Fang

Egyptians

* Ima
* Infected Argentinosaurus
* Alpha Tyrannosaurus
* Tyrannosaurus pack

All threats against her or her allies

**Fang** is the deuteragonist of *Primal.* A female *Tyrannosaurus rex*, she tragically lost her young around the same time she crosses paths with a prehistoric human. Together, they strike an unlikely friendship and struggle to adapt to the harsh and unbearable world.

## Appearance

Fang is an adult teal-colored *Tyrannosaurus*. She has small pale eyes and a large jaw of teeth; she has a larger tooth on the right side of her jawline that prominently juts when her mouth is closed, hence her name.

Fang has dark stripes patterned across her, with two stripes wrapped around her head—one underneath her jaw and the other running down her eyes—that precede a large stripe on her neck, a single thick stripe on each of her thighs and shoulders, and a series of stripes running around her tail. She has large legs with three white claws on each and a pair of claw-tipped arms of the same color.

## Personality

Fang is a reserved and brave hunter who does not shy away from violence when confronted. Despite being a primitive animal, she possesses keen intelligence with deducing when to fight back and when to maintain self-preservation. Fang is quite cognitive to the degree that she can communicate with Spear, a caveman, and hold an entire conversation by physical expressions. Nevertheless, Fang, unlike Spear, is quite audacious and straightforward about her preferences; she will behave stubbornly about it until she is satisfied.

Complementing her fierce nature, Fang has strong loyalty to her allies and family. Numerous times Fang has proven to be extremely loyal to Spear and does not hesitate to rush to his side to protect him from more brutal opponents. She loved her offspring deeply and those who helped her family earned her respect, as shown when she was grateful to Spear for saving her offspring, then reacting in both rage and despair following their death by the Alpha Tyrannosaurus.

## History

### Life Before Travelling with Spear

Initially a lone dinosaur, Fang spent her days raising two infant Tyrannosauruses by hunting in the forest and fishing in the streams to bring them food. She came across a stream that contained fish one day, and she managed to catch enough in her mouth. Then she caught a peculiar scent and sensed that something was watching her. Wasting no time, Fang returned to her territory, which was a secluded willow grove where she could feed her two juveniles.

When Spear entered and threatened the family, Fang immediately took a defensive stance but saw a rival Tyrannosaurus pack trailing behind Spear. Fang managed to fight them off, she quickly killed one by biting the back of its neck and tossing its dead body away. Spear came to help her fight off the larger predators as she killed the second Tyrannosaurus by ripping its snout off. She watched as Spear killed the third member of the pack.

Fang watched her babies nuzzle Spear and play with him as gratitude for protecting them, but the tender moment was cut short when the Alpha Tyrannosaurus appeared and knocked Fang away, it ate her infants while Fang could only look on helplessly. The Alpha proved to be formidable in strength, so Spear and Fang teamed up to kill it and avenge their families' death. Fang briefly mourned for the loss of her young and later decided to join Spear to explore new areas as a new family. ("Spear and Fang")

### Travels and Survival

Initially, the relationship between neanderthal and dinosaur did not prove very cooperative as Fang would keep any prey for herself, be it hunted by her or the ones brought down by Spear. Even the simplest act of gathering fruit from a high tree proved volatile, as Fang would ram her head into the tree trunk, after Spear had already climbed near the top canopy, and caused both the fruit and Spear to land on the ground. The situation was only worsened as the still grieving Spear began seeing Fang as a reminder of the tyrannosaur that had eaten his children. She shares a moment of frustration with the caveman while camping in cave near an open fire.

During a particularly stormy day, both Fang and Spear notice a primal doe and give chase. Once again, Fang comes out as the winner of the food since she slays the doe. However, she is now attacked by Spear, who wants the kill for himself. A fight breaks out between the two, wherein Fang is swifter and stronger do to her sheer bulk, but Spear is at an advantage do to his namesake weapon. Fang manages to get an upper-hand in the fight after biting the spear's shaft in two. The Battle comes to a sudden stop as the two hear a troubling sound. A massive pile of red giant snakes is huddled up in the nearby woods. The two start fearing for their lives and walk slowly back, then immediately run away from the danger. Suddenly, a flash-flood, likely caused by the rainstorm, sweeps the woods and carries both Fang, Spear and the snake colony down hill. Fang an Spear fend off against the snakes while submerged and Fang even manages to kill a snake bigger than herself through decapitation.

