Petrie's Birth

[NewOrder]

I've thought about this before, but it came to me just now. I realised that during the original Land Before Time we witness the birth of 4 of the main characters. Ducky, Cera, Littlefoot, and Spike latter on in the film. Why is Petrie the only character of the gang of five that just shows up?

We know nothing about his parents or his siblings until the very end of the story. Why wasn't this character presented in the same way as the others?

This also brings up the issue of Petrie's age. Could it be that he's much older than the others, or maybe just a hatchling like Spike?

[Machine Slave]

I have never noticed this. And now, that I'm reviewing the film in my head... maybe they cut it out for some reason. But I think Petre got lost somehow, because he couldn't fly from the beginning. His family maybe rushed off in hurry (during the earthquake?) and forgot him?

[Malte279]

I suppose the reason why they didn't include his hatching was what it might have been to repetitive to include yet another hatching scene. Also they probably thought that it would distract from the main plot if they had shown the hatching and then show nothing at all about the character anymore until the joining up with Littlefoot (which is what they did with Ducky in particular).

[Petrie.]

Petrie is the oldest because I said so!  Even in the books, Petrie's hatching is never mentioned.  It would be the same song and game.  Probably just extra $$$ to animate, so why bother?

[Kor]

I guess you could say what you want, Petrie may be the oldest as the 3 oldest, or only older the Spike, or hatched at the same time as one of the other 3 oldest ones.  With no real clues anyone can say what they thing and have just as much chance of being right as someone else with another preference or opinion.

[WeirdRaptor]

If that were the only reason to exclude his hatching, then why show Ducky and Cera's? It's probably amongst the cut material Spielberg has.

[Animeboye]

I think it's also possible that they hadn't even thought of Petrie at that point. He could have been put into the movie at the last minute.

[WeirdRaptor]

...That would also be a sufficient explanation, given the relative uselessness of the character.

[NewOrder]

That just doesn't happen. Before a movie goes into production the script and the plot's final drafts are already finished, especialy in animation, you just don't throw in a character in the last minute.

What they did with the begining sequence was present the main characters, maybe, for some reason, they cut Petrie's hatching scene during editing.

Anything we might discuss here is just pure speculation, since the only ones who know the real reason are the crew that worked on the film.

[Karmarsi]

I personally do side a bit to the fact he might of been a last minute character, even before production. The script may of just been edited to include him right before production was started, or it may of  been cut from the movie ( for reasons unknown. Possibly may of had a "scary" part to it involving some sort of incident. ). Often times there is something added / removed last minute leaving many mysteries to it, it's a way of movie life

[Malte279]

I'm not so sure about him being a last minute character of sorts. If they wanted to have a mixed group of "dinosaurs" (though technically Petrie doesn't fall under that term) a Pterosaur is very likely to be included to have all groups covered. Moreover it brought in this important element of overcoming the own fear (of flying) into the movie. Personally I think that it is not unlikely that they decided against yet another hatching scene to merely avoid repetitions. After all the minutes of dinosaur hatching in a relatively short movie they might have feared that with yet another hatching parts of the audience might have started eye rolling wondering if there was anything else to come.
Involved as Petrie is in so many of the movie scenes I really don't think it would be very likely for him to be a last minute addition nor is there any indication of this in any of the texts published by Don Bluth (which alone of course doesn't say anything at all).

[Almaron]

I always assumed that Petrie's birth wasn't shown specifically to give him a different introduction. Littlefoot's birth being shown is obvious; he's the main character. Ducky's birth appears to be just to give an example of hatching dinosaurs at the beginning, and so does Cera until Littlefoot meets her. Spike being born alone and then being discovered gives him a different origin from the others. Finally, having a new character appear from nowhere fills another option.

Plus, not seeing Petrie being born adds an element of surprise to his character.

[Zenoah]

I agree with you Al.
It gives a suprise to the viewers when Littlefoot eats the "talking tree."

Hard to say why his hatching was'nt shown. Im gonna go for either suprise or the fear of repeating.

