The third installment of Fox’s startlingly successful Ice Age series suggests that this coldly calculated animated franchise may have finally run out of steam. Perhaps even the studio has realized this, since the new film moves away from the earlier ones’ drab frozen tundra setting and replaces their geniality with too much spectacle and slapstick.

Feeling left out of the birth plans of his mammoth friends Manny (Ray Romano) and Ellie (Queen Latifah), Sloth Sid (John Leguizamo) stumbles upon a collection of giant eggs in an underground cave and decides to raise them as his own. Imagine Sid’s surprise when the eggs hatch to reveal a trio of baby T-Rexes -- and he discovers that their angry mother wants them back. Finding himself in a massive subterranean world where the formerly extinct reptiles still roam freely, our goofy mammal needs all the help he can get. Aide eventually comes in the form of Manny, Ellie, saber-tooth tiger Diego (Denis Leary), possums Crash (Seann William Scott) and Eddie (Josh Peck), and the newest member of the makeshift herd, diminutive daredevil weasel Buck (Simon Pegg). As they traverse the many dangers of this unfamiliar place, our heroes must remain constantly vigilant of the arriving mammoth child... while avoiding the numerous beasts who want to eat them all.

Strangely, the film refuses to give the foul-tempered dinosaurs any personality, aside from a moment or two of maternal compassion for Mama T-Rex. That's a shame, because the first two Ice Age films owed their success in part to the intermittently amusing interplay between their characters. But with the titular reptiles constantly on snack patrol and the film's four credited screenwriters seemingly unable to come up with any real laughs, Ice Age 3 relies mostly on action setpieces, with occasional pit stops for cloyingly cutesy skrat love and bon mots about parenthood. And although the 3D derring-do is movie-safe, parents may indeed be wary of taking their child to see a film in which beloved characters (one of whom is pregnant) are constantly threatened by lava, carnivorous plants, and the sharp incisors of drooling dinos.

To his credit, primary director Carlos Saldanha (also on hand for the first two films) keeps the noxious pop culture riffing to a minimum, while focusing more on the supporting players, including charming frat dude possums Crash and Eddie. But as an ongoing enterprise, the studio seems to have tapped Ice Age for a last time. This series is definitely ready for extinction.

The DVD includes a commentary track, short films, and several making-of featurettes.

Aka Ice Age 3.



I think they call this a "plot" hole.