The the flood culminates in a high waterfall, which forces Fang to cooperate with Spear. Both grab onto the dead body of the giant snake and use it as a makeshift rope around a rock to cling over the bottom of the waterfall. They both end up falling anyway do to the rainwater making the snake skin slip out of Spear's hands. While Fang comes out unscathed (having fallen from a shorter height), Spear is knocked around on some rocks and is bleeding. She carries Spear back to shore and waits for him to recover. As a sign of apology Fang brings him the remaining spear tip and the two form an actual alliance. They are next seen charging at a wild boar together, with Spear riding on Fang's back and flinging his spear at the boar. They even share the meat over an open fire and Spear kills a snake that had startled a sleeping Fang. ("River of Snakes")

As the two continued journeying, they would encounter several threats along the way. Some were the result of happening to stumble in the territory of vicious creature, or creatures, while other times Fang and Spear wronged another. In one adventure, the two killed a lone male mammoth in a frozen land. The mammoth was old and feeble, and without the aid of his herd, was easily put down by Spear and Fang. Although Spear began showing some remorse over the creature, Fang only cared about eating its meat. After Spear constructs a sled from its bones, he carries as much of the mammoth's meat with him, while Fang went on ahead. She is briefly separated from Spear after walking into a snowstorm. As the two meet up again they make shelter inside a cave. Although Fang gives Spear his share of the hunt he is uninterested, instead contemplating on the mammoth's death. Soon enough, they are ambushed by the dead mammoth's herd, seeking to avenge his death. Both Fang and Spear put up a fight, but the mammoth's prove to many and too strong for them. Spear ends up buried under some rocks, while Fang is slammed into and squeezed by two mammoths. But the herd relent after Spear presents the single tusk of the old mammoth as a peace offering. The Mammoth Matriarch accepts the tusk and she retreats with the rest of kind, leaving Fang and Spear in peace. ("A Cold Death")

Fang and Spear later find themselves chased by a pack of velociraptors in an outback wilderness. The raptors, despite being in larger numbers and having surrounded the duo, relent and retreat s the sun sets and a red moon rises. The two soon discover that the farther reaches of the outback is home to a colony of giant, blood-red Man Bats, who stalk and carry whatever prey happens to be walking in the region at night. Spear saves a Monkey-looking caveman, as well as the dead boar he had been carrying, and brings them safely to his peoples burrow. But Spear himself is instead captured by the Man-Bats while also having stopped Fang from almost being flown away. Fang runs after them, locating the Man-Bats's hideout in an eerie atop a high rock formation. She fails to climb the steep rock face, but instead allows Man-Bats to carry her to the top by playing dead. Inside the eerie, Fang sees the horde of varying animal carcasses that the bats had collected.

Deeper in the cave she makes a grisly discovery. A megalithic spider, taller than even Fang, has wrapped hominids inside cocoons to eat for later. The spider and Fang fight for a bit, but the spider proves to be stronger, thus making it hard for the tyrannosaur to fend off alone. She instead finds and frees Spear from his cocoon, leading to them fighting the spider together. Spear is able to kill the spider by driving through the spider's head one of the horns of a nearby dead triceratops. As the duo descend the rock with use of the spider's silk they are once again targeted by the Man-Bats, now out for revenge for the spider's death. As the two run back from where they came Spear is given is spear back from one of the monkey-looking cavemen from before and uses it to fend of the Man-Bats. Fang and Spear manage to eventually escape through an ironic twist. They lead the swarm of Man-Bats into the pack of raptors from the other day. As the two groups of animals fight and kill each other, Fang carries Spear into the distant sunrise. ("Terror Under the Blood Moon")

### Overwhelming Adversity

Fang and Spear are able to find a little bit of peace after stumbling across a serene jungle spring, full of fish to eat and a quiet atmosphere. However, Fang's luck for survival is put to the test after she and Spear are abducted by a tribe of belligerent Ape-Men and forced to participate in grueling gladiatorial combat. The tyrannosaur is lowered into an arena and put to fight against the tournament champion, the massive gorilla-like Krog. Prior to their battle, however, Krog was given a sip of the Ape-Men's enhancement drug, resulting in Krog transforming into an even larger, green skinned behemoth. Despite her best efforts Fang is swiftly overpowered, beaten into bloody submission by her opponent and has her right leg broken. But before she can be killed by him, Krog is ambushed by Spear. At first, Spear is also unable to overcome Krog while in his enhance state. So in the heat of the moment Spear rushes to the enhancement drug, killing the Ape Shaman guarding it, and consumes it entirely. Now with his own monstrous size and strength, Spear forces Krog to release Fang and proceeds to dismember and beat him to death. Soon after, the hulking Spear murders the other ape-men who are looking to avenge their champion. In the following morning, after having reverted to his normal state, Spear is shocked to find Fang lying unconscious on the arena ground, seemingly dead. ("Rage of the Ape-Men")

