[[quoteright:250:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/scrat.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:250:OhCrap.]]

--> Sid: "I don't know about you guys but, we are the weirdest herd I've ever seen."

Starting as a single adventure in 2002, the CGI animated movie was a box office hit and expanded into an entire quadrilogy. It is Creator/BlueSkyStudios' first film and their flagship franchise so far.

In the Ice Age, a clumsy sloth named Sid, a depressed woolly mammoth named Manny, a saber-toothed cat named Diego and an acorn-obsessed saber-toothed squirrel named Scrat are forced to become unlikely heroes. The first three reluctantly come together and brave the deadly elements of the impending big freeze. Scrat has his own parallel StoryArc. He tries to bury his beloved acorn, but he only manages to create mayhem around him.

In the first ''Ice Age'' film, Sid is left behind sleeping when the rest of his family and all the other prehistoric mammals begin the journey to the south. Awaking, he meets Manfred, a mammoth who is resolutely travelling to the north, and decides to follow him. When a human camp is attacked by a pack of vengeful sabers, a woman takes her baby and jumps in a river. Before she dies from her trauma, Manny and Sid rescue the baby. The two animals decide to search for the father and return the baby to him. Diego, one of the tigers that attacked the humans, comes also claiming the baby. Diego starts to work as a double agent, but along the journey he is befriended by Manny and Sid and finally joins them.

In the sequel, ''Ice Age: The Meltdown'' Manny, Sid and Diego are living in a large valley with an enormously high ice wall filling one end. The trio discover that the ice wall is actually barely holding a massive body of water that would flood the valley to nearly a mile underwater. A vulture tells them that there is a boat at the other end of the valley that may save them all, but they have only three days to make it or die. Manny is having trouble facing the fact that he may be the last mammoth left. Along the way, they meet Ellie, a mammoth who thinks she is a possum, and her possum "brothers", Crash and Eddie.

The third movie, ''Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs'' was released in 2009 and involves a LostWorld filled with [[EverythingsBetterWithDinosaurs DINOSAURS!]] It turns out there is an entire prehistoric world that somehow survived by being located underneath the surface of the Earth. Manny and Ellie are expecting their first child, and Manny becomes compulsively over-protective of her as he tries to be readily prepared for when the time comes. Sid is jealous and raises three abandoned eggs. They turn out to be baby T-rexes, and when their real mother finds out they were stolen, she takes her three babies and Sid underground, and Sid's friends all go to his rescue. There they meet a seasoned, [[CloudCuckooLander slightly insane adventurer weasel]] named Buck, who becomes their guide in surviving this new world, and with an agenda of his own.

A fourth movie, ''Ice Age: Continental Drift'' was released on July 13 2012. Taking place a few years after the events of Dawn of the Dinosaurs, Scrat's pursuit of the acorn has world-changing consequences, forcing Manny, Sid, and Diego on an adventure, where Sid reunites with his long lost family, Diego finds his love interest, Shira, and they encounter exotic sea creatures and meet a gang of pirates determined to stop them from returning home.

Also spawned three short films that are on the [=DVDs=]: ''Gone Nutty'' and ''No Time for Nuts'', both short adventures starring Scrat, and ''Surviving Sid'', [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin obviously centered around Sid.]] And there's "A Mammoth Christmas", a ChristmasSpecial that raises huge FridgeLogic issues just by looking at it.

----
!! The films provide examples of:

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder:The series as a whole]]
* AllThereInTheManual:
** Background information provided in the books and other websites confirms that Manny's family died in the TroubledBackStoryFlashback in the original and corroborates the belief that his first child was a son.
** There is also confirmation for the human baby's name, which is Roshan. His parents are called Runar and Nadia.
** The names of the two aquatic antagonists in the second film: Cretaceous and Maelstrom.
* AnachronismStew: Crosses over with MisplacedWildlife and SomewhereAPaleontologistIsCrying. The fourth film lampshades it, with Sid ''outright stating'' near the start that their fight against dinosaurs from the third film made no sense whatsoever.
** Also, Pangaea? ''In the Ice Age''?!
* AnthropomorphicShift: from Surviving Sid onwards. Though the main villains of the second and third films were actually more animalistic than the cast.
* AnimationBump / ArtEvolution: Actually, it both evolves and ''de''volves as the series progresses. While the overall animation does improve with each sequel, due mostly to advances in CGI animation technology, the character designs (mostly for the minor characters) becomes increasingly simplistic; for example, take a look at how more accurate the glyptodons look in the first movie, compared to how silly and cartoony they look afterwards.
* AscendedFanboy: [[DrakeAndJosh Josh Peck]] was a fan of ''Ice Age'' before being cast as Eddie in the sequel. He was very excited to be a part of the saga. Queen Latifah was also a fan of the original film before she was cast as Ellie in the same film.
* AttackAttackRetreatRetreat: Sid a couple of times through the series...
--> '''Sid:''' We're gonna LIVE!
--> ''*Everybody sees the water rising rapidly*''
--> '''Sid:''' We're gonna DIE!
* BigBad: Soto in the first movie, and he is a very, very [[MagnificentBastard effective]] one, especially if one watches and is aware that he is setting up a gambit for Diego's death at the same time Diego is machinating the demise of Manny and Roshan, [[AndZoidberg and Sid.]]
** Arguably, Cretaceous and Maelstrom in the second movie.
** Rudy probably counts in the third movie.
** Captain Gutt in the fourth.
* {{Badass}}: Buck the Weasel of ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs'', who is the most badass character ever to be featured in a children's film.
** Diego also counts, especially in the Original film.
* BelligerentSexualTension: Manny and Ellie in the second movie, Diego and Shira in the fourth.
