OLD MACDINO HAD A FARM

Outsized new livestock drive the familiar farmyard sing-along residents into a tizzy.

Entirely a one-trick pony, this umpteenth “Old MacDonald” spinoff wedges dinosaurs into the barnyard and lyric with little visible effort to make them fit: “Old MacDino had a farm, E-I-E-I-O! / And on this farm he had a… / DIPLODOCUS! / (dih-PLOD-uh-kus) / E-I-E-I-O!” (or, at the end of the verse, “E-I-E-I-Argh!”). In the cartoon illustration, overalls-clad MacDino—white, wide-eyed, and open-mouthed—stands and rather superfluously points at a huge green dino that is chowing down on a pile of hay as cattle and poultry hang around watching. Likewise, a pterodactyl (TARE-uh-DACK-tul) zooms in with a “Swoosh! Swoosh! here, / and a Swoosh! Swoosh! there,” a stegosaurus stomps along and (literally) upsets the apple cart, and a smiling velociraptor charges a herd of smiling sheep as the (smiling) sheepdog heads in the opposite direction. Finally a purple T. Rex comes charging out of the gray (or pink or blue, depending on the picture) barn with a “Roar! Roar!” and prompts everyone to “E-I-E-I-RUN!”

The dinosaurs may make this a minor storytime hit, but more and juicier twists on the song abound. E-I-E-I-Bleh.