It all seemed to be going well for The Croods and its prehistoric family. The film debuted in 2013 to healthy box office and it looked as though DreamWorks Animation had another franchise on its hands. There's a very different cave picture being painted now, as new DWA owner Universal has pulled the plug on the sequel.
Despite a $587 million worldwide haul and a TV spin-off carried by Netflix, progress had been slow on a follow-up that would have reunited much of the cast including Emma Stone and Nic Cage. Writer/directors Kirk De Micco and Chris Saunders had gathered a small team to start working on the movie and the likes of Kat Dennings and Leslie Mann were announced as joining the voice cast.
Yet rumours of trouble surfaced when the movie's release was pushed back to 2018 and now Variety's report mentions that DreamWorks was considering shutting down the movie even before the new parent company arrived. It adds a source saying that The Croods will stay in the company's catalogue, so it may yet head back to that well, but nothing is happening on the big screen for now.
DWA's Trolls is in cinemas now, and The Boss Baby will be out next year.