* BookEnds: the first movie opens with Scrat somehow causing [[DisasterDominoes an ever-growing crack]] with the acorn. It ends with one too. [[spoiler: And so does the third movie.]]
* BreakOutCharacter: Scrat appears in more advertisement and has more shorts than any other character in this film series, and he's not even a main character!
* BrickJoke: In the second movie, Scrat's vision of FluffyCloudHeaven includes rows of dodos welcoming him - could they be the same ones that essentially ''extincted themselves'' in the first movie?
** In the third film, while Ellie is pregnant, she challenges Manny, "Let's see how you handle the teen years." In the fourth film... it's not easy.
* ButtMonkey: Sid. Not even his ''family'' wanted him.
** Scrat counts as well.
* CallBack: The game Sid plays with the baby dinosuars in the third movie is the same one he and Diego did with Roshan in the first movie.
** Buck's knife in the fourth film.
** The 4th movie shows Sid's family that abandoned him in the first.
** Manny saying "Get off my face!" to Uncle Fungus in four mirrors a similar situation from the original.
** When Scrat falls to the center of the earth in the fourth movie, he passes Buck riding Rudy from the third movie.
*** Speaking of the third movie, Buck commandeering a pterodactyl like an aircraft is mirrored in the fourth movie by [[spoiler:Granny commandeering her pet whale like a submarine.]]
* CarnivoreConfusion: The "predation is a fact of life" approach is taken with the saber-tooths, humans, and tyrannosaurs. The PredatorsAreMean approach is taken by the antagonists Cretaceous and Malestrom from ''The Meltdown'' and Rudy from ''Dawn Of The Dinosaurs''.
** Not to mention the fish from the second.
* CastCalculus: Changes with each movie.
** FreudianTrio: "Ice Age"
*** TheKirk: Manny
*** TheMcCoy: Sid
*** TheSpock: Diego
** FiveManBand: "The Meltdown"
*** TheHero[=/=]TheBigGuy: Manny
*** TheLancer: Diego
*** TheSmartGuy: Sid, who actually ''is'' pretty smart.
*** TheChick: Ellie
*** {{Kid Appeal Character}}s: Crash and Eddie.
** TheMagnificentSevenSamurai: "Dawn Of The Dinosaurs"
*** The above six, plus a new, ''seventh'' Ranger: Buck the CrazyAwesome CloudCuckooLander weasel, though he doesn't stay with the group permanently and is remembered as an honorary member.
*** And the fourth gives us Teenage Peaches, Louis, Sid’s Granny, and Shira. Safe to say this group is no longer small.
* CatsAreSnarkers: Diego.
-->'''Sid:''' Hey, my feet are sweating.\\
'''Diego:''' Do we need a news flash every time your body does something?
** Shira and Diego engage in SnarktoSnarkCombat repeatedly in ''Continental Drift''. It's no contest.
* CelebrityVoiceActor: JohnLeguizamo, [[EverybodyLovesRaymond Ray Romano]], DenisLeary, QueenLatifah, Seann William Scott, SimonPegg, and [[spoiler: PatrickStewart]].
* ChekhovsSkill: Ellie being the only tree-climbing mammoth ''until [[SoLastSeason Continental Drift]]'' helps her to save one of the dino eggs in ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs''.
** Possibly Diego's forcing panicked Manny to flee ''towards'' the giant raft in ''Meltdown'' qualifies, as the other tigers' plan to ambush the mammoth in the first film involved driving him to his death. Presumably Diego knows how to do that too.
*** Actually this probably comes with the territory of being a pack hunter. Any pack hunting species will know how to herd their prey to where other members of the pack need them to be.
** Peaches's tree-swinging abilities and Louis's tunneling in the 4th movie.
** In the original, Sid's proficiency at wintertime athletics.
* TheChewToy: Scrat and Sid.
* CloudCuckooLander:
** Ellie.
** The Dodos.
** [[CloudCuckooLander Buck]] [[CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass the]] [[ChekhovsSkill Weasel]]
** Sid’s Granny (played by Wanda Sykes) is the 4th movie's “Buck” in some respects.
* ComicBookTime: The animal characters never seem to age, even though by rights Crash and Eddie should be old now. Which leads to the puzzling thought about how old the characters actually are...
* CompletelyMissingThePoint: The dodos in the first movie. Sid continually.
* ContinuityNod: Whereas this was ignored in the sequel, the third movie comes through with a {{Callback}} to the Original Film. In the scene before Diego leaves Manny to go protect Ellie, he says four words that Manny knows very well from some years earlier: "You have to trust me." And the poignant expression in Manny's eyes seals the deal as you clearly can see that he is remembering that event all over again, and thus why he lets Diego go protect his mate.
** Also the opening of the fourth movie. As Scrat falls into the chasm in the opening, we can see a glimpse of Buck and Rudy. And in the siren's nest, Scrat momentarily sees Scratte, before he shakes it away.
** In an earlier of the fourth film, Diego briefly brings up his old pack.
* CrazySurvivalist:
** Buck the Weasel, the delightfully [[CloudCuckooLander deranged]] {{Rambo}}/[[MobyDick Ahab]] {{Expy}}.
** The dodos are preparing for living billions of years underground with a stockpile of... three watermelons! They failed.
* CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: Scrat and the piranhas. Or Scrat and Sid. "Tae kwon dodos! ATTACK!"
* DeadpanSnarker: Diego and Manny. Shira in the fourth film.
* DecoyProtagonist: Scrat.
* DefrostingIceQueen: Shira is eventually worn down over the course of the fourth film, [[spoiler:just as Diego was in the first film, and like him, she ultimately joins the group for good at the end.]]
