60 Fun Facts About Ice Age

Which animation studio made the first five Ice Age films?

Blue Sky Studios made the first five films; the original Ice Age was the Fox-owned studio's debut feature, and Disney closed the studio in April 2021.

What kind of animal is Manny?

A woolly mammoth, Manny spends the first film convinced he is the last of his kind, a belief that explains his gruffness toward the rest of the herd.

Who voices Manny?

Ray Romano, star of Everybody Loves Raymond, voices Manny in all five theatrical Ice Age films; he did not return for the 2022 streaming spin-off Buck Wild.

What kind of animal is Sid?

He is a Megalonyx-style ground sloth, though he moves like anything but.

Who voices Sid?

He found the voice after learning sloths store food in their cheek pouches, and recorded with a mouthful of food.

What inspired the lisping voice the actor gave Sid?

Learning that sloths store food in their cheek pouches gave the actor the idea for Sid's spitting lisp; he had tried some thirty other voices before settling on it.

Diego is what species?

Smilodon is the sabre-toothed cat; his pack leader Soto and packmate Zeke are Smilodons too.

Who voices Diego?

Denis Leary voices Diego; the comedian's growl suits a sabre-tooth who spends most of the first film plotting to hand the baby over to his pack.

Which comedian voices Zeke, one of Soto's sabre-toothed pack?

Jack Black voices Zeke, the twitchy member of Soto's pack; the small role came years before he headlined Kung Fu Panda in 2008.

What is the name of the human baby the herd carries in the first film?

The baby is Roshan; Tara Strong, also the voice of Timmy Turner in The Fairly OddParents, supplied his gurgles.

What is the herd's goal in the first film?

To return the baby to its tribe is the goal; Sid, Manny and Diego form a very reluctant family on the trek, with Diego supposedly guiding them toward the humans.

What does Manny remember in his cave-painting flashback?

His family being killed by human hunters is what the cave paintings stir up; the memory explains why Manny is so cold toward the baby at first.

What finally makes Diego switch sides completely?

Manny saves his life at the lava flow, and Diego confesses the ambush; he then takes a mortal-looking blow from Soto, only to turn up alive at the end.

The first Ice Age lost the Best Animated Feature Oscar to which film?

Spirited Away, Hayao Miyazaki's film, won at the 75th Academy Awards, only the second year the category existed; Shrek had won the first.

On what date was the first Ice Age released in the United States?

March 15, 2002 was the US opening; it debuted at No. 1 with about $46 million, and every theatrical sequel kept a spring or summer slot.

Roughly how much did the first Ice Age gross worldwide?

$383 million worldwide, against a budget of about $59 million, made the original a hit and launched the studio's biggest franchise.

The first Ice Age was originally conceived by Fox Animation Studios as what?

A traditionally animated film was the plan at Fox's hand-drawn studio in Phoenix; when that studio closed in 2000, the project moved to Fox's CGI house and was remade in computer animation.

Which composer scored the first Ice Age film?

David Newman scored the first Ice Age; John Powell took over the franchise's music from The Meltdown onward.

What kind of creature is Scrat?

A saber-toothed squirrel, Scrat is a long-snouted, rat-like rodent with fangs and no dialogue, designed by the franchise's character artist Peter de Sève.

Who provides Scrat's vocal effects?

Chris Wedge co-founded the studio and directed the first film, then squeaked and screamed as Scrat in every theatrical entry and the Scrat Tales shorts.

How did Scrat get his name?

Michael J. Wilson's daughter Flora coined it.

What is Scrat forever trying to bury?

An acorn, which he never manages to keep, is the prize; his pursuit of it sets off avalanches, floods and, eventually, continental drift.

Which long-fanged fossil mammal, described in 2011, was nicknamed after Scrat?

Cronopio dentiacutus, a Cretaceous mammal from Patagonia with long canines, was dubbed the Scrat fossil; describer Guillermo Rougier said the resemblance was only superficial.

What is the name of Scrat's female counterpart introduced in the third film?

Scratte is a flying squirrel, both his love interest and his rival for the nut; she debuted in Dawn of the Dinosaurs.

What happens to Scrat in the studio's 2022 farewell short?

He eats his acorn at last in 'The End', the studio's final short; after two decades of failure, the animators let him win in peace.

Who directed Ice Age: The Meltdown?

Carlos Saldanha directed The Meltdown after co-directing the first film; he also directed Dawn of the Dinosaurs and later Rio.

In The Meltdown, Ellie is a mammoth who believes she is what?

A possum is what she takes herself for: raised by the opossums Crash and Eddie, she hangs from trees by her tail to prove it.

Who voices Ellie?

Queen Latifah voices Ellie; she joined in the second film and stayed for the rest of the theatrical series.

Which pair of actors voice the opossum brothers Crash and Eddie?

Seann William Scott and Josh Peck voice Crash and Eddie; Scott was already known as Stifler from American Pie, and Peck was then a Nickelodeon sitcom star.

What is the danger the herd flees in The Meltdown?

An ice dam about to flood the valley is the threat the Lone Gunslinger vulture announces; the herd's only hope is a boat waiting at the far end of the valley.

Which two sea reptiles are freed by the melting ice in The Meltdown?

Cretaceous and Maelstrom, two marine reptiles thawed out of the ice, stalk the herd through the flooding valley as the film's wordless main predators.

Which Arrested Development actor voices the Lone Gunslinger vulture in The Meltdown?

Will Arnett, Arrested Development's Gob, voices the Lone Gunslinger; his vulture leads a flock singing 'Food, Glorious Food' from Oliver! about the doomed animals.

