Dragon of the Outback (Episode 4.3)

Dragon of the Outback is the third episode of Series 4 and the thirty seventh episode of *Prehistoric Earth: A Natural History*.

## Synopsis

The team goes back to Late Pleistocene Australia 65,000 years ago to rescue a large species of Monitor Lizard that was even larger than a modern day Komodo Dragon in a time when humans had arrived on the continent from coastal islands. While dealing with the land's wildfires and rescuing other weird and dangerous animals.

## Plot

At the park, many of the staff are doing well taking care of many kinds of prehistoric animals that Allen rescues from prehistory and gives them their second chance. Some of them gave birth to youngsters of each of their species either by laying eggs or giving birth to live young. Allen then heads to check on the park's largest modern day lizards the Komodo Dragon which a group of them were enjoy a cow carcass. He even had an idea of he could bring back to the park and heads to Joanna's headquarters to explain his next mission. Allen decides that he will lead a team to go back to Australia 65,000 years ago, back when the Northern Hemisphere was in the middle of the Ice Age and when Neanderthals still roamed Europe to when humans have arrived on the continent so he can rescue large species monitor lizard called Megalania as a staff member brings a Komodo Dragon into her office on a leash.

He show her how Megalania possess the same attributes to the Komodo Dragon such as a long forked tongue to smell the air and saliva that contains deadly bacteria that can kill an animal with one bite. As Allen shows Joanna a life size statue of the giant lizard and compare it to the size of the Komodo Dragon, she found out that Megalania was twice as big as it's modern day relatives that live on the Indonesian islands. Allen and the team prepares to live bringing along camping and medical supplies. They open the portal and arrive on the coastlines of Late Pleistocene Australia 65,000 years ago where Rebecca spots a small group of Aboriginal Australians beach coming and making spears. The team watch one throwing his spear 10 meters away from them, however as he went to get his spear the Aboriginal found the skull of a person in the sand with huge hole on the forehead.

When the Aboriginal Australians left, Kaine sniffs at the skull as Allen picks it up to analyze the hole on it. He says that the person the skull belonged to was the victim of an animal kill and believe that it maybe caused by Megalania. The next day, the team arrives at a coastal fringe forest where some women and children Australians were gathering shells, crabs and plants since to the ones from the island they came from as the men were found for food away from them. A Brown Snake slithers nearby as Allen tells his group to be careful as Brown Snakes are one of the most dangerous vemonous snakes in the world and that the rivers are filled with Saltwater Crocodiles. Later on as they were looking for Megalania, Allen and the team came across a large species of bird similar to goose called Genyornis who was looking for a drink.

They set up the portal and gets a pair of Genyornis back to the park where they put into the Giraffe Enclosure. After getting the Genyornis pair to the present, the team continues on to find Megalania. As they traveling through the Australian rainforest, they were attacked by a group of Aboriginal Australians who claimed the area the team was traveling through. Luckily no one got hurt and escape from the hostile group of Australians and continue looking for the animal they have came for. The next day the team retreats as a wildfire coming due Australia being a dry land for the last 2 million years and are often causing storms.

They make their way to a dense jungle where explore looking for any animals in it. As Allen's daughter Crystal heads towards some bushes a large marsupial called Diprotodon charges out the brush until it halted. Allen tries to approach the large herbivore slowly and gently to show that he is not a threat until eventually begins to feast on leaves on a tree. The team opens the portal and gets a Diprotodon herd back to the park so they can be put into their enclosure. With Diprotodon rescued, the group travels through the rainforest until they came across a carnivorous marsupial with the behavior much like a lion called Thylacoleo which was feasting a kangaroo it killed.

Kaine barks at it which gets the marsupial's attention and begins to attack them until Allen shoots a tranqulizer dart at it so he can bring it back to the park along with it's family. With the Thylacoleo family back at the park, they go to find Australia's other predator Megalania back as they head towards a river to fill their canteens with water. Kaine sniffs at some animal tracks and Allen saw that the tracks belong to a Megalania as it was not the tracks of a crocodile. That night, the group sets camp and making a fire. Kaine whimpers a bit as he sees something in the bushes and Allen investigates as he knows it must be a reptile and that it is too cold and sluggish to hunt.

The next day as the team once again scouring the landscape for Megalania, Allen and Rebecca found a carcass of a Diprotodon and analyzes that this was not a kill made by Thylacoleo but rather by a Megalania. Later the team watches as a group of Red Kangaroos and a flock of Emu grazing on grass while looking for water. Another wildfire emerges and the group watches it from a safe distance, but also the seasons are beginning to change and water begins to dry up. Allen and the group watches some Aboriginal Australians stealing eggs from a Genyornis nest until they spotted mother guarding them and even dropping one of the eggs. The female Genyornis chases the Australians until something else distracts the bird from chasing them, suddenly rearing up from the grass was the large lizard that the team came to bring back, a large female Megalania who was pregant and came to steal the eggs from the same Genyornis nest.

Allen was amazed to see he was right that it can smell the air with it's forked tongue like the Komodo Dragon and has bacterial salvia in it's mouth. The huge lizard steals more of the eggs from the Genyornis as the team sets up the portal to get the female Megalania back to the present. When they finally bring the massive female reptile back to the park they put her into her enclosure near her modern day Komodo Dragon relatives. Allen then injorms Joanna that the Megalania is finally safe in it's enclosure.

## Animals

* Aboriginal Australians
* Bat
* Brown Snake
* Crab
* Diprotodon
* Emu
* Frilled Lizard
* Green Ant
* Megalania
* Perentie
* Phasmatodea
* Red Kangaroo
* Red-Tailed Black Cockatoo
* Thylacoleo