Ice Age/Headscratchers


 * Between Ice Age and Ice Age 2, the entire ice age happens. It starts out in the first that everything is about to experience instant permafrost for the next few thousand years, and in the next, everything is melting, and a mammoth, giant ground sloth, and sabretooth cat with the same names and personalities (and, in the case of Sid, Lord of the Flame, skills) as the first movie's protagonists are experiencing the end of the ice age, and nobody thinks it would ever end, because everything has been frozen since before the earliest stories. They could have easily handwaved this, by saying it's the first movie's characters' descendants, or by not having everyone say that the ice had been there forever (the sloth priestess did say it was lava melting the ice), but they don't even bother explaining the discrepancy.
 * I always thought the first movie took place near the end of the Ice Age. Remember, most of the animals were headed south, where it was warmer, and Manny was moving against the flow which is how he got wrapped-up with the left-behind Sid. After the errand with the human was done, the three of them could've just followed common sense and moved south too.
 * The "Ice Age" wasn't just long stretch of permafrost. It was cyclical.
 * Actually, going by the specific assortment of animals seen (and ignoring the dodos), it's pretty clear that the film is intended to be set in South America. Moving south would most likely take them into colder territory, not warmer.
 * I really don't think they were trying to make the setting be South America so much as a generic ice age American land. Bisons, brontotheres, mammoths, Gastornis and Hesperornis (two birds seen in the second movie) all come from North America and Moetherium (the things that looked like little naked tapirs) comes from Africa. But many of those lived way before the ice age anyway, and Hesperornis was contemporary of dinosaurs.
 * The movie gave hints of being set in all kinds of places. We see both Old Faithful and Stone Henge within less than a day's walk of each other.


 * In Ice Age 2, one would think that the mammoth-who-thinks-she's-a-'possum would at least realize that she's way too big to hide behind a small shrub. Rule of Funny, yeah, but really, she should think that she was a giant 'possum rather than a normal-size 'possum who looks big for her size.
 * Something tells me that she also wanted to belong with her brothers regardless of her size. That includes sleeping in groups.


 * The buzzard chick hatches, and instead of imprinting on Scrat (or the acorn), which could have been funny, it decides the acorn (and not the squirrel) is food, and that the buzzard is its mummy. It seemed the writers were trying not to abandon every scrap of logic for the Rule of Funny, but really, the chose oddly in deciding which scraps of logic to throw out.


 * Ice Age 3. Dawn of the FRIGGIN' DINOSAURS. Anyone with any knowledge of prehistory would know that the ice age came AFTER the dinosaurs. What were they thinking?
 * They were thinking that the dinosaurs would have been previously frozen in ice, probably a call back to that scene in the first one, and then thawed out, although even that concept is questionable.
 * Well, they probably ran out of ideas that didn't involve things that lived after the dinosaurs. But Ice Age has never been big on being chronologically accurate anyway (the dodos, for one, are in the wrong time and place). Plus, who DOESN'T want to see dinosaurs?
 * I'm just pissed that every time I see an animated movie, I have to see that same damn trailer where there's the female squirrel AND NO FUCKING DINOSAURS. Are they even in the plot?
 * Trailers for the first two movies focused on the squirrel almost exclusively, when in fact that squirrel had little to do with the plot. It's kinda tradition for the series at this point.
 * This troper had a drama teacher who figured it was a deliberate tribute (or an unconscious cultural nod) to Shakespeare. To take the obvious example, Romeo and Juliet starts with two servants who have absolutely nil to do with the plot; it's a scene-setting device, just like Scrat the unfortunate squirrel.
 * Based on the most recent commercials, it looks to be a lost world scenario, with the dinosaurs somehow living in an underground jungle. Huge trees and everything.
 * Writers wanted the movie to be an homage to Lost World based fiction, especially Journey to The Center of The Earth so it's understandable.
 * The designer also said they were running out of giant mammals to introduce, and the lost world could be a good variant to the icy environment with mostly brown animals.


 * What is it with the happy families thing they pull in 2, What kind of responsible adult would let their kids out on their own in an area known to house a carnivore (it's only Diego, but he is a carnivore)?
 * We have carnivores. They are called DOGS and CATS.
 * okay, would you let your kids play outside in an area 'known' to contain a murderous cannibal (which is the only analogy that can be drawn, since we also have pet food, and cats and many dogs are smaller than anything bar a newborn)?


 * What in the hell did they feed that baby? A baby cannot live on watermelon- a baby just learning to walk is still drinking almost exclusively milk. And there weren't any other women with the humans- which also makes NO SENSE? So how did they keep it alive afterwards, anyway?
 * On that last point, it's a possible interpretation that the group of humans was a search party or a hunting party, so the women would be back at the camp, or in some other temporary hideout where they would be safe. Presumably any other children the tribe has are with them.
 * Babies learning to walk are usually around 10 months to a year old, they can eat pretty much everything by then. He could have been picking up things to eat off the ground too


 * The flashback of Manny in Ice Age 1. I haven't seen the movie in a few years so maybe my memory has been jogged but..
 * The flashback shows the baby, along with the mother, cornered by hunters. The adult that trumpets in shock afterwards is Manny.


