History WesternAnimation / TheGoodDinosaur

* SmashedEggHatchling: Arlo’s egg is cracked open when Buck repeatedly hits it with a stick. Arlo peaks out of the egg alive, but is rather underdeveloped.

* SmashedEggHatching: Arlo’s egg is cracked open when Buck repeatedly hits it with a stick. Arlo peaks out of the egg alive, but is rather underdeveloped.

* EyesNeverLie: When Thunderclap gives a rather intense stare to Arlo, his eyes quickly jut to the side in Spot’s direction. This makes Thunderclap look over behind him and see Spot.

* TerrorDactyl: Thunderclap and his clan are a band of hostile pterosaurs that are the closest to actual villains in the film. They all have very inaccurate designs: Thunderclap himself bears resemblance to a ''Nyctosaurus''...except that he has teeth, birdlike talons, and wing claws, which ''Nyctosaurus'' did not have in real life (especially the wing claws, as nyctosaurids are distinctive for ''lacking'' those). The other pterosaurs appear to be ''Ludodactylus'', ''Caulkicephalus'', and ''Guidraco'', which also have birdlike talons. However, the pterosaurs are [[ShownTheirWork quadrupedal like in real life]], but they walk on their knuckles and their arm anatomy is more bird-like.
** Supplementary material simply calls the pterosaurs "pterodactyls". Thankfully, the merchandise also describe them as flying reptiles and one children's coloring book explicitly states [[ShownTheirWork they are not dinosaurs]].

* ArtStyleDissonance: Downplayed; While the movie is not exceedingly grim and and has lots of moments of lighthearted downtime and levity, the film is a still a grounded coming-of-age story that takes itself mostly seriously and does not sugarcoat any peril or trauma characters may experience. All of this is done with rather cartoony and exaggerated character designs. The designs also clash with the look of the world, which are environments that look very photorealistic.

** In a minor note, the scene in which the asteroid misses Earth shows a ''Parasaurolophus'' -- while they did live in Late Cretaceous, they lived only around 76 to 73 million years ago, 7 million years before the asteroid hit.

* ButtMonkey: Arlo gets put through a lot of injuries, frustration, and heartache, and it isn't really PlayedForLaughs.

* ArtisticLicensePhysics: On a realistic trajectory, the asteroid would have flown by in a hyperbolic/parabolic trajectory, due to Earth's gravity altering the trajectory of the asteroid

* BondingOverMissingParents: Arlo and Spot begin to bond when Arlo talks Spot about his family. Spot then reveals [[spoiler:he did have a family, but they died. Just like him, Arlo lost his father recently.]]
* {{Bookends}}: At the beginning and end of the movie there's an ''Apatosaurus'' walking, with a shot of its shadow as they're walking, then the back of their head. At the beginning [[LikeFatherLikeSon it's Henry and at the end it's Arlo]].

* DidNotThinkThisThrough: Papa Henry trying to catch up to Spot and get Arlo to face his fears ends up being rather short-sighted planning in hindsight. Since his son is a CowardlyLion, he tries to get him to do his chores but he keeps getting scared due to the hens attacking him. Poppa Henry eventually thinks that the best thing to do to toughen him up is to have him kill a pest. Then when ''that'' fails, he take him into a treacherous storm to help him conquer his fears. [[spoiler: Papa Henry’s rash decision making ends up getting him killed and leaving Arlo traumatized and developing a new fear for storms.]]
* DisasterScavengers: The pterosaurs are more literal practitioners of this trope, preferring to sit back and let the storms do the killing for them while they feast on the remains.

* FutileHandReach: Arlo reaches out his front leg before [[ spoiler: his father is killed by the rushing flash flood.]]

* PteroSoarer: Thunderclap bears resemblance to a ''Nyctosaurus''...except that he has teeth, birdlike talons, and wing claws, which ''Nyctosaurus'' did not have in real life (especially the wing claws, as nyctosaurids are distinctive for ''lacking'' those). The other pterosaurs appear to be ''Ludodactylus'', ''Caulkicephalus'', and ''Guidraco'', which also have birdlike talons. However, the pterosaurs are [[ShownTheirWork quadrupedal like in real life]], but they walk on their knuckles and their arm anatomy is more bird-like.
** Supplementary material simply calls the pterosaurs "pterodactyls". Thankfully, the merchandise also describe them as flying reptiles and one children's coloring book explicitly states [[ShownTheirWork they are not dinosaurs]].

* FriendToAllLivingThings: Forrest Woodbrush, aka the Pet Collector, is surrounded by small animals.

''The Good Dinosaur'' is an American 3D computer-animated film produced by Creator/{{Pixar}} Animation Studios and released by [[Creator/{{Disney}} Walt Disney Pictures]]. It was released on November 25, 2015 as the studio's sixteenth feature film. Infamous for its TroubledProduction, which resulted in the original director, longtime Pixar writer Bob Peterson, leaving the project due to story problems and being replaced with fellow regular Peter Sohn.

