Disney has announced thatIce Age6is officially in development, marking their second movie set within the hit animated franchise. Originally produced by Blue Sky Studios for 20th Century Fox, the franchise would later fall under Disney’s ownership following 2019’s Fox-Disney merger. Following that merger,Blue Sky Studios was officially shut downby Disney in 2021, but not before producing a series of animated shorts, dubbedIce Age: Scrat Tales, that debuted on Disney+ in 2022. Meanwhile, Disney+ would also release its own exclusive spinoff movie,The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild,without Blue Sky’s involvement.
Taking to X (formerly Twitter), the officialDisneyaccount revealed thatIce Age 6was officially announced at this year’s D23 Brazil. Featuring the return of the franchise’s original voice cast, the new animated sequel will feature the vocal talents of Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Queen Latifah, Denis Leary, and Simon Pegg. Set to arrive in theaters in 2026, the movie’s first logo reveal was created in the announcement video by having Romano draw the number 6 on a frosted screen beside the franchise’s classic title font. Check out the official announcement video below:
What The Original Voice Cast’s Return Means For Ice Age 6
Disney Has Already Tried Recasting The Franchise’s Main Roles
While Disney has already attempted to makeits ownIce Agemovie separatefrom the original animation studio that first created the franchise,Ice Age 6marks a very different project toThe Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild.Not only is the new movie set to further expand the franchise’s core movies, but the return of the original voice cast is a vast improvement over their approach to the 2022 spinoff.
9 Characters Ice Age 6 Needs To Bring Back After 8 Years
Now that the sixth main Ice Age movie has been confirmed, there is a lot of speculation over which characters from the franchise need to come back.
While Pegg did reprise his role as the titular Buck Wild inDisney’s previousIce Agemovie, he wasnot joined by any of his previous co-stars. Instead, the roles previously played by Romano, Leguizamo, Latifah, and Leary were all recast, a move that generated a great deal of condemnation from critics and general audiences alike. Furthermore, the absence of the franchise’s fan-favorite character Scrat was also considered a sore point for many viewers, who delivered the movie the franchise’s lowest audience rating on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes. Check out the franchise’s scores below:
77%
82%
56%
71%
46%
63%
37%
61%
18%
39%
19%
32%
Our Take On Disney Returning To The Core Ice Age Cast
The Franchise Has Never Really Lived Up To The First Movie
Comparatively speaking, theIce Agefranchise did appear to suffer its own decline in quality even prior to Disney’s acquisition of 20th Century Fox. Looking more closely at the franchise’s overall ratings, the responses to Disney’s spinoff are not all that dissimilar to Blue Sky’s final movie, 2016’sIce Age: Collision Course. Indeed, in the franchise’s 22-year history,only 2002’s original movie would earn itself a fresh critical rating, and each subsequent outing would suffer incremental declines.
As such, theIce Agefranchise is probably long overdue for a major course correction, and audiences have long been crying out for a movie that could stand on par with the first entry. Whether or not Disney will be able to deliver such a feat withIce Age 6remains to be seen, but at least bringing back the original cast seems like a sensible first step.
Ice Age
TheIce Agefranchise is a popular animated film series produced by Blue Sky Studios, centering around a group of prehistoric animals surviving the Pleistocene ice age. Led by a woolly mammoth named Manny, the films feature his adventures alongside a sloth named Sid and a saber-toothed tiger named Diego. Known for its humor, heartwarming themes, and memorable characters, the series has expanded to include spin-offs, short films, and TV specials. The franchise continues to captivate audiences with its colorful animation, family-friendly humor, and ongoing stories of friendship and survival.
