the best job of maintaining some of the darker tone of the original movie while broadening its humor for younger audiences. But it’s also responsible for introducing the musical format, so, boo.
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6. 'The Land Before Time IX: Journey to Big Water' (2002)
This one provides a breath of fresh air by bringing in the element of water, allowing the world to open up to underwater species.
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7. 'The Land Before Time IV: Journey Through the Mists' (1996)
Finally the series adds a little more girl power in the form of Ali, who looks just like Littlefoot. But then it quickly takes her out of the picture by the film’s end, and she doesn’t show up again in another movie (though she was on the TV spin-off series, albeit in a different color).
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8. 'The Land Before Time VIII: The Big Freeze' (2001)
The introduction of the Ice Age into the series is an interesting (read: hilarious) choice, because even though the gang may be fine at the end of the movie, they’re still totally going to die.
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9. 'The Land Before Time XII: The Great Day of the Flyers' (2006)
It’s forgettable and small in scope with very low stakes, but the flying scenes are cool-ish? And there’s a dinosaur named Guido. That’s a plus.
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10. 'The Land Before Time VII: The Stone of Cold Fire' (2000)
Though not quite as annoying as “Tinysauruses,” the name “Rainbow Faces” comes pretty close.
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11. 'The Land Before Time VI: The Secret of Saurus Rock' (1998)
The secret of Saurus Rock is that it’s boring and uninspired. Does a folk tale about a lone dinosaur based on “The Lone Ranger” sound like a good idea to you?
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12. 'The Land Before Time XI: Invasion of the Tinysauruses' (2005)
“The Land Before Time” series was never big on factual accuracy — they don’t even call the dinosaurs by their real names (i.e., a T. rex is called a Sharptooth).
But they crossed the line with the introduction of “Tinysauruses,” which is so dumb it’s unbearable.
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13. 'The Land Before Time XIII: The Wisdom of Friends' (2007)
Even if this movie weren’t terrible, it’d probably still deserve to be last on the list based on the terrible name alone.
That aside, the plot is about as lame as these things get, and not even a phoned-in voice role from Cuba Gooding Jr. can save it. Blame this one for putting the final nail in the coffin for the series.