* ArtStyleDissonance: Downplayed; While the movie is not exceedingly grim and and has lots of moments of lighthearted downtime and levity, the movie is a still a grounded coming-of-age story that takes itself mostly seriously and does not sugarcoat any peril or trauma characters may experience. All of this is done with rather cartoony and exaggerated character designs. The designs also clash with the look of the world, which are environments that look very photorealistic.

** The four-legged snake Spot fights is supposed to be a ''Tetrapodophis'', but is shown to more closely resemble a viper as opposed to the actual animal which was more lizardlike in appearance. It could be a descendant, given the AlternateHistory setting, though it does raise the question on why snakes would retain their legs if the mass extinction never happened.

* KingOfTheDinosaurs: Butch and his two children, Nash and Ramsey, are basically ''Tyrannosaurus'' cowboys. Butch in particular is depicted as a hardened, but loving father, and teaches Arlo not to let fear control his life.

* AlternateHistoryDinosaurSurvival: The movie is set in a world where [[WhatIf non-avian dinosaurs never became extinct]] and Jurassic dinosaurs like ''Apatosaurus'' and ''Stegosaurus'' coexist with Cretaceous dinosaurs like ''Triceratops'' and ''Parasaurolophus'' and even prehistoric mammals like the giant bison ''Bison latifrons'' that existed in the ice ages.

* ToylineExclusiveCharacter: Some characters who have a presence in the toyline do not appear in the movie in any capacity. These include two ''Ankylosauruses'' (Jack and Vivian), two ''Triceratops'' (Mary Alice and Sam) and Will the ''Stegosaurus''.

* DumbDinos: Averted with Arlo and the other dinosaurs, who are fully sapient. Ironically, the raptors come off as the least intelligent dinosaurs in the film, while Thunderclap and the pterosaurs are superstitious and cruel but not stupid by any means.

* PteroSoarer: Thunderclap bears resemblance to a ''Nyctosaurus''...except that he has teeth, birdlike talons, and wing claws, which ''Nyctosaurus'' did not have in real life (especially the wing claws, as nyctosaurids are distinctive for ''lacking'' those). The other pterosaurs appear to be ''Ludodactylus'', ''Caulkicephalus'', and ''Guidraco'', which also have birdlike talons. However, the pterosaurs are [[ShownTheirWork quadrupedal like in real life]], but they walk on their knuckles.

* BigGuyLittleGuy: Spot the human is a mere 3-feet tall. While Arlo is a juvenile dinosaur, he is still quite large compared to Spot.

* TooDumbToLive: Your son is CowardlyLion in that he tries to do his chores but keeps getting scared, due to the hens attacking him. So you think that the best thing to do is to toughen him up by having him kill a pest. Then when ''that'' fails, you take him into a treacherous storm to help him conquer his fears. [[spoiler: It's no surprise that Papa Henry gets killed.]]

* TheWestern: With dinosaurs!

* EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs: A universe where the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs never happened.

* AlternativeForeignThemeSong: The ending theme for the Japanese release is [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wwqp0ejpJ8 "Best Friend (Mother Earth version)"]] by Kiroro, a rerecorded version of one of their earlier songs.

* ArtStyleDissonance: Downplayed; While the movie is not exceedingly grim and and has lots of moments of lighthearted downtime and levity, the movie is a still a grounded coming-of-age story that takes itself mostly seriously and does not sugarcoat any peril or trauma characters may experience. All of this is done with rather cartoony and exaggerated designs. The designs also clash with the design of the world, which has a more photorealistic influence for its environments.

* AnAesop

* StockDinosaurs: What ordinarily would be a case of ArtisticLicensePaleontology is subverted by the premise of the film: [[WhatIf set in an alternate universe]], where the cataclysmic asteroid that forever changed life on Earth actually missed the planet completely and giant dinosaurs never became extinct. All named dinosaur characters belong to the well-known genera: Arlo and his family are ''Apatosaurus'', Forrest Woodbrush is a ''Styracosaurus'', the cattle rustlers are ''Velociraptor'', and the cattle rancher family are ''UsefulNotes/TyrannosaurusRex''. ''Parasaurolophus'' make cameo appearances in the opening, and the tie-in toy line features ''Stegosaurus'', ''Triceratops'', and ''Ankylosaurus'' (which were planned to appear in the movie, but were cut out during the revision). The pterosaurs on the other hand avert this, being based on obscure genera such as ''Guidraco'' and ''Caulkicephalus''. Deleted scenes also include the temporally misplaced Non-Dinosaur ''Dimetrodon'', but one possessing mammalian traits like fur and visible ears and serving as the setting's analog to wolves or coyotes.