It’s insane to think that the Ice Age franchise is 20 years old! Yet here we are. The original film made its debut in 2002. Today, Disney+ continues the story from that cold world with The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild. This feature film for Disney’s streaming platform follows the one-eyed dinosaur hunting weasel, Buck Wild. We first saw him back in Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs in 2009, where he was voiced by Simon Pegg.
No doubt that Buck probably has a plethora of stories to tell about his many, many adventures. Something that Pegg has been advocating for now for years. In a recent press event that LRM Online was a part of, he commented about his thoughts on making a film like The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild.
“I’ve been dropping hints about this for 12 years. Lori [Forte], you can attest to this, every time we do it, I’m like, ‘Probably this Buck should have his thing. Maybe…’” Said Peg. “The great thing about this is that the Ice Age story has so many fabulous characters in it, this is the era of the cinematic universe. I don’t think there is another animation, which is more suited to expansion like this. It’s great.”
He talks about how the Ice Age franchise has the advantage of having a variety of characters that can be featured in films. Lucky for him, it’s his character’s turn as well as Crash and Eddie.
“There are so many wonderful characters and in a movie you can only spend so much time with each one.” Continued Pegg. “So this is a lovely way to give over some time to not only Buck and Crash and Eddie. But also Zee and these new characters, which are welcome additions to this fabulous group.”
ALSO SEE: ITS OFFICIAL PERCY JACKSON AND THE OLYMPIANS COMING TO DISNEY+
Lori Forte, a producer for the franchise since the original Ice Age film, also commented on the opportunity to expand the Ice Age world and spend more time with characters that we loved but really did not have time for in the previous films.
“I’ve been living with all these saber-tooth tigers and mammoths and possums and weasels for so long. Just the extension, like Simon said, it’s such a great franchise to open it up and to spend time with certain characters that we can’t get to see all the time. I think with this project, we came up with Buck for Dawn of the Dinosaurs. Which was the third Ice Age film.” Said Forte. “It obviously it’s such a lovable and eccentric and wacky and joyful and adventurous character and Simon brought all of that to life for us. I mean, he is all those things I just mentioned, eccentric and joyful and wacky and lovable and wonderful.”
Director for The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild John C. Donkin also talked a little about what we will be learning about Buck. As well as the connection with the new character, Zee who is voiced by Justina Machado.
“Just adding to that, I think that this movie allows us to start to peel back the layers of all that is Buck. Actually, the introduction of the Zee character gives us a glimpse into some backstory in Buck. There’s some history between the two of them and we start to reveal that through the course of the movie.” Commented Donkin.
Fans of the franchise are going to have a lot of fun digging deeper into the characters in this new feature film. As well as getting to know new ones that may be featured in more future Ice Age projects.
The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild is now available exclusively on Disney+.