* TheDitz: Sid, who is also a GeniusDitz occasionally, especially in the second movie.
* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: See AdultFear. Humans do not have a role in the story after the first film at all. The first film's environments are emptier and more deserted, the cast is smaller, and it's probably the darkest of the four.
* {{Expy}}: Buck the Weasel in ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs'' is a clear allusion to [[{{Rambo}} John Rambo]], another traumatized jungle warrior. His maddened quest to take down a giant white beast that took a part off of him makes him an [[MobyDick Captain Ahab]] expy as well. He also seems to be channeling [[PiratesOfTheCaribbean Captain Jack Sparrow]].
** On the fourth movie, Captain Gutt seems to be styled after Blackbeard, being a fearsome pirate with a giant ego and horrible treating of his own crew, the way his fur is organized also strongly resembles [[PiratesOfTheCaribbean POTC Blackbeard's]] trenchcoat, they have a similar unkempt and grey-ish beard, as well. They even both wear a similar tricorn hat.
* EyeAwaken:
** In ''Ice Age 2'', one of the unfrozen sea reptiles.
** In ''Ice Age 3'', Rudy does this fairly often.
* EyeScream: Narrowly averted in the fourth film.
** Played straight in the third film when Buck gets his eye ''ripped out'' by [[spoiler: Rudy the Baryonyx.]]
* FireForgedFriends: Manny and Diego, especially in the original film, where their friendship is put to the test - and once tested, remains strong - out of the herd in the newer movies, Diego and Manny's bond is the deepest.
* FiveBadBand: The pack of saber-toothed tigers in the first film:
** BigBad: Soto.
** TheDragon: Diego, pre-HeelFaceTurn.
** TheEvilGenius: Lenny.
** TheBrute: Oscar.
** TheDarkChick: Zeke.
*** The Pirates In the fourth movie as well.
** BigBad: Captain Gutt.
** TheDragon: Shira [[spoiler: and later Squint]]
** TheEvilGenius: Raz.
** TheBrute: Flynn and Boris.
** TheDarkChick: Squint.
** TeamPet: Both Silas [Gutt's Pirate parrot] and Boris [their pirate flag].
* GettingCrapPastTheRadar:
** Pulled off twice in ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs''; first when Sid tries to milk a "Cow" ([[spoiler: "I thought you were a female!"]]) and at the end when [[spoiler: Ellie's daughter is born ("Oh look, it's a boy!" - "That's her ''tail'', Sid." - "It's a girl!")]]
** When Diego and Manny are pressed up against each other:
--> '''Diego''': "I feel...tingly!"
--> '''Manny''': "Don't say that when you're pressed up against me!"
--> '''Diego''': "Not ''that'' kind of tingly!"
** And ''again'' with "You know the old saying, an eye for a tooth, a nose for a chin, a butt for a... well it's an old saying. It's not a good saying."
** It's virtually impossible not to ''at least'' raise an eyebrow after hearing Buck say this: "What does that mean, 'I got your back'? I'd rather they covered the front. That's where all the good stuff is!"
** Also in the first movie:
-->'''Manny:''' [The baby] must be wearing one of those baby things.
-->'''Sid:''' So?
-->'''Manny:''' So if he poops, where does it go?
-->'''Sid:''' (beat) Humans are disgusting.
** This little gem:
-->'''Buck''': "And now let me tell you about the time I used a sharpened clamshell to turn a T-Rex...into a T-Rachel!"
-->'''Manny''': "That's enough [[StealthPun fairy]] tales for one night."
** Sid and Diego ''kiss'' in the fourth movie.
--> '''Diego''': Why are we kissing?
--> '''Sid''': Um... 'cause cruises are romantic?
** In the first movie, Diego mistakes Manny and Sid for a gay couple and thought they had adopted the human child.
* GracefulInTheirElement: Sid is graceful on snow and ice, unlike Manny and Diego, but is awkward on earth. Even becomes a plot point towards the end of the first movie.
* GrumpyBear: Manny.
* HeelFaceTurn: Diego in the first film, [[spoiler:Shira]] in the fourth.
* HeldGaze: The [[HeterosexualLifePartners platonic]] version of this trope occurs in ''Ice Age'' after Manny has just rescued Diego from death at the lava fields.
** This happens again during a tense situation between the mammoth and the tiger in the third film, ''Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs'' when Diego is attempting to convince Manny to let him go protect Ellie.
* HeterosexualLifePartners: Manny and Diego.
** Manny and Sid and Diego and Sid (more like Heterosexual Life Trio).
* HonorableElephant: Manny.
* HumbleGoal: Scrat wants nothing more than to enjoy his acorn in peace.
* IAmBigBoned: Manny. He's not fat, it's all that fur. It makes him look...poofy.
* InsistentTerminology: Manny has poofy fur, he's not fat.
* InterspeciesRomance:
** Scrat and Scratte. Scrat is a ground squirrel and Scratte is a flying squirrel...
*** Given that [[spoiler: Scratlantis]] shows creatures that resemble both Scrat and Scratte, one could argue that it's a case of BizarreSexualDimorphism, but who knows.
** Peaches the mammoth and Louis the molehog.
* {{Jerkass}}: Sid can come off like sometimes, most notably in the third movie where he doesn't even give his friends one word of thanks for embarking on that perilous journey to save him, and instead complains about how hard watching his kids were - for ''one'' day!
** Manny was this in the first film, but goes through character development and becomes a JerkWithAHeartOfGold once he opens up to Sid and Diego.
** Fast Tony from the second film. Let's put it this way: upon learning his best friend is probably dead, the first thing he does is try to make a buck selling his now empty shell.
* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Manny and Diego.
