While Darkwing Duck is investigating mysterious thefts and kidnappings in St. Canard, Honker and Gosalyn track down a set of dinosaur footprints, and are led to the nefarious Dr. Fossil, duck turned dinosaur. With his de-evolution ray and the aid of a passing comet, Fossil plans to end the current life on the planet to give dinosaurs a second chance.
This episode contains examples of the following tropes:
- Amoral Attorney: The first on-screen kidnapping victims of Dr. Fossil are a pair of lawyers and their secretary, with one of them dictating a letter charging their latest client an exorbitant amount of money despite losing the case.
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking: Dr. Fossil's crimes involve kidnapping, transforming people into dinosaurs, planning to wipe out life on Earth with a comet and making Stegmutt drive around with expired plates.
- Artistic License – Paleontology:
- Dr. Fossil's plan to turn all the avian populace into dinosaurs with a Devolution Device is clearly based on the fact that birds are directly descended from dinosaurs. However, it was small theropod dinosaurs that birds are descended from, therefore he and Stegmutt would have turned into those rather than a pterosaur (which, to make matters worse, wasn't even a dinosaur) and a stegosaur. To make it even more confusing, some of the dinosaur-turned victims of the de-evolution were originally mammals.
- Gosalyn asks Stegmutt if he uses his spiked tail to knock down Tyrannosaurus. While Stegmutt denies it (as he was originally a duck), Stegosaurus went extinct millions of years before Tyrannosaurus came into existence.
- Brick Joke: When explaining his motivation, Dr. Fossil claims people would call him Godzilla as an insult. Later on, when Darkwing gets hit with the Retro-Gun and mutates, he gets confused for Godzilla by the panicking people.
- Comically Missing the Point: When Darkwing realizes that he was talking to Stegmutt, a dinosaur, this exchange happens:D.W.: (shocked) Launchpad! Did you see that!
Launchpad: Yeah! That trucknote had expired plates!
D.W.: I know! But that's... not what I meant! - Evilutionary Biologist: Dr. Fossil is this, planning to mutate everyone into dinosaurs.
- Failed a Spot Check: Even considering Dr. Fossil's prank call distraction, nobody seems to notice Stegmutt, a massive stegosaurus, wandering around St. Canard and kidnapping people.
- Fantastic Racism: Dr. Fossil believes dinosaurs aren't being treated with respect by modern people, brandishing dino-themed merch to prove his point.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Dr. Fossil ends up having the super-magnet he stole turned against him, resulting in him getting squished flat by a battleship.
- Ignorant Minion: Stegmutt; Gosalyn and Honker had to tell him that Dr. Fossil was evil, even though he practically did little to hide his true nature.
- Locked Out of the Loop: Contributing to Stegmutt's nature as an Ignorant Minion (see above), Dr. Fossil admitted to keeping Stegmutt in the dark on various details of his plan, knowing it would upset him. Sure enough, when Gosalyn and Honker makes clear what Dr. Fossil's plan really means, Stegmutt pulls a true Heel–Face Turn.
- Luxury Prison Suite: St. Canard's Minimum Security Prison is this. There's literally no fences or walls, only a loudspeaker thanking the prisoners for not leaving.
- Minion with an F in Evil: Stegmutt partially, because he wasn't evil, and until Gosalyn and Honker told him otherwise, he didn't think Dr. Fossil was either.
- Not Zilla: Darkwing gets transformed into a giant dinosaur resembling Godzilla, whom he even gets mistaken for.
- Prank Call: Dr. Fossil distracts people with these while Stegmutt gathers the items/people he needs.
- Professor Guinea Pig: Dr Fossil deliberately turned himself into a pterosaur.
- Shown Their Work:
- Honker correctly dates Stegosaurus to the Late Jurassic period.
- This may be one of the earliest cartoons to incorporate the then-recent hypothesis that the Cretaceous extinction was caused by an asteroid impact, which was arguably popularized after Jurassic Park.
- Smooch of Victory: Gosalyn kisses Honker on the cheek when they are at the museum tracking down Stegmutt.
- Stating the Simple Solution: When Dr. Fossil bemoans all the stares and fear he gets from the public as a dinosaur person, Honker asks "Why don't you just change back?". However, Fossil thinks he's being a "wisenheimer" and loses his temper.