It is soon revealed that Fang is still alive, albeit clinging to life and in critical condition as she cannot drink or eat without assistance and unable to move on her own. Spear notices a flock of vultures hovering overhead and eating from the ape-men carcasses, thus fearing for Fang's life. To that end he begins covering up Fang's bleeding injuries with mud. Likewise he builds a stretcher out of the wooden pols and rope left behind in the arena in order to carry Fang away from the birds. Along the way Spear spots wild dogs pursuing them from a distance. Spear is forced to look fend off the dogs by lighting fires while he and Fang sleep at night. He eventually decides to hide Fang away in a rock burrow as the wild dogs begin forming a hunting party. Fang is continuously treated by Spear as she begins to heal. In a matter of days the duo are attacked inside the burrow by a swarm of spiked beetles, while the dogs continue hovering around the burrow. Fang wakes up one evening at the sound of Spear fighting against the pack outside. He manages to escape into the burrow, but is covered in gashes. Fang wishes to help him fight the attackers, but Spear coaxes her to stand down and instead uses two dead beetles as pair of knuckledusters against the pack. As the battle rages on Fang has had enough, she breaks out off the burrow and joins Spear in slaughtering the wild pack, her wounds having seemingly healed in the past few days of convalescence. ("Scent of Prey")

As time passes the duo are soon confronted with threats of a more unnatural origin. In one instance Fang and Spear come across a grizzly sight, a slaughtered herd of argentinosaurs that had been killed by one of their own. Fang is the first the notice that the cause of the massacre was do to an infection thanks to her heightened sense of smell. As the Infected Argentinosaurus gives chase, Fang and Spear are forced to flee as they cannot fight the beast without running the risk of also being infected by the dinosaur's plague. After a day of having narrowly evading the creature the two are able to escape in a field of volcanic fissures. The zombie-like dinosaur falls into the fissures and is incinerated to death. Fang and Spear can only watch in shock and feel pity as the creature writhes in pain. ("Plague of Madness")

Another threat came in the form of a coven of elderly witches, whose leader drained male Neanderthals of their vitality so as to give birth to infants. Neither can escape as the witches use their magic to bind and freeze Spear in place, while Fang is mind-controlled. The following day, one of the witches, Lula, begins prepping Spear for the birth ceremony. Lula can't help but notice the emotional link between Fang and Spear, and begins investigating. She uses her magic to see into their pasts and finds that both Fang and Spear saw their respective children get killed. She feels remorse as Lula had also lost her daughter in an accident. Later that night, as the Head With is ready to drain Spear of his life-force, Lula betrays the coven and rescues the two. She murders the Head Witch's pterodactyl mound, then has Fang pluck Spear from the sacrificial stone and run off with him. Lula is killed after a brief fight with the Head Witch, but at that point Fang has been released from the witch's thrall. She and Spear take a moment to mourn Lula, then immediately make a quick escape. ("Coven of the Damned")

It was only a matter of time until Spear and Fang would come across an enemy that required more unconventional tactics to stop. This was the case when the duo had to confront The Night Feeder, a highly aggressive and sadistic night time predatory dinosaur that seemingly hunted down and slaughtered multiple prey not for feeding, but rather out of a base desire to kill. For two days Spear and Fang came across the mangled, gut-wrenching, remains of the Night Feeder's attacks. The first morning, the two discovered the mostly eaten remains of a Smilodon. And Fang cannot help herself from smelling the unsettling stench of the attacker, prompting her to discourage Spear from investigating the kill. Later that night, Fang yet again stops Spear from going after the Night Feeder, which at that time was busy slaughtering an entire herd of triceratops-like dinosaurs. The following morning Spear notices the site of the mass-murder from atop a tree. Throughout the rest of the day the duo begin fearing the eventual confrontation with the unseen creature. Their uneasiness even causes them to mistake a strong wind with the creature's roars.