[Pangaea]

(Zenoah! I thought you'd stopped coming around here! Great to see ya! )

I think that if the births of all of the main characters (excluding Spike) had been shown, then it would have made the movie less interesting to the viewers to some effect, because when the character shows up onscreen, they feel like they've already met him or her earlier in the movie. We got a pretty good hint of Cera and Ducky's (assuming that swimmer was really meant to be Ducky) personalities during their brief appearances at the beginning. Ducky shows herself to be curious, energetic, innocent, and affectionate; before she is even all the way out of her egg, she chases after an insect, then pursues a small mammal, and finally attempts to explore the inside of a giant tortoise's mouth. Upon being rescued and returned to her nest, she immediately begins playing with her siblings and nuzzling her mother. Cera, meanwhile, indicates her plucky, headstrong, and rambunctious nature by chasing and butting her siblings and parents before she can even see outside the eggshell (also demonstrating her flighty reaction to perceived danger when she is frightened by the thunder). If Petrie's hatching had been similarly shown, not only would viewers likely have an idea of his personality and find his official introduction less amusing, but they might notice a pattern of Littlefoot meeting each of the dinosaurs that were shown hatching earlier, and think “Oh, he's going to meet the pterodactyl next”. So I also think that a big part of the reason Petrie's hatching wasn't shown was to provide more surprise and novelty for the audience.

[Kor]

That is some pretty good reasoning.  That could be why they did not show Petrie's hatching.  I do wonder if it was animated and cut or not animated in the first place.

[NewOrder]

If it was in fact animated I'd imagine it was meant to be shown at a different moment in the film. My firm belief is that the writers just didn't include that scene in the script for the reasons Pangaea stated.

[Zenoah]

((I took a small hiatus, but I think Im back now ^^))


Right, I belive they wanted Petrie's personality and lack of flying ability to really make him the true comic relife.

[Saft]

I think that with Petrie's birth it can go in different directions.
Perhaps they had included it originally in the film but had to cut it out as it was repetitive, what with four dinosaur births already in the film,and would thus have been boring for the audience to have to go through it again.

They may not have included it at all, as to give the element of novelty suprise in Petrie's character appearance.  I mean, if there had been a birth scene of Petrie and we discovered early on that he couldn't fly, then that would have spoiled one of the important (in my opinion ) aspects of the film.  

He may have been born before, but I don't think that is acutally so otherwise he might have been dead long before from predators etc.

However:

That just doesn't happen. Before a movie goes into production the script and the plot's final drafts are already finished, especialy in animation, you just don't throw in a character in the last minute.

Actually, there have been several cases in which an animated character survives pre-production; various story boards and drafts etc, then during the actual movie-making process, the character is dropped completely from the film.  An example of this is from the The Lion King film, in which a fennec fox named Bhati was dropped (along with Mheetu; nala's brother-although I believe that he was dropped during pre-production at story board).  

I don't believe that the animators placed Petrie in, as a last minute character.  To be honest, animated film makers are generally quite organised, they may drop characters during story boards (like Mheetu for the TLK) or during the film makng process (like Bhati) but they, as far as I know, they don't add characters with the amount of personality and story line that Petrie has, into a film part way.

[LBTDiclonius]

You know? I've always wondered that. It's probably in those 10 minutes of deleted scenes we'll never get to see. I try to imagine it in my head whenever I hear something I'm not sure about in LBT. Petrie probably might be older than maybe...Cera? I'm not sure. And what's more, it never mentions how old he is in the sequals. All we get is in number 5 when their fighting over the first treestar of the day and Cera says that it should go to the oldest, but then Littlefoot says, "but that's YOU." Then Cera goes, "I know." Then smiles. But we all know from the first movie that Ducky hatched first. Then Cera. Then Littlefoot. It just makes no sense at all. But I'm thinking that Ducky might be a little bit older than Petrie. Maybe? :unsure: I don't know. I just don't think it will ever be explained. Sadly.

[Malte279]

But we all know from the first movie that Ducky hatched first.

While we know the order in which they (excepting Petrie) hatched in the movie, they don't. Even in case they had a calender accurate enough to determine the day (as suggested in the TV episode the star day celebration as well as in Cera's reference to "waiting for your hatchday" in LBT 5) they are still not likely to be able to determine the minute if we assume for Ducky, Cera, and Littlefoot to share the same hatchday as the original movie suggests (though there remains the highly unlikely possibility of a time leap between the hatchscenes).