Prehistoric Critters, Shadow Monsters, and Optimistic Space Travel: Movies to See the Weekend of July 21

Hollywood is casting a pretty wide net this weekend. Children are covered, as are the horror aficionados, plus the sci-fi spectacle fans get their big movie, too. 

Let’s check in on what the moving picture industry is serving up to us for this scorching July weekend.

Ice Age: Collision Course
Directors: Mike Thurmeier, Galen T. Chu
Writers: Michael J. Wilson, Michael Berg, Yoni Brenner, Aubrey Solomon
Starring: Ray Romano, Denis Leary, John Leguizamo, Stephanie Beatriz

If you are like me, you did not know there was yet another Ice Age movie on the way until the second you saw this article. The series has reached the point where jumping the shark grows more and more likely with each passing second. By the looks of it, the creative team behind the newest installment in the 14-year-old series, Collision Course, decided to wear the shark jumping like a badge of honor.

A meteor is on its way to Earth, and the furry characters, played by comedy veterans Ray Romano, Denis Leary, and John Leguizamo, must somehow save themselves or the world from destruction. If the teasers are any indication, there may be spaceships involved. Have fun, kids!

Lights Out
Director: David F. Sandberg
Writer: Eric Heisserer
Starring: Teresa Palmer, Gabriel Bateman, Alexander DiPersia, Billy Burke, Maria Bello

Everyone’s afraid of the dark to some extent. Lights Out makes that fear literal on the big screen, with a monster that only comes out in the dark. You can’t avoid shadows in life, so how can Teresa Palmer (Warm Bodies) expect to get away? She learns that her brother is being haunted by the same shadow monster she was when she was a kid. Being the good big sister she is, she throws herself back into harm’s way.

Director David F. Sandberg makes his feature directorial debut after a number of shorts made in the last decade. It remains to be seen whether he’ll be able to sustain scares for an entire feature film, but that premise is tantalizing and the 81-minute runtime make it sound about right.

Star Trek Beyond
Director: Justin Lin
Writers: Simon Pegg, Doug Jung
Starring: Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto, Karl Urban, Zoe Saldana, Idris Elba

Star Trek is not a pessimistic property. It is all about the possibility of humanity working together to solve problems. The last installment of the rebooted Star Trek movie series, Into Darkness, was all about post-9/11 paranoia and neoconservativism. That stuff appears to be gone with Beyond, thanks largely to a change in screenwriters -- Simon Pegg pulled double duty to co-write and star in the movie as Scotty -- and director. The Fast and the Furious series’ Justin Lin takes the directorial reigns from J.J. Abrams, who remains in the fold as a producer.

With a new creative team behind the terrific reboot cast, the crew of the Starship Enterprise finally head out on their exploratory journey into the deepest reaches of space. No more Earth this time around. They get attacked outside an uncharted planet and the family-like crew gets scattered around the planet. They must work in pairs to reach each other and overcome a villainous Idris Elba.