* LighterAndFluffier: The series starts out relatively serious, violent, and realistic, and gets progressively sillier. [[TropesAreNotBad Not that there's anything wrong with that.]]
** Arguable in the ''[=DotD=]'', where Buck turns the action (and obviously the silliness) up to 11.
* MamaBear: "Momma" in the third. Helps that she's a T-Rex.
** Also Roshan's mother in the first film. She leaped over ''a waterfall'' to protect her son from the sabers.
* MisplacedWildlife
* MixAndMatchCritter: Hammerhead sloths. Yeah.
** Also, aardvarks with giant anteater-like snouts and tails.
* MoreTeethThanTheOsmondFamily: The piranhas in Ice Age 2; [[spoiler:the sirens]] in Ice Age 4. Sid's Granny too, once she gets ''shark-teeth dentures''.
* NeverTheSelvesShallMeet: Averted in ''No Time for Nuts'' when Scrat ends up meeting himself via use of the time machine. HilarityEnsues when both Scrats start craving the time traveling one's acorn.
* ObfuscatingStupidity: Sid occasionally, most notably in ''Ice Age: The Meltdown''.
* ObliviousAdoption: Ellie in the second movie; the baby dinos in the third (but justified by imprinting.)
* ObliviousToLove: Manny. Sid has to even point it out to him in ''The Meltdown'' that he clearly '''likes''' Ellie, since Manny just doesn't realize it.
** Then, in the 4th film, Sid ''and'' Manny do the same to Diego after his first run-in with Shira; though the two are clearly laughing it up as much as they can, while Diego stubbornly denies it...although he probably realizes his attraction, at the very least at a subconscious level, if [[spoiler: the "siren"'s taking the shape of Shira to lure him in is any indication. It works ''wonderfully well'', until Manny wakes up from his own illusion.]]
--> '''Manny''': Denial is the clincher! You're in love, ''pussycat!''
* PlummetPerspective
* PredatorsAreMean: Only one of the {{Big Bad}}s has ''not'' been a predatory animal.
** Ultimately though, its subverted. Just look at Diego, Mamma Rex, and the humans. They are all carnivores but are not malicious, at least not inherently.
* RecordNeedleScratch: Abruptly ending Scrat's [[spoiler: stay in his FluffyCloudHeaven]] at the end of the second movie. Again, in the begin sequence of ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs,'' ending the first encounter of Scrat and Scratte.
* RoadRunnerVsCoyote: Scrat and the Acorn.
* [[ButterflyOfDoom Sabre-tooth Squirrel of Doom]]: Scrat
* SeaMonster: Cretaceous and Maelstrom in the second film, a Mosasaurus and an Icthyosaurus. [[SomewhereAPaleontologistIsCrying with legs]].
** Actually, Cretaceous looks a lot like a Metriorhynchid, a kind of sea-going crocodile from the times of dinosaurs. If this wasn't the creature used as inspiration by the character designers, then it's an amazing case of convergent evolution...
** [[spoiler: [[ChekhovsGunman Precious]], Sid's Grandma's pet.]]
* SeldomSeenSpecies: A lot of the background Species are real animals that are fairly obscure to anyone but a paleontologist, and the fourth film feature Hyrax, a rarely seen creature alive today.
* SeriesMascot: Scrat.
* ShoutOut:
** In the first film, the alien ship seen in the cave is a reference to ''Franchise/StarTrek''. The baby even does the Vulcan salute as they pass by it.
** "[[Theatre/{{Oliver}} Food, Glorious Food]]"
** "[[SpaceJam I Believe I Can Fly]]"
** Scrat's "death" in the second film is reminicent of King Kong.
** Moby Dick=Rudy and Buck.
** Also, in the third movie, when they inhale the gas, Crash and Eddie try to sing like the Chipmunks ... or at least a Chipmunk song.
** "Yabba Dabba Doo!" "Don't Ever Yabadaba''[[TheFlintstones Doo]]'' that again!"
** When Buck mentions that he calls the dinosaur he fought Rudy, Manny wonders why he didn't call him something more terrible, like [[Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail Tim]].
** Buck's analysis of the "crime scene" always ending with "[[CSIMiami leaving... a vegetable!]]"
*** This scene is also quite similar to the scene in ''Film/ShaunOfTheDead'' when SimonPegg's (who voiced Buck) character is trying to make a plan upon realizing there's a zombie outbreak, with each proposition ending with "and wait for all of this to blow over". Could also double as ActorAllusion
** The leader of the hyrax army in the fourth film paints half his face blue, a clear reference to William Wallace in Braveheart. The army as a whole, with their ZergRush against the pirates and Sid's communication with them by dance, channels the Ewoks in ReturnOfTheJedi
* ShownTheirWork: While they may not be anatomically or historically accurate, the obscurity of the animals in the series is outstanding. Some of which don't even appear in documetaries that much.
** When Sid threw the Archaeopteryx off the cliff expecting it to fly off, it instead dropped like a stone. Real Archaeopteryx probably couldn't fly like they are usually depicted (though they could have glided).
* SomewhereAPaleontologistIsCrying: Too much to fit on the main page. See [[Headscratchers/IceAge Headscrathers]].
* TheSpeechless: Despite being ''very'' noisy, Scrat. Also, the humans of the original movie ''Ice Age'' Mama T. Rex in ''Dawn''.
* SuperPersistentPredator:
** [[spoiler: Rudy. Justified, as Buck took out one of his teeth.]]
** Cretaceous and Maelstrom.
* TertiarySexualCharacteristics: Scratte appears to be wearing blue eye shadow, but makeup won't exist for millions of years, so it's probably natural coloring. In other words, you could say it's all down to her [[IncrediblyLamePun biological makeup]].