On the second night, as soon as the campfire burns-out, Spear and Fang are immediately pursued by the Night Feeder. The two split up, prompting the creature to run after Spear. Despite dodging several attacks and jumping through the trees, the Night Feeder soon catches up to the Neanderthal, but Fang comes to his rescue by biting into the attacker. The creature escapes mostly unharmed, leaving Fang's muzzle covered in a viscous black substance, likely the source behind the Night Feeder's nocturnal camouflage. Fang regroups with Spear, who managed to discern that the creature had an extreme case of pyrophobia, as demonstrated when it ran off at the mere sight of a spark from Spear's flint spear tip. With the knowledge of the creature's weakness in mind Spear and Fang lay a trap. Spear lures the Night Feeder into a clearing with several sparks, followed by setting several trees ablaze, thus cornering the beast. The Night Feeder is trapped inside of a circle of fear within the clearing which allows Spear to toss his spear into the middle of the ring. The Night Feeder is soon discovered to be highly flammable (likely from the tar-like substance covering its body) after being impaled by the spear and immediately after bursting into flames. As the beast flails its arms and writhes in pain both Fang and Spear scowl from a safe distance at the creature's death. ("The Night Feeder")

("Slave of the Scorpion")

## Abilities

* **Strength:** Fang has demonstrated her ability to handle opponents far greater than her. She has enough strength to fight off different creatures, such as managing to tear off the snout of a horned Tyrannosaurus with her jaws and powerful enough to tear away the heads of gigantic bats or puncturing the thick hide of a mammoth.
* **Resilience:** Fang has proven her resilience as she is able to survive attacks from the sheer force of the Alpha Tyrannosaurus and giant Spider, the latter of whom brutally thrashed her into the wall, and was able to take a few hits from the mutated Krog.
* **Bite:** Fang has a particularly strong and powerful bite, either because of her sharp teeth, jaw-muscles, unusual jaw-structure or some other reason. Exactly what she can bite depends on the jaw-strength, resilience of her teeth/bite-surface and the shape of her jaw.
* **Combatant:** Fang is a very strong fighter. Her jaws and tail are especially powerful, which make her a deadly opponent in battle. Due to her size, she can push with a considerable force.
* **Intelligence:** Fang is astute, for she had realized Spear was supporting her. She was also clever enough to play possum in order to be taken by the bats so that she could save Spear. She’s intelligent and has the capacity to understand how to fight like Spear, by jumping on the Man Bats. Furthermore, she even tries to warn Spear about the Night Feeder and in The Colossaeus, Part II she was able to show disgust as she understood that the Egyptian Queen was blackmailing Kamau into decimating innocent people.
* **Stamina and Speed:** Fang's stamina is very high as she is barely ever shown to be exhausted, and she can run for long periods while still being able to fight well enough without too many difficulties. Her speed is fast enough to run away from raptors and flying giant bats.
* **Smell:** Due to being a Tyrannosaurus, Fang's sense of smell is one of the most developed of the whole animal kingdom. In normal times, she uses it to find her prey or detect enemies, but her heightened smell has also helped her in near-death situations. She was able to find Spear among the cocoons of the Mega Spider and she detected the infectious scent among the corpses of sauropods, as well as being able to identify a mysterious killer by sniffing the corpses of its victims.
* **Stealth:** Fang demonstrates brilliant stealth, she is capable of simply using the color and stripes on her body for camouflage to blend in with tall grass or shady areas so that she is able to remain undetected by her prey.

## Relationships

### Spear

Fang is a loyal companion to Spear, sharing a tragic past of losing family to a common enemy. They work together to survive in their harsh world. Though they can have their moments of disagreement, they truly value each other’s company. Fang chose to protect Spear against her newfound friend Red. She trusts Spear more than anyone as she would leave him to guard her offspring when she hunts. When he died saving her from the Viking chief fire demon, she and her children roared in agonizing sadness and ran off to mourn him in private.

### Her offspring

Fang’s clearly loved her original two hatchlings, fiercely protecting them against any threat. She was devastated when they were devoured by the Alpha Tyrannosaurus and fell into a brief depressive state over her loss once the fight was over.

It is revealed in Vidarr that Fang had mated with another Tyrannosaur known as Red, and subsequently laid three eggs. Fang was extremely protective toward her new eggs, so much so that she did not appreciate even Spear or Mira touching or getting too close to them, though she did refrain from hurting the two when they did. Fang was willing to move her eggs, however, when she saw that Spear and Mira had built a another nest for them.

Unfortunately, in The Colossaeus, Part I, a strong man named Kamau accidentally smashed one of Fang's eggs while he was attacking the ship, leaving her with only two out of the three. Her two surviving eggs hatched while Mira and Kamau's daughter were trying to escape the Egyptian Queen's palace.

When the red-faced hatchling is injured during their battle against the Egyptians, she is notably shocked and furiously attacked them to protect her offspring.

Fang dotes on her children as seen when she lovingly teaches them to swim safely and allows them to sleep next to Spear.