 * I can forgive Dawn of the Dinosaurs since it's a rip-off homage to Journey to The Center of The Earth. I can't forgive The Meltdown for not offering any explanation for how two carnivorous aquatic reptiles can survive being frozen in ice for millions of years with no side-effects, other than being Super Persistent Predators.
 * Oh you mean except Scrat at the end of 1 (okay ~20,000 years, but just as bad)?
 * First off IT IS JUST A MOVIE! can't you guys's learn to forget about the real word and just enjoy a good plot? and second of all theirs are other stuff move t.v and episode of dinosaurs living under us.
 * It Just Bugs Me. Dismissing these things with "IT'S JUST A MOVIE" is annoying as hell.
 * The cardinal rule for IJBM is that it doesn't matter how fictional something is if it bugs you.
 * I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "side-effects" so this may not be of any help to you, but being a dino nerd I know that the sea reptiles of the dinosaur time and the ones in the movie had a few differences in physical appearance. But Word of God states that the differences in appearance are because the sea reptiles were mutated from being frozen. So does mutation count as a "side-effect"?
 * Well, if Cretaceous and Maelstrom didn't have legs, they wouldn't have posed much threat to the heroes. At least it makes some sense, considering mosasaurs and ichthyosaurs descended from land reptiles.


 * Okay, in Ice Age, the baby's mom is nearly dead in a river. She looks up and sees a fucking mammoth hovering over her and her infant. She simply smiles, dies, leaving the baby at the mercy of the mammoth. Of course, we know this mammoth is Manny and he's not going to hurt the infant, but seriously, IRL, a woman would not be too pleased that an elephant is within a few feet from her baby.
 * She was probabley woozy from being near-death and unable to get out and help her child. She might have not even known that the animal next to her child was a mammoth.
 * Ice age. Freezing water. SUDDENLY A MAMMOTH. She probably died of shock from seeing the mammoth so close.
 * Or she thought she was hallucinating Manny. Or she was hallucinating something else entirely.
 * Based on the beliefs of ancient peoples, she could have seen him as a totem/protector spirit.


 * All the stupid rumors flying around the Internet about the possibilities for casting (The Role Association of Jennette McCurdy who might potentially voicing Manny's daughter Peaches) plot-line ideas such as the ridiculous Ice Age: Th4w (thankfully Jossed) and how speculation about Ice Age: Continental Drift is already causing a slight Internet Backdraft on sites such as fanfiction.net. Rant over.


 * Fridge Logic: Mostly the context of the fight VS Rudy - a) how did it know to wait for them in that cave? and b) how did it even fit inside in the first place without wrecking the cave door? It's HUGE!
 * Rudy is suposed to be intelligent and he was tracking them.
 * He was not exactly there in the cave that leads to the Lost World, his roar is just loud.
 * How did the eggs wind up in the ice cave in the first place?
 * Think about it. Where's the safest place to hide vulnerable unhatched offspring from predators? Somewhere they would never go. Hence, cave. It's not Mama's fault Sid decided to adopt steal them.
 * I think the OP may have been referring to how the T rex got them there in the first place. If I remember correctly they had to walk over a path of bones over a fall to get there that would of broke under the weight, and the cave probably wasn't tall enough for her to get in there with out breaking it. If that isn't what he/she was referring to, then it's a new question.


 * Did this movie kill the dinosaurs?
 * No. Watch the third movie.
 * I see what you did there...
 * Quiet, you.


 * In Ice Age 2 after Manny  Ellie yells at him and then claims believing crash accually could was Manny's fault. REALLY? and she's supposed to be his WIFE
 * She's supposed to be his wife AFTER the events of the second movie. Chronology, folks!
 * I understand, and I love Ellie's character usually, and maybe she was just worried about her "brother" but what happens when Peaches gets hurt (as most little kids do) will she yell at Manny for that?
 * Again, chronology. They had time enough to make a kid between the two movies(20 months or more, assuming mammoths and elephants have roughly the same gestation period). They changed.
 * How can they have a Christmas Special with Santa Claus if it's set in the ice age?! Aka a prehistoric era!
 * Money, Dear Boy makes anything possible.
 * Just how long before the third film's events did Buck have his near-fatal encounter with Rudy? Carnosaurs like Rudy replaced their teeth when they were damaged, yet he's still missing a tooth in the film.
 * It's to make the character distinctive and to give a visual aid as to why they're rivals in the first place. Plus, it makes Buck more Crazy Awesome.
 * Ok, one thing that's somewhat bugged me about the third film...Where's the male T.rex? Did he die? Is he the frozen T.rex in the first movie? What? The movie shows that the female T.rex took care of her young (which is a widely accepted theory among paleontolgists), but paleontologists also theorize that T.rex lived in small family groups (IE: A breeding pair and their offspring) and that both the male and female take care of their young. So, I ask again...Where's the male T.rex?
 * Word of God says that Diego really did die in Number 1. So, in the sequels, Diego's a ghost?
 * He had nine lives. Now he has eight.
 * What I never got when watching the first; what exactly happened when Diego jumped between Manny and Zoto that nearly cost him his life? Zoto bit his throat? Way too subtly shown in that case.
 * In Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs, why was Ellie mad at Manny after he and the others got out of the helium/laughing gas? He asks her how much she heard and she says she heard everything. I didn't hear him say anything about her? Was she mad about what he and Diego had said to each other?
 * In Ice Age 2, A Piranha eats Scrat's acorn, but after Scrat beats them up, he get the acorn out of another Piranha. How is this possible?
 * The Piranha Scrat gets the acorn out of is the same Piranha Scrat used to whack the Piranha that ate the acorn. It is possible that the acorn was knocked out of one mouth and went into the other.