** An extreme one with Diego and Shira, where Diego (and all sabers seen beforehand) are orange, while Shira is grey with black stripes.
* ThrowItIn: John Leguizamo made up Sid's lisp after seeing a model for what he looked like.
* TooDumbToLive:
** The Dodos.
** Often (and hilariously) subverted by both Scrat and Sid, often just barely.
** Buck, arguably. Even though he is insane, he does show some sort of intelligence. Sometimes.
* TrueCompanions: The term "Herd" is used to describe the characters, and contrary to popular belief (ie Sid's) the sloth is not the to first to call them that, Manny termed them thus in the original movie after his rescue of Diego.
* UnusualAnimalAlliance
* WasntThatFun: In the first movie, after the animals all go hurtling through an [[ItMakesSenseInContext Ice Helter Skelter]] and slam into a wall, Diego punches the air and asks who wants to go do it again.
** Also in the third movie, when the herd is leaving the underground world, Buck states that they should have that adventure full of mortal peril again.
* WhatCouldHaveBeen: Creator/DonBluth was offered to make Ice Age as a 2D animated film, but he refused to have any part of Ice Age.
* VileVillainSaccharineShow: Almost all of the villains can apply. Things are usually fairly nice seeming and happy until one of the baddies shows up. For example almost all the jokes stop during the duel with Soto in the first film. In the second film the opossum brothers' cavorting on ice is abruptly interrupted by Maelstrom exploding through it, cracking open the river's surface and instigating a tense and frightening chase scene that ends with Manny, Cretaceous and Maelstrom sharing [[DeathGlare Death Glares]] with dark and foreboding music playing, with not a single humorous moment in the scene. The final battle with Rudy in the third film has only a single quick funny moment with Sid tying the vines. Hell, Rudy is so scary he comes off more like an EldritchAbomination rather than just a dinosaur like all the others, with every scene he's in being ominous and scary. And in ''Continental Drift'', while his crew has their quirks and funny times, Gutt himself is a very cruel and vicious ape.
* VillainSong: The vultures from the second movie use Food Glorious Food, from Oliver the musical as theirs, and Captain Gutt from the fourth has his own sea shanty entitled [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1YA2nU5CatY "Master of the Seas"]].
* VitriolicBestBuds: Sid is this, to Manny and Diego.
* WorldOfFunnyAnimals: Averted in the first film, played straight in the sequels.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Ice Age]]
* AccidentalAthlete: Sid makes a touchdown during a game of football against dodos, ice-skates better than his other traveling companions, and is successfully able to create the first skiing and snowboarding events in history!
* {{Adult Fear}}s: The first film is more serious than the sequels, with human beings slaughtering mammoths, tigers slaughtering human beings, multiple characters with dead family members, parents trying and failing to protect their children, ''somebody's mom practically dying on screen''...
* AlternativeForeignThemeSong: The Japanese version has a surprisingly melancholy theme song for a family comedy. It's called [[http://jpopsuki.tv/video/ZONE---Hitoshizuku/1ec0f06261408539b087b5aa2164434d "Hitoshizuku"]] which translates to "A Single Drop of Tears". This could reflect the first movie's DarkerAndEdgier tone compared to the sequels.
* ArtShift: During the sequence where the "herd" happens upon the cave paintings, which fade into traditional animation to reveal Manfred's [[{{Tearjerker}} tragic loss]] and explain the reason why he is so moody - he is still grieving.
* TheAtoner: Diego becomes this as the film progresses.
* ComeForTheXStayForTheY: Roger ebert critic about the movie. "I came to scoff, and stayed to smile."
* ChekhovsGun: The ominous vibrating icicles in the final battle.
** Diego's game of Where's the Baby with Roshan during the first half. Watch closely to see how it shows up again later.
* ChirpingCrickets: "We're gonna miss the mi... the mi... gration..."
* ConvectionSchmonvection: You'd think the ice would melt a hell of a lot faster with all that ''lava'' underneath it.
* ACrackInTheIce: The herd is walking on an ice field when a lava flow opens up beneath them, leaving only a thin bridge getting thinner by the minute.
* [[spoiler: CrusadingWidower: Manny. It's revealed his wife and son were [[TearJerker killed]] prior to the film]].
* CynicismCatalyst: For Manny, it was [[spoiler:the death of his wife and child.]]
* DawnAttack:
-->'''Diego''': We'll teach that human what happens when he messes with sabers. \\
'''Soto''': Alert the troops. We attack at dawn.
* DisneyDeath: Diego.
* [[FallingChandelierOfDoom Falling Icicles Of Doom]]
* TheGlomp: Sid does this to Diego when the tiger returns from his DisneyDeath. Diego doesn't really appreciate being Glomped though.
* GoryDiscretionShot: [[spoiler: Soto being impaled by the falling icicles.]]
* HeelRealization: Diego after seeing Manny taking care of the baby even after remembering that he lost his family to them.
* HeroicSacrifice: Nadia, the baby's mother and [[spoiler: Manny and Diego, both subverted.]]
* HumansAreBastards: Played with: humans kill mammoths and have caused real heartbreak for Manny, but at this stage of human development they aren't really worse than other predatory species like saber-tooths.
* ImDyingPleaseTakeMyMacGuffin: Manny and Sid receive baby Roshan from his mother Nadia in this way, seconds before she succumbs to her injuries.
* MeaningfulEcho: Employed quite effectively between Manny and Diego in two life-and-death situations.
-->"That's what you do in a herd."
* MoodWhiplash: The second half of the original film whips you through hilarity, and then sorrow, and then funniness again, and then back to close-to-tears-ness with the showdown with the sabres and Diego's DisneyDeath.
