There have been many mysterious "ultimate suspense" in the fan circle.
For example, in the "Guide to The Galaxy".
The pursuit of a set of numbers has fascinated science fiction fans for more than 40 years.
The Ultimate Answer to the Universe:
42
Stephen Chow Universe.
The audience always wants to know when and how Li Jianren will look back at you with deep affection.
Wong Kar Wai Universe.
The Sunglasses King had previously personally announced the mystery, so all fans turned out the old movie to find clues about "an egg"
△ Zentung Film Company 30th Anniversary Commemorative Short Film, "0.01 Centimeter Distance"
These suspense seem to have nothing to do with the main line of the movie.
But it is like an indispensable "secret language" between fans and directors, sharing interesting, emotional, and secret complexes that are not humane.
Recently, there is another ultimate suspense that has been "deciphered".
Instantly burst into domestic and foreign social media.
In just 34 seconds, it ends a 43-year saga.
The protagonist is it
Well, a squirrel.
Ben is a very inconspicuous supporting role in the cartoon "Ice Age", who knows that he later "counterattacked" and became the most popular troublemaker in the entire series.
And the story derived from it has made anime fans chase after it year after year:
Squirrel ah squirrel, when will you be able to eat that acorn?
Now the story is finally over.
To be honest, people were happier than rats at that moment.
In the snow, the acorn lay peacefully in the middle, bouncing around, and the squirrel appeared.
Suddenly realized what was wrong:
So simple?
Nobody me?
……
If you hesitate, you will lose, and you will eat it in large bites, leaving a residue on the ground.
There was no ecstasy, not even expression, jumping out of the picture after eating.
Fade black.
Exiting, the audience collectively emo.
It turned out that Blue Sky Studios, which produced the Ice Age (Ice Age) series, had been shut down by its parent company, Disney, in April last year.
This short film, titled "The End," is its belated farewell.
The legendary animation studio that has been in business for 34 years has become a thing of the past.
Ice Age won't freeze completely, but the blue sky is sure to be gray forever.
Leaving a single "legacy"
Spin-off: The Adventures of Scott.
fortunately.
The whole film was originally not only 34 seconds above, but consisted of 6 short films of 24 minutes.
Sir was even happier.
On the occasion of farewell, Blue Sky is still playing the "heart machine game" with movie fans:
No way?
You don't really think this squirrel can eat an acorns, do you?
01
Father's kindness and filial piety
I have to say that these 24 minutes have laughed and there were tears, sir was even once killed. scare. arrive.
The opening is not unexpected.
Ice and snow, cliff edge.
The squirrel is still the squirrel, the brain is still the brain, it smashed the acorn on the ground, the landslide cracked, and the acorn flew away.
It flew to save the fruit, the result
This is the "acorn", it is actually a small pine!
△ Who is not confused about this?
At first glance, the short film is a "family film".
The small, red fluttering flesh beeps, two eyes fluttering; the old, soft-eyed, willing to be "cheap daddy".
One big and one small, fighting in heaven and earth, loving and killing each other.
△ Always can't learn, be smarter
Looking at two more episodes, Sir found that this was still a "road movie".
The two rats chased the acorn through 9981 difficulties, during which they sometimes beat each other, sometimes "framed", and sometimes jointly resisted foreign enemies...
Gradually, feelings warmed up and reconciled with each other.
In the end, and the most important ending, it turned out to be a "suspense film".
The two rats chased after each other, only to see the acorn fall off the cliff
"Boom".
Under the cliff is boiling lava, and the acorns are "dead and dead".
Seeing the situation, the two rats looked at each other without words.
Still chasing?
No, we have each other.
Then live a peaceful life, year after year, turning the love of father and son into a sea of stars...
...... Fart!
The squirrel will die, the soul will go out of the way, and the secret of the little squirrel will be seen.
It's all conspiracy!
It turns out that the acorn dropping magma is an illusion carefully arranged by mice, in order to "boil themselves to death" and then enjoy the acorn exclusively.
The ascension was suspended, the anger was stupid, squeezed into its own body, directly resurrected...
Finally the short film switched to a thriller "zombie movie".
Saw
The rat laboriously reloaded its "soul" into the flesh, and then, like a walking corpse, walked toward the mouse and was about to regain the acorn.
Then you guessed it.
This time, can it catch up?
02
Acorn, you are my God
The short film did not slide into the warm mediocrity as expected, but instead had a variety of tricks.
That's right.
Looking back on its birth, it can be said that it is the most vivid "soul" of "Ice Age".
It has little to do with the main line, but it is closely related to the whole world.
The second part inadvertently smashes the iceberg with an acorn, drains the flood, and saves the animals; the third part encounters a female squirrel, and after love and hatred, the acorn is temporarily defeated to love.
The fourth part is a famous birth scene.
Smash the acorn, smash into the center of the earth, toss on the core of the earth, direct plate drift.
