Ice Age: The Meltdown

This second trek with the mammoth, the sloth and the saber-toothed tiger feels like a rush job—a half-assed effort to cash in. Ray Romano, John Leguizamo and Denis Leary lend their voices once again, joined by Queen Latifah as another mammoth who thinks she’s a possum (Ha, ha, ha … choke, slorp …. ha, ha, ha!). The earth is experiencing the end of its ice age, and animals must escape a valley before it’s flooded and history plays out. Because this is a kid’s movie, it doesn’t end with extinction for its stars. (Although that’s pretty much what happened in real life and would’ve been an interesting lesson for the youngsters). Lots of sanitized fart humor, too much stuff involving Scrat chasing his acorn, and animation that isn’t all that good-looking make this one pretty mediocre fare.