* ParentalBonus:
-->'''Manny:''' "With a trunk that small, I wouldn't be drawing attention to yourself."
* ParodyOfEvolution: Seen in the ice caves.
* PickUpBabesWithBabes: Sid the Sloth tries to use this... and it actually DOES seem to be working, until Manny the Mammoth steps in. A cut-out scene shows Sid attempting to complete the 'score' after Manny's taken away their youthful charge, and predictably it ends badly.
* PunctuatedForEmphasis: "Because. Of all. ''The Ice''!"
** This statement from Diego at the end: "Leave. The. Mammoth. Alone." He directs it at [[BigBad Soto.]]
** Sid has his moment, too, during the same scene: "Survival! Of the! Fittest! I don't think so."
* RealSongThemeTune: Rusted Root's "Send Me On My Way", which was used rather prominently in the Original film during the TravelMontage.
* {{Retcon}}: The first film's ending sequence of [[spoiler:Scrat waking up 20,000 years later in the volcanic age]] was more or less ignored to create sequels. Following the ending would have also meant the lack of Manny, Sid and Diego in future installments.
** It's possible that Scrat hasn't gotten to the event that froze him yet.
* ThoseTwoBadGuys: Carl and Frank.
* TitleDrop: The Original employs this along with PunctuatedForEmphasis, below. "How do we know it's an Ice Age?"
* TongueOnTheFlagpole
* TravelMontage: in the first film, accompanied by [[CrowningMusicOfAwesome Rusted Root's ''Send Me on My Way'']] as the characters experience Old Faithful, brave a blizzard, and attempt to walk on ice.
* TroubledBackstoryFlashback: How Manny [[spoiler: lost his family to hunters.]]
* UnexplainedRecovery: Diego's DisneyDeath. It's explained in the DVDCommentary that it was originally planned for him to die, but the filmmakers ultimately went against it.
-->[[CatsHaveNineLives "Nine lives, baby!"]]
* VillainProtagonist: Diego, especially after joining Manny and Sid in their quest to return Roshan to his tribe.
* {{Xenofiction}}
[[/folder]]

[[folder:The Meltdown]]
* AppeaseTheVolcanoGod: The sloths try to sacrifice Sid for this purpose...even though they understand the science behind volcanic eruptions perfectly.
-->'''Sid:''' You're a very advanced race! Together, we can look for a solution.
-->'''Sloth:''' We have one - sacrifice the fire king.
-->'''Sid:''' Well, that's not very advanced!
-->'''Sloth:''' Worth a shot.
* TheArk: The giant bark raft from ''Meltdown''. Some of the animals getting on board (though not all) even do so in male-and-female pairs.
* BreakUpMakeUpScenario: Manny and Elie, twice.
* BusbyBerkeleyNumber: Vultures singing "Food Glorious Food" from ''Theatre/{{Oliver}}''.
* CirclingVultures: ''Ice Age 2'' had [[TalkingAnimal talking vultures]] circle the various creatures trying to escape the flood waiting for some to fail, leaving them with dinner.
* ChekhovsGun: Fast Tony, trying to make a last-minute sale before the animals start evacuating: "Try bark! It's so buoyant, it actually floats!" Three guesses as to what the ark's made of.
* EarWorm: InUniverse, the vultures sing a reworded version of "Food Glorious Food" regarding eating the main characters. Sid starts dancing along to it, then humming it, much to the other characters' irritation.
* FluffyCloudHeaven: Scrat's near-death experience with the giant golden acorn in ''The Meltdown''
* InnocentSwearing: People are treated to a double-dose in this movie; first, when Manny tries to tell Sid's daycare group a story:
-->'''Kid:''' "Burro" is a demeaning name; technically, it would be called a "wild ass".
-->'''Manny:''' Fine. The "wild ass" boy returned home to his "wild ass" mother.
-->''Kids start laughing''
-->'''Manny:''' See, ''that's'' why I called it a "burro"!\\
And later, when a prehistoric beaver notices the ice dam protecting them from flood waters is starting to break apart.
-->'''Father Beaver:''' Dam!
* LastOfHisKind: Manny thinks he's this in the second film.
** Proven wrong by meeting Ellie and not so much a herd, but a ''horde'' of them appearing at the end.
* MotivationalLie: In the second movie when Sid figures out that Diego can’t swim and tries to teach him, he says something to the effect of “Some animals can swim as babies”, which is technically true. But at the end when Diego has overcome his fear and saved Sid, Crash and Eddie, he responds to Sid’s surprise over his swimming with the same line, only for Sid to tell him “Except Tigers, I left that part out”.
* OppositesAttract: Manny and Ellie
* SnakeOilSalesman: Fast Tony...
* WhatDoYouMeanItsNotSymbolic: The ark in The Meltdown.
** Also Scrat falling off and "dying" after saving everyone.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Dawn of the Dinosaurs]]
* ActorAllusion: In ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs'', when the eggs hatch and the hatchlings start playing with Sid, the Was (Not Was) song "Walk the Dinosaur" comes on. The song appeared in John Leguizamo's first movie, ''Film/SuperMarioBros'' ([[OldShame even if he probably won't admit it]]).
* ArentYouForgettingSomeone: In the 3rd movie, after being rescued from death by laughing gas Manny gets up and gets ready to go, only for Diego to stop him with the trope name verbatim. Cut to next scene where Bucks being pulled back to safety while still laughing his head off.
* ArsonMurderAndJaywalking: Buck listing the rules for getting his help.
-->'''Buck:''' He who has gas, travels at the back of the pack!
