The Velociraptors are the final and true main antagonists of The Land Before Time III: The Time of the Great Giving as threats to the children and their guardians during the movie's climax.
Character[]
Appearance[]
These sharpteeth differ from the Tyrannosaurus in the previous two films. They are much smaller and much faster than the larger theropods. They are also quite inaccurately depicted. They are correctly depicted with three-fingered hands (unlike most of the other dromaeosaurids in the series), but they lack the birdlike feathers that dromaeosaurs were known to have, and they are also larger than the real-life Velociraptor.
History[]
A pack of four Velociraptor appears during the climax, not long after Hyp is rescued from a tar pit in The Mysterious Beyond, and is reprimanded by his father for getting into danger. They come down from the hills to prey upon the group of dinosaurs. On of the raptors tries to attack Grandpa Longneck, but the Longneck moves aside and hits the raptor into the air with his tail. It lands on Daddy Topps' head, who throws it into the air, sending it sliding down a rock wall. It snarls back at them, but it is then knocked out and possibly killed by a falling stone. The raptor stays incapacitated for the remainder of the fight and eventually dies. The leaf-eater children are guided away from the battle by Hyp's Father, while the other adults attempt to fend off the three remaining dromaeosaurs. Grandpa fights a couple of them off with his tail, and Littlefoot turns back, fearing for his safety, but Hyp's father tells him to keep running. The raptors soon get past Mutt's father, and leave the area and chase after the search party. The children comes across a large rock wall in a small valley, where the raptors await them. A standoff between the sharpteeth and the adults begins, though only shortly, as the cliff collapses not long afterwards, sending every leaf eater and fast biter down to the valley below.
A good deal of the adults are knocked unconscious by the sudden collapse of the rock wall, and so do the raptors. However, they quickly wake up and close in on the herbivores. Hyp's father attempts to stop the carnivores from making a meal out of the other grownups, and Hyp distracts them away, even managing to get all three of the raptors to knock heads. The other adults regain consciousness, and Grandpa Longneck hits away all three raptors. When Hyp runs up the dam the kids had run up to escape, he steps on a rock, causing it to hit one of the raptors (possibly the leader) on the head, and Topps rams it from behind, sending it into a wall. This causes rocks to fall on it, including one hitting it on the head, taking it out of the fight for the time being.
The other two subordinates then try to climb up the dam of rocks to reach the children. The children, attempting to aid the adults, manage to push a large boulder onto all three of the remaining dromaeosaurs, causing rocks to bury them, though they very quickly emerge from the rocks. The adults continue to fight the sharpteeth as the three of them slowly move towards them. With the collapse of the dam, however, water begins to flood the narrow valley in which the characters are located. The herbivorous dinosaurs manage to escape the rush of water, though the raptors are ultimately washed away, they become relocated to a different area of the Mysterious Beyond.
Trivia[]
- Some people have believed that the Velociraptors aren't villains, although they were villains because they're actually sentient predators. Most of the sharpteeth are sentient predators which they are not normal animals at all.