Seven continents and four oceans, it turned out that you were dry and cracked.
This is still foraging.
This is simply the heroic dream of ordinary life.
Scott was as strong as ever, but the glacier melted inexorably.
In 2002, "Ice Age" turned out to be a small work, followed by slow work, one in three or four years, and by the fifth "interstellar collision", the audience has long been no longer the same person.
Completely imaginable, this picture will appear:
Years later, facing Ice Age 5, Bob recalls the afternoon his father took him to watch the series for the first time.
And Xiaoming's son, at this moment, is very happy to see, meteorite spaceship, flowers and greenery.
But Xiaoming said that this is still Ice Age.
This is the embarrassment that Blue Sky Studios faces.
Creativity is no longer gushing out, but expression is stuck in the past.
The intention is to innovate, but it rubs shoulders with the taste of the new era, taking care of one or the other.
The squirrel part, for many years the inspiration has not been pulled.
For example, the power of burying Easter eggs is not inferior to Marvel.
The big shell at sea staged the temptation of his ex-wife; the alien spaceship that Skto had inadvertently broken into had actually appeared earlier.
In the latest derivative drama, the first is to grab the watermelon, and the dodo that is suspected of being destroyed is back; the paragraph of the balance beam, playing three times and four shakes, can also rub the personality of the character inside.
This is the accumulation of established studios.
But feature-length animated films can't just have a flash of inspiration.
The balance between children and adult audiences, old and new audiences, is difficult to grasp.
The last score fell because of the obsolescence brought about by conservatism.
The storyline is an increasingly unsettling game and save the earth, and the core is a constantly renovated "Meet your father-in-law".
Compared to the blockbusters in recent years.
"Dream Quest" talks about "death and forgetting" like a grand festival of flowers;
"Zootopia" tells "equality and prejudice" as an animal farm-like metaphor, and the moisturizer is silent;
Even if "Crazy Primitive Man" only talks about family, it will understand more than love, and the old concept that love is higher than understanding is fresh and unworldly.
The concept of "Ice Age" is somewhat stagnant.
We love Scott for all reasons, it doesn't have the full growth line of the protagonists, there is no reunion ending.
But also because of this, it is not dragged down, can be free enough, simple enough.
You can go up and down the Yellow Spring, and travel through time and space without limits.
You can shout without fear of embarrassment: Acorn, you are my god.
This desperate momentum inspired us when we were young and still soothes us when we grow up.
03
The passing of childhood
Blue Sky Studios was founded in 1987 and was originally born for animation.
However, there was not enough money in the early scale, so he immersed himself in the development of the most advanced CG rendering software in the animation industry at that time.
After doing special effects shots for masterpieces such as "Alien 4" and "Fight Club", the first short film "Bonnie the Rabbit" came out.
The 7-minute story, which took 6 years, won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film in one fell swoop.
The small studio attracted Fox's attention and signed a contract to make a 3D animation, which brought that distant ice age to the children.
Let the mammoth Manny, the saber-toothed tiger Diego and the sloth Sid, this strange combination of tall, large, fat, and completely incompatible, come together.
How brilliant was this series at the time?
In 2006, the second part was released, with a production cost of 80 million yuan, which directly doubled the publicity cost, and also put forward the majestic slogan of "Every cinema must have "Ice Age"".
Together, the five films grossed $3.2 billion+ worldwide.
In addition, works such as "Forest Warrior", "Horton and Anonymous", and "Rio Adventure" also enrich the studio's territory.
Most of the stories take place in nature, and under the contradiction of destruction and rebirth, the "blue sky style" heroism becomes the symbol.
The flightless blue macaw;
Small squirrels that cannot eat acorns;
The "forest warrior" who struggles to protect the forest...
These topics, in themselves, are not obsolete.
But the tone of the story will.
Family affection, love and friendship, including the context of heroism, can only resonate if they match the magnetic field of the current audience.
Otherwise, it will become self-talk and forcibly moved.
In recent years, it is not uncommon to say goodbye to classic animation IP.
We chanted: Alas, the classic era is over, and now children are watching something.
At the same time, I shook my head at the sequels one after another, and there was no taste.
No need to be too sorry.
Think back to the works that moved us
Where does the emotion come from?
The answer is actually hidden in the opening chapter by the creators of Blue Sky Studios.
That 34-second "farewell video."
The little squirrel saw the dream acorn in front of him, and his first reaction was not to nibble with his mouth.
Instead, lift it up.
Look around.
Seems to be waiting for something to happen and let it continue its journey in pursuit of the acorn.
yes.
We don't love it because it's stupid, cute, or cute.
Instead, it provides an illusion:
It never stops.
We don't understand it until we grow up.
How precious is this "illusion".
The picture in this article comes from the network
(Full version, station B has)
Editorial Assistant: Frozen boiled water