-->'''Eddie:''' Aw... *Hangs head, walks to the back of the pack*
* AttackOfTheFiftyFootWhatever: Manny, if he's the same size as a real mammoth, is about 11 feet tall at the shoulder. Which makes Mama ''T. rex'' and Rudy around 40 to 50 feet ''tall'' (real life ''Tyrannosaurus'' was 13 feet tall at the hips, ''Baryonyx'' was 9 feet tall, and for comparison ''Spinosaurus'' was 15 feet tall). And that's not getting into the very-oversized ''Ankylosaurus'' and ''Pachycephalosaurus'', the ''Stegosaurus''-sized ''Kentrosaurus'', the flock of ''Pteranodon''-sized ''Pterodactylus'', and the Franchise/{{Godzilla}}-proportioned ''Brachiosaurus''. Pretty much the only animals decently sized are ''Triceratops'', ''Iguanodon'', ''Harpactognathus'', ''Guanlong'', and ''Troodon''.
* ChasedOffIntoTheSunset: Played with, the movie ends with Buck realizing his nemesis Rudy (the great white Baronyx) is still alive, [[SealedEvilInADuel and goes back to continue fighting him.]]
* ChestMonster: ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs'' has a giant carnivorous plant that disguises itself as an innocuous fruit bush.
* CleanPrettyChildbirth: The baby mammoth Peaches is born, then shown dry and fluffy approximately 5 minutes after birth.
* CliffStack: At least once in the third movie.
* DidYouDie: In ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs'', when Buck is telling the story of his encounter with Rudy. "Sadly yes... but I lived!"
* DynamicEntry: the third movie. "Go Momzilla!"
* EatenAlive: Little Johnny the aardvark in the third film. Thankfully, the baby T-Rex spits him out.
* EvilAlbino: Rudy from ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs''.
* FluffyTheTerrible: Rudy, the fearsome white Baryonyx in ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs''. {{Lampshaded}} by Manny:
-->'''Manny:''' Oh, I was thinking it'd be something terrifying, like... ''Sheldon'', or [[Film/MontyPythonAndTheHolyGrail Tim]].
* GoOutWithASmile: CrossesTheLineTwice here. The way to the subterranean world goes through a crevasse full of toxic fumes, which is revealed to have very similar properties to [[{{Batman}} Joker's laughing gas]].
* GoodLipsEvilJaws: The good Mommy dinosaur vs the Albino DinoMonster.
* HartmanHips: Scratte.
* HeartInTheWrongPlace: When the acorn is abandoned by Scrat and Scratte, it drifts out to sea and washes up inside an intact ribcage on the beach, right where people who believe this trope ''expect'' a heart to be.
* IDontLikeTheSoundOfThatPlace: The path to Sid.
* InstantBirthJustAddWater: Ellie gives birth in the middle of a Guanlong fight, screaming and wincing, and Peaches comes out already clean, happy and sleepy. One of the most exaggerated Hollywood births ever.
** Played straight, and averted with Manny at the beginning of the third movie. He appears onscreen by screaming "IT'S HAPPENING!!" and carrying a hollowed out, upside-down turtle shell full of water.
* LastMinuteBabyNaming: In the third movie, Manny and Ellie have apparently not decided on what to name their child. After the baby mammoth's birth, Manny suggests they name her Ellie, but Ellie decides on the name "Peaches", which had been their code word for Ellie to tell Manny she was going into labor.
* [[ManEatingPlant Mammal-Eating Plant]]
* MidairRepair: Buck performs mouth-to-mouth on a pterosaur knocked unconscious by a mid-air collision..
* MirrorCrackingUgly: Sid falls through into a cave in the third film because of this.
* MobySchtick: The third film plays this out with Buck and Rudy.
* PteroSoarer: Roger the ''Harpactognathus'' (possibly) from the third movie. Also the flock of (oversized) ''Pterodactylus'' that attack Buck and the possums.
* RaptorAttack: Ellie, while giving birth, is attacked by a pack of velociraptors.
** WordOfGod states they're actually Guanlongs (a cousin of the T-Rex.)
* RescueRomance: Scrat and Scratte's relationship really kicks off after he rescues her from death by lava when they are hanging by a thin root on a cliff.
* RedWireBlueWire - Hilariously spoofed in the carnivorous-plant action-sequence in ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs.''
* SandInMyEyes: Invoked and subverted by Diego after [[spoiler: Peaches is born]], as well as Crash and Eddie.
* SherlockScan: In the third movie, Buck tries to make it seem like he has this, but it is really but another product of his madness. At one notable occasion, Buck uses his supposed awesome deduction skills to deduce from a broccoli on the ground that Sid had gone AxCrazy and beat down Rudy with the broccoli and turned the giant dinosaur into a vegetable. After being told this was implausible because Sid was not violent, he remakes his theory to that Sid was eating the broccoli when he was eaten by Rudy, thereby turning the broccoli into a vegetable.
* StockDinosaurs: The third film has Tyrannosaurus, Brachiosaurus, Triceratops, Ankylosaurus, Iguanodon, and Archaeopteryx,.
* TakeThat: Possibly one against ''Film/JurassicParkIII'' in ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs''. In the third JP, a Tyrannosaurus is killed after a brief fight with the Spinosaurus. Well, at the end of the third Ice Age, Mama (a Tyrannosaurus) turns up just at the last moment and attacks Rudy (an overgrown Baryonyx, related to Spinosaurus), effortlessly charging him, slamming him through the jungle and knocking him off a cliff. He doesn't actually die, but it was an incredible asskicking for the supposed BigBad of all dinosaurs in the series.
* TakingTheKids: The storyline with Sid, Mama Dino and the baby dinos is a parody of this trope, with Sid and Mama Dino playing the divorced parents fighting for custody.
* TheVamp - Scratte. Might also count as a squirrel version of LadyInRed.