What proves Manny is not the last mammoth at the end of The Meltdown?

A herd emerges from a fissure after the flood, proving Manny is not the last of his kind; he still chooses Ellie and his friends over joining it.

Roughly how much did The Meltdown gross worldwide?

$667 million worldwide made it the year's top animated film; its $68 million debut was the biggest March opening weekend to that point.

Who voices Buck, the one-eyed dinosaur-hunting weasel?

Simon Pegg voices Buck, the swashbuckling weasel introduced in Dawn of the Dinosaurs; Buck later got his own streaming spin-off, The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild.

Which creature took Buck's missing eye?

Rudy, an albino Baryonyx, is the giant that took the eye; Buck wears one of Rudy's teeth as a knife and calls the beast his nemesis.

How many dinosaur eggs does Sid adopt in Dawn of the Dinosaurs?

Three eggs hatch into Egbert, Shelly and Yoko before their real mother, a Tyrannosaurus, comes calling.

What do Manny and Ellie name their newborn daughter?

Peaches is born near the end of Dawn of the Dinosaurs; she grows into a rebellious teenager by the fourth film.

Where does the herd end up in the third film?

A subterranean lost world: an icy cave leads down to a jungle where the dinosaurs never went extinct, and where Buck has lived alone for years.

Roughly how much did Dawn of the Dinosaurs gross worldwide?

$887 million worldwide made it the highest-grossing animated film of 2009 and the third-highest film of that year overall, behind Avatar and Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

Who voices Captain Gutt, the pirate ape in Continental Drift?

Peter Dinklage voices Captain Gutt, a Gigantopithecus, a real giant ape of Pleistocene Asia known mostly from fossil teeth and jaws.

Which pop star voices Shira, the sabre-tooth who falls for Diego?

Jennifer Lopez voices Shira, who starts out as Gutt's first mate before switching sides to join the herd.

Which comedian voices Sid's Granny, introduced in Continental Drift?

Wanda Sykes voices Granny, whose supposedly imaginary 'pet' turns out to be a real giant whale named Precious.

Which rapper voices Ethan, the mammoth Manny's teenage daughter has a crush on?

Drake voices Ethan; Nicki Minaj voices Steffie, one of Ethan's clique of cool mammoths, in the same film.

Which Simpsons short played before Continental Drift in theaters?

The Longest Daycare, starring Maggie Simpson, played ahead of the film and earned an Oscar nomination of its own.

Which pair directed Ice Age: Continental Drift?

Steve Martino and Mike Thurmeier directed Continental Drift; Martino had co-directed Horton Hears a Who! for the same studio, and Thurmeier went on to Collision Course.

How does Scrat kick off the plot of Collision Course?

He is launched into space and knocks an asteroid at Earth: a flying saucer frozen in the ice takes off with Scrat aboard, and his fumbling sets the cosmos in motion.

What was Collision Course's production budget?

$105 million was the budget; the film grossed about $408 million worldwide, less than half its predecessor's take and the weakest since the 2002 original.

Where did Collision Course have its world premiere in June 2016?

Sydney Film Festival hosted the world premiere in June 2016, a month before US theaters got it on July 22, 2016.

The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild skipped theaters in January 2022 and went straight to which streamer?

Disney+ streamed it from January 28, 2022; it was the first Ice Age film made without the franchise's original studio, and without most of the original voice cast.

What is the combined worldwide gross of the first five theatrical Ice Age films?

Over $3.2 billion combined, with every theatrical sequel outgrossing the original, puts the series among the highest-grossing animated franchises ever made.

Who voices Louis, the molehog friend of Manny's daughter in Continental Drift?

Josh Gad voices Louis, the timid molehog, a year before his breakout as Olaf in Frozen.

Who voices Soto, leader of the sabre-tooth pack in the first film?

Goran Visnjic, then playing Dr. Luka Kovac on ER, voices Soto, the pack leader who dies under falling icicles in the final fight.

How many episodes are in the streaming series Scrat Tales?

Six shorts make up Scrat Tales, released to streaming in April 2022; each follows Scrat and his son, Baby Scrat, fighting over the nut.

Which theme park hosts the dark ride Ice Age: Expedition Thin Ice?

Genting SkyWorlds in Malaysia, the Fox-themed park that opened in 2022, hosts the ride, which uses animatronics and projections to send guests through the melting valley.

Which 2006 Scrat short, bouncing him between eras after his nut, earned an Oscar nomination?

No Time for Nuts, directed by Chris Renaud and Michael Thurmeier, first appeared on The Meltdown DVD and lost the Oscar to The Danish Poet.

Which villain steals and hides all the eggs in the TV special Ice Age: The Great Egg-Scapade?

Squint, the pirate rabbit from Gutt's crew, hides the eggs; his twin brother Clint helps the herd in what becomes the world's first Easter egg hunt.

Which 2002 Scrat short was nominated for the Best Animated Short Oscar?

Gone Nutty, released with the first film on home video, was nominated at the 76th Academy Awards, where Harvie Krumpet took the prize.

Which mobile game company released Ice Age Village in April 2012?

Gameloft released Ice Age Village in April 2012 as a free-to-play tie-in to that summer's Continental Drift, letting players build a settlement for the herd.

Which studio handled the outsourced animation for The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild?

Bardel Entertainment, a Vancouver studio, animated Buck Wild for Disney after the franchise's original studio was shut down; only the actor voicing Buck returned from the original cast.