Ice Age: Collision Course, the fifth installment in the 14-year-long saga of animated prehistoric animals, will, with any luck, be the last. Lazy and excruciatingly unfunny, it is a hazard to the very young, who might get the erroneous impression that movies don’t get any better than this.
We get it: It’s summertime and the kids need to be entertained. But take them to see Finding Dory a second or third time. It’s no “Finding Nemo,” but it’s better than this.
Why settle for a story that’s set into motion — yet again — by that saber-toothed squirrel in search of an acorn? Yes, Scrat ends up in a UFO, pinballing around the cosmos. The good news — for the universe, not the viewer — is that his bouncing around somehow leads to the formation of our galaxy. The bad news is that the activity sends a huge asteroid hurtling at Earth.
Down on the Blue Planet, Manny the mammoth (Ray Romano) is fretting over losing his daughter Peaches (Keke Palmer) to her betrothed, the stupid but sweet Julian (Adam Devine).
Manny’s buddy, the lisping sloth Sid (John Leguizamo), has just had his heart broken, and saber-toothed tigers Diego and Shira (Dennis Leary and Jennifer Lopez) are lamenting that every young animal in the kingdom is terrified of them.
Of course, they’ve got a bigger problem to worry about: the imminent destruction of their planet.
To help with that conundrum, they have the crafty, one-eyed weasel Buck (Simon Pegg), who formulates a far-fetched plan involving magnetic space rocks. But nothing can save them from the terrible dialogue and stale jokes.
The movie’s idea of hilarity is a pun on the word “duty.” Measured against that low bar, the film’s more inspired bits include a cameo by Neil deGrasse Tyson and a cult leader, Shangri Llama (Jesse Tyler Ferguson), who loves crystals and yoga; and hashtag jokes.
Screenwriters Michael J. Wilson, Michael Berg and Yoni Brenner strain to jam as many characters into the story as possible, leaving the movie feeling both overstuffed and superficial. A musical interlude is usually a pick-me-up, but the one in Ice Age feels slapdash.
If there’s a bright spot, it’s the animation, which conjures a colorful world called Geotopia, inside the fallen asteroid.
It isn’t enough, though. Since Pixar upped the animation game, children’s entertainment is now expected to delight grown-ups, too. That may seem like a tall order, but this franchise has done it before.