Valley of the Dinosaurs

I avidly watched this series as a 10 year old in 1975, when it was shown by the BBC on children's TV, and thoroughly enjoyed it!!

OK, I may be 42 now but I would love to own this series on DVD just for old times sake!!

Sad I know, but I don't remember seeing an episode I didn't enjoy!

Yes the idea of a family being propelled into a lost world is silly, but the story lines were always original without being overly moralistic....as far as I remember...it's been a long time!

Does anyone know if Hanna Barbera have any plans to release it?

Am I being nostalgic? Or am I just having a mid-life crisis? !!!

I personally liked "Valley of the Dinosaurs", and for the record, the Butler family did *not* arrive in a plane as a previous poster wrote, but in a rubber raft while on a trip down the Amazon (I believe). A whirlpool sucked them into a land that time forgot--not that different from the live-action "Land of the Lost", which I also liked.

"VOTD" was to me, underrated because it was very educational as well as adventurous. I learned a thing or two about submarines, paddleboats, air pressure, as well as expanding sticks of wood that could split a cliff! I think somebody from H-B actually did some reasearch!

The Butler family, along with Garak's family, was always barely staying ahead of the dinosaurs that wanted to, say we say, feast on them (at least the carnivores, that is). I enjoyed the ways how they could get out of their predicaments. I recalled that me and my mother enjoyed the cartoon very much when I was around ten. Yes, Garak's family, for a "backward caveman's", spoke English, but so what? It was a fun show to watch! And before Daria Morgendoffer, there was Katie Butler. Now, *there* was a girl who could hang with Daria in the sarcastic department! She could give a funny crack even during the most dangerous of situations, and I laughed! Good show, that was...

In addition to never meet your heroes, in general, I think it's best to not re-watch TV shows you thought were awesome when you were 6 years old.

Still, I loved Valley of the Dinosaurs so much when I was six I decided to break the second rule and streamed some episodes from Amazon.

And I was more than pleasantly surprised. For Saturday morning kiddie fare, this wasn't half-bad. Hellz I'd stack it up against prime-time 'adult' TV shows of the same era such as 'The Brady Bunch Hour' any day.

Despite the title, the heart of the show was actually the dynamic between two families - one from modern times, and one from the stone age. If you can get past the convenience of the stone age family speaking English - it works quite well without being preachy as an example of how different groups can come together to become stronger as a whole. The modern-day Butlers brought very helpful scientific knowledge to Gorak's family; while Gorak and his family taught the Butlers how to survive in a prehistoric jungle. One episode the Butlers would save Gorak's family with some sort of improvised stone-age fire engine, submarine, drilling rig or what not; the next episode Gorak and crew would save the Butlers with their ancient knowledge of Pterodactyl egg medicine.

And the characters were quite likable and engaging - and much more believable than typical Saturday morning characters. Teenage daughter Katie in particular was just snarky enough to be believable; but still caring and sympathetic enough to be endearing. And each Butler family character was paired up perfectly with a Gorak family member. Father John with patriarch Gorak; mother Kim with Gorak's wife Gana; young Greg with Gorak and Gana's young daughter Tana; and of course teenage Katie with Gorak and Gana's strapping teenage son Lok - who gets in one of the best completely-over-the-heads-of-children lines ever when he brags to Katie of a 'giant snake' that he's had to tame.

That line alone makes VOTD one of the best Saturday morning cartoons ever.

This was one of the better Hanna-Barbera entries of the 1970's. It had interesting stories and many likable characters. Unfortunately, the same day that this show debuted, the Krofft brothers unleashed there masterpiece "Land of the Lost". In fact, that show aired at exactly the same time as this one and quickly overshadowed "Valley". This was pretty much an unusual show from H-B at the time due to the fact that unlike many of the other shows that were on at the time, this one didn't try to be preachy or ram a valuable life lesson down your throat each week. It was very action oriented without a lot of violence and it showed how the Butlers were trying to adapt to their new surroundings while at the same time trying to introduce all the modern advances of their world to Gorak's family and other cave people who inherited the valley. This was a really good show. Too bad it was overshadowed by that other good show that debuted the same day and the same exact hour as this one.

This was pretty good from what I remember, same old plot as Land of the Lost-but they seemed to take care to stay away from the shrill campiness of that particular show. I remember as a kid liking it, they seemed to work in some morales and psuedo-geological lessons amongst the action.

Plus the pet mini-stegosaurus was kinda cute too...

**1/2 outta ****, it worked...