Tonight I went to go see “Walking with Dinosaurs” at the Key Arena. The show started tonight and runs through 5/3/09. The show started at 7pm and the crowd attending filled the arena about 60%. Matt had to work tonight, so I brought my sister along. About half of the audience were children, which shouldn’t surprise me, but it still did. There were babies up to teenagers attending and every age in between.

It seemed that ages 8 to 10 years of age really were engaged by the show and enjoyed it. There were a few incidents of 3-5 year old children screaming and crying when the dinos attacked or there were ambient “scary” moments.

The animatronic dinosaurs were very cool, even to this adult. The brachiosaur at it’s tallest stood about 30-35 feet high and it boggled the mind why the neck didn’t snap in half. The detail of the dinos were fantastic, even down to mucus trailing out of the noses, and trails from their eyes. Some of the dinos were supported by single actors, who controlled the puppet from inside while being it’s legs too. Some of the larger dinos were moved around from a small base that helped move the feet and tail.

Our seats were $49.50, aisle 113, row 16, seats 12 & 13, which had a great vantage point. We were halfway up the arena near the end of the stage area.

Of course the show was really intended for kids, so a lot of the humor (yes there were poo and fart jokes) were put there for the kids. The actor who played “Huxley” the paleontologist wasn’t that great an actor, but was more of a volunteer type that you’d see give short lectures at the Pacific Science Center.

A family of 4 is likely going to spend around $300 for the night (if you include a few snacks and some of the cheaper souvenirs). The program is beautiful, but is $20. Some of the light toys range from $12 to the spinners for $18. There are cute dino shirts ($20-$25), dino slippers ($30), and many plush versions of the dinos featured in the show ($25).

Overall, if you can afford it, the show is great for the family with 8-12 year olds. I believe that younger than that you may have a problem. The dinosaurs do look fairly realistic as they hover and growl at the audience, and **SPOILER ALERT!** a comet crashes to Earth destroying all of the dinosaurs. The lights and sounds at times were even hard for me to handle. The light strobing and sound blaring would be difficult for the very young to handle (I heard an infant screaming toward the end).

That being said…if your child cannot handle a person in a large mouse costume (aka Mickey), they probably will have a hard time distinguishing that these dinos are for fun, and not re-roaming the Earth to eat them.

I know a few of you have youngsters, and if the review didn’t answer every question you had, please email me. I’ll try to help as much as I can.

For those of you who would like to go see “Walking with Dinosaurs“, Seattle Geekly has a special offer for you!

* $10 Off Select Tickets w/ Code “MYDINO”
* Ticket URL: http://www.ticketmaster.com/venueartist/122918/1265328
* Ticketmaster Phone: 866-448-7849
* Discount not valid on lowest price level ($19.50)
* Discount valid on the following dates: 4/30, 5/1, 5/2 (7pm), 5/3 (5pm)
* Discount Details Online: http://dinosaurinvite.wordpress.com/

My suggestion is to call Ticketmaster and give them the discount code. If you DO go to the show, let us know whet you and your kids thought! I’ll be posting more pictures to our Flickr site, and I’ll review this in our next podcast taping tomorrow!