The end of the world as we know it, is coming....umm, now is the time to panic?
Life is starting to get bumpy again for Manny (voice of Ray Romano) and Ellie (voice of Queen Latifah). Their young adult daughter Peaches (voice of Keke Palmer) is preparing to get married to her fiance Julian (voice of Adam DeVine), and they are having a hard time letting go. Meanwhile, Sid (voice of John Leguizamo) is hoping to win a love interest of his own. When Scrat accidentally sends a series of asteroids hurling toward earth, our furry friends must find a way to avoid potential extinction.
On the positive side, the animation is as crisp and cartoony as ever. The characters are colorful and fun, the backgrounds are occasionally beautiful, and some of the animated effects are really well-done. Having voiced their roles for 15 years now, Romano, Leguizamo and Denis Leary are still sounding like they are having a lot of fun with their roles. Also, a smart decision by the production team to bring back Buck (voiced to a T by Simon Pegg) from Dawn of the Dinosaurs, as he does bring a semi-dramatic tone to the Indiana Jones-wannabe.
The Scrat sequences are perhaps the funniest moments of the whole movie, as usual. He remains the most memorable character of the whole bunch. Out of the new cast members, standouts include singer Jessie J (as a female sloth named Brooke) and Jesse Tyler Ferguson as the dramatic Shangri Llama, though he is introduced somewhat late in the film. John Debney has a few solid pieces, and there are a few very sweet moments (including the ending).
However, Collision Course's humor misses more than it hits. The gags fire rapidly and repeatedly, and often evoke more grimaces than grins. It almost felt like, in my opinion, like the friend that always tried to crack jokes, and often missed more than actually was funny. In that case, Collision Course never slows down or has any real serious or heartfelt moments (save for the end). While the pacing gets the 90 minute runtime to go quickly, it's more to its detriment than its recovery.
Also, Collision Course takes modern conveniences a little too far. I know, The Flintstones utilized some, but they were actually funny. Collision Course uses some really weird sounding terms for its proposed time period, such as "hashtagging", "profile picture" and the like. There's depictions of a bar and many other modern things. In previous movies, they maintained a solid balance of prehistoric and the modern, but in this movie, there's hardly anything left that really represents the time period (besides the backgrounds).
Finally, there's so many characters present here that some do get left out in the cold. Sid's Granny (voice of Wanda Sykes) does get a few solid jokes, but you almost forget she's there for almost the whole journey. Same goes for Shira (voice of Jennifer Lopez). Some of the new characters hardly get anything to do, and actually appear kinda late in the movie.
You got to hand it to the folks at Blue Sky Studios for keeping up with this movie series for so long. The Ice Age franchise, while far from the best and most memorable animated features made to date, have at least been entertaining diversions that offered laughs and fun for parents and kids. Personally, I felt Continental Drift was the best in the franchise, with a clever blend of good-natured laughs, some heartfelt moments, and even a couple of memorable musical moments.
But, unless a strong ending is made, franchises often run out of steam the more time passes, and alas, the same applies for Collision Course. This frantic and somewhat desperate entry is nowhere near as engaging, fun or inventive as its predecessors. Prehistoric antics have just about been thrown out the window. Its becoming too overstuffed. And, the jokes are sounding more desperate and more worthy of rolling eyes than laughs (with the welcome exception of Scrat's slapstick adventures).
Ultimately, you could do far worse than this fifth installment though. It has very good animation, and it's fine for younger kids (I heard the younger ones chuckle a lot at my screening). But, when it comes to engaging audiences older than maybe 9 years old, Collision Course fails to make an impression.
Score: 4.4/10
Content Problems Families Should Be Aware Of:
Language: Some name-calling ("funsucker", "nimcompoop") and one use of the British exclamation "crikey". "What the...?" is left unfinished.
Adult Content: A few innuendos. A joke is made about leg garters. A hot tub scene causes quips such as "naked bingo" and "hot tubbin' just got more interesting". One character cross-dresses. Someone says based on the cold weather, "parts are retracting into other parts". Sid's nipples are shown burning at one point.
Violence: Some animated peril and action. Scrat crashes constantly and gets hurt repeatedly in his quest for the acorn, as a spaceship crashes out of ice and into several asteroids. A few asteroids hit the earth and cause a lot of damage (and fire). Someone is eaten (and then regurgitated). A flock of birds are hit by multiple asteroids, and three dino-birds threaten characters repeatedly. A volcano explodes and planets are bonked against each other.
Drugs/Alcohol: A water hole is made to look like a bar with mixed drinks.
Other: Several bathroom jokes include jokes about "butts", "doodys", passing gas, and bad smells. Some crotch hits. Sid wipes his eyes and nose with poison ivy. Some annoying moments. Sid says, "My nose is dangerously close to my butt" and makes poor relationship choices, asking females to marry him 15 minutes after starting to date them.