### Mira

In Slave of the Scorpion , Fang was shown to be skeptical and hostile towards Mira when they first meet. Later on, Fang begins to soften up and even started trusting her. She later assisted in saving Mira from her Viking captors. Mira returned the favour by treating her many wounds from the battle. Mira is the only person other than Spear and their daughter she allows to be near her children, let alone touch them, showcasing their bond.

### Red

In Shadow of Fate, Fang encountered another Tyrannosaurus named Red. She was understandably guarded at first as she was in a foreign land, separated from Spear, and possibly reminded of her hatchlings’ killer. Eventually, she bonded with Red, sharing a hunt with him, eating fermented fruits together, playing, and even sleeping together.

When Red confronted Spear in the Celtic Tribe village, she attempted to protect both from each other and stop the fighting to no success. It ended when Fang accidentally pushed Red off a cliff onto sharp debris, fatally wounding him. She comforted him in his dying moments.

In the beginning of Dawn of Man, Fang was still mourning Red. She was so depressed she did not even move to eat the hunt Spear brought her.

In Vidarr, it was revealed that Fang and Red had mated, and she later lays three eggs that he sired. The two eggs that survived the events of The Colossaeus, Part I would later hatch at the end of The Colossaeus, Part II.

### Spear and Mira's Daughter

Fang sees her as a member of her pack and shows no hesitation to let her ride on her children's back on hunts.

## Trivia

* Her name along with Spear's was based on the Robert E. Howard short story, *Spear and fang*.
* Something that may seem strange for a *Tyrannosaurus*, a carnivorous dinosaur, Fang also feeds on fruit in "River of Snakes" and with Red in "Shadow of Fate". This could be a reference to how real-life crocodilians, despite being predators, have been observed eating fruits as nutritional supplements.
* Some of the sound effects used for her actually came from the *Daspletosaurus*, *Protoceratops*, and *Oviraptor* from the Discovery Channel documentary *Dinosaur Planet*. She also sometimes uses quite a few roars from the 1998 American film *Godzilla*.
	+ Most of the sounds she used throughout are actually stock dinosaur, big cat, hyena, crocodile, elephant, pig, and bear sounds. At the 2020 New York Comic Con Metaverse panel, it was confirmed that several bird calls are also mixed into her vocal effects as a reference to the common ancestry between dinosaurs and birds.
* During the climax of “River of Snakes” Fang had an encounter with a Titanoboa that she managed to slay, but she was left traumatized by what happened, as a result she develops ophidiophobia, so far this has only been seen three times in the series, first towards the end of the aforementioned episode, secondly in “Rage of the Ape-Men” and finally in “Echoes of Eternity” as she was seen running alongside Spear from the Chieftain when he morphed into a giant snake, reminiscent of the Titanoboa.
* Fang is the only dinosaur to appear in all but one episode.
* Fang isn’t the first *T. rex* that was seen in a show created by Genndy Tartakovsky, in an episode of Dexter’s Laboratory titled “ Jurassic Pooch” Dexter was seen attempting to clone a *T. rex* with an incomplete DNA sequence, he then uses a dog's brain and heart to fill in the gaps, interestingly both *T. rexes* are green.
* As a refence to the 60s Toho films, *King Kong Escapes* and *Destroy all Monsters*, When Fang accidentally kicks her mate Red to his death, was a reference to a Gorosaurus using a kangaroo kick to kick on both King Kong and King Ghidorah.
* In real life the *T. rex* had feathers, Tartakovsky explained that he decided to have some of the dinosaurs be shown in their outdated depiction prior to the discovery that dinosaurs had feathers, as it’s how most people recognize dinosaurs.
* Realistically Fang should be much bigger for a *T. rex* the reasoning behind her discrepancy in size is for simplicity as it would make the storytelling far easier in some cases.
* According to recent studies, some scientists have theorized that the *T. rex* was as smart as a primate, this could explain how she was able to understand not only her surroundings but communicate with Spear through body language.
* It is unknown what happened to Fang's first mate; the father of her previous offspring.
* A more cartoony looking *Tyrannosaurus* resembling Fang makes an appearance in Tartakovsky's next series *Unicorn: Warriors Eternal*, episode six The Mystery of Secrets.

## References

1. ↑ Lang, Jamie (June 14, 2019). "Genndy Tartakovsky Gets 'Primal' at Annecy Work in Progress". *Variety*.
2. ↑ James, Tito W. (June 19, 2019). "Annecy 2019: Genndy Tartakovsky’s Primal Is A Primordial Epic Filled With Visceral Emotion". *COMICON*.
3. ↑ Adult Swim The Making of Genndy Tartakovsky's 'Primal'