* TheVoiceless: All of the dinosaurs.
* ThirdIs3D
* TyrannosaurusRex: Momma from the third movie.
* VerbalTic: Listening closely to Buck in ''Dawn of the Dinosaurs'' reveals that the weasel is somehow prone to neglecting the usage of the letter aitch/H in his speech... ...which is probably due to Simon Pegg (his voice actor) being English. As a fellow Englishman this troper can attest that it is quite common in our speech pattern.
[[/folder]]

[[folder:Continental Drift]]
* ABoyAndHisX: Or, to be more accurate, an elderly sloth and her [[spoiler: giant sperm whale]].
* {{Adorkable}}: Louis the molehog.
* AdvancingWallOfDoom: The stone wall in the fourth film.
* [[AmazinglyEmbarrassingParent Amazingly Embarrassing Friend]]: Trailers for the Fourth movie show a moment of this between Sid and Diego. Three guesses who the embarrassing one is, and the first two don’t count.
** It looks like Manny might be shaping up to be this in some respects to Peaches
* [[spoiler:{{Atlantis}}: In ''Continental Drift'', Scrat arrives at Scratlantis... and then causes it to sink.]]
* BambooTechnology: The fourth movie gives us sailing ships made of ice, complete with wooden cannons.
* CastingGag: The JerkJock mammoth is voiced by rapper [[NamesTheSame Drake]]. Not the DrakeAndJosh reunion some were hoping for...[[hottip:*:Josh Peck is already on the cast as one of the possums.]]
* ChekhovsGunman:[[spoiler: Granny's pet, Precious (a Giant Whale) turns out to be real and the cavalry in the fourth film.]]
* CoolOldLady: Sid’s Granny in the fourth film is this.
* DisneyVillainDeath: Rather disturbingly averted with Captain Gutt in ''Continental Drift''.
* DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: With their world destroyed by Continental Drift, our heroes must take the last working ship and find a New World. And they do. One with [[StatueOfLiberty a suspiciously-arranged]] [[BigApplesauce rock structure.]] It's worth noting that practically the whole cast is comprised of known immigrant races at one point or another (Jewish Italian, Irish, Hispanic, black...)
* EnthrallingSiren: In ''Continental Drift''.
** SirensAreMermaids: Prehistoric amphibians, actually, but close enough.
* GiantEnemyCrab: One appears in the fourth movie.
-->'''Sid:''' [[GettingCrapPastTheRadar Holy Crab!]]
* GlamourFailure: [[spoiler:The sirens]] in the fourth movie. Sometimes their real nature leaks through their disguises, which amusingly [[SchizoTech flicker off like a bad signal.]]
* HeyItsThatVoice: [[spoiler: Jean-Luc Picard is a talking squirrel from Atlantis!]]
* InternetBackDraft: Speculation over the details of ''Ice Age 4: Continental Drift'' is already beginning to cause some of this at fan forums.
* IWillFindYou: Stated word for word by Manny in the forth film.
* JustDesserts: In ''Continental Drift'', [[spoiler:Captain Gutt is eaten by the sirens.]]
* KissingInATree: When Manny and Sid discover Diego has fallen for Shira, they taunt the denying sabre with this old classic.
* KillerRabbit: Squint the rabbit pirate. He's insane, vicious, bloodthirsty...and adorable! Don't tell him that though, [[BerserkButton or you're bunny chow.]]
* ManiacMonkeys: Captain Gutt, the main villain in the fourth movie is a prehistoric ape pirate captain.
* ParentheticalSwearing: Used in the fourth film.
* PirateGirl: Shira, a female [[NinjaPirateZombieRobot white sabretooth tiger pirate]]. Also Raz, the short-faced kangaroo.
* RidiculouslyCuteCritter: The hyraxes.
* SelfDeprecation: In ''Continental Drift'', Sid tells Granny that she'll love hanging out with him and the herd, because they've survived the ice age and "fought dinosaurs, [[SomewhereAPaleontologistIsCrying which didn't really make any sense]], [[RuleOfFun but it was fun!]]"
* SolarPoweredMagnifyingGlass: In the fourth film, Sid's little brother Marshall uses a piece of clear ice in this manner to burn an ant hill. We then pull back to see Sid's Granny doing the same thing to Marshall's head.
* ShoutOut: The hyraxes are obviously references to the Ewoks in StarWars VI, and to the celts in Braveheart.
* SwordDrag: Gutt scrapes his claws against the ground at one point.
* OutOfCharacterAlert: In the fourth film, [[spoiler: how Manny realizes he's seeing fakes of his family.]]
* TailfinWalking: Averted with Flynn the elephant seal, who flops and hops while remaining upright (he even has a [[{{Squick}} posterior]]), but played straight with [[spoiler:Scrat when he's trawled through a mess of sea-junk and winds up half-gobbled by a fish, and has to walk around with ''its'' tail for a bit.]]
* TimeSkip: There is a fairly sizeable one between the third and fourth films (Enough for Peaches to go from baby to the mammoth equivalent of a teenager).
* TookaLevelinBadass: Louis. Throughout the whole movie he is timid and shy. But at the climax he challenges Captain Gutt to a one-on-one battle, (Captain Gut who can keep two Mammoths captive with ease, and aside from claws has multiple deadly weapons) not mention Gutt was pretty much an equal fighter towards Manny, "A full grown Mammoth" so where Louis was heading, whether he knew or not how dangerous Gutt was. He had serious balls to do this.
* UnusualEuphemism: The fourth film gives us this line:
-->"Holy Crab!"
* WhatDidYouExpectWhenYouNamedIt: At the end of the fourth movie, [[spoiler:Scr{{atlantis}}.]]
[[/folder]]

----