First Look at ‘The Croods’ Characters & Story

When it comes to DreamWorks Animation’s upcoming neaderthalic flick The Croods, we’ve only been given one measly teaser poster. But finally DreamWorks has come through and given us an official first look at the film and its characters.

According to the EW exclusive, The Croods (directed by Chris Sanders) details a clan of prehistoric homosapians who become nomads after a continental drift (no, not that type of Continental Drift) crashes into their cave. As the family is wandering across the new landscapes, the parents—Grug and Ugga—become horrified when their daughter—Eep—falls in love with a newly met fire-starter human, Guy.

The story focuses on how families stick together during hard times. The “daughter falling in love with someone forbidden” is a plot element that we’ve seen before, most recently in the upcoming Hotel Transylvania. It’ll be interesting to see what spin DreamWorks puts on the film.

Also, detailed description of The Croods family and main characters was given:

• Grug (Nicolas Cage): The overprotective dad of the clan, based on “hopelessly outdated cinematic dads such as Steve Martin in Father of the Bride or Spencer Tracy in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner.”
• Eep (Emma Stone): The adventurous, cave-hating daughter who is excited to try new things and explore new places.
• Ugga (Catherine Keener): The open-minded mom whose tries to balance keeping her family safe while giving them the freedom they desire.
• Sandy the baby: Refered to as the “half Tasmanian devil and half child” by Sanders. She’s a biter and ferocious.
• Gran (Cloris Leachman): The super old grandma of the bunch; and by old, we mean 45. She butts heads with her son-in-law.
• Thunk (Clark Duke): The 6’9”, 320 pound middle child, who is clumsy but caring. He wants nothing else than to be like his big sis and dad.
• Guy (Ryan Reynolds): A more advanced human being than the Croods, who uses his brain rather than his brawn. He gets kidnapped by the Croods when they realize that he can make fire.

Originally in Episode 3, we called The Croods’ character design “generic.” But after seeing these stills and reading more of the plot summary, this film could have a lot of potential. The film has everything you need in a good story: a struggling family, a forbidden love story and, of course, a prehistoric setting. Ok, maybe the last one’s a stretch, but it will still be fun to see a film about a Flinstones era family.

EW also released photos of the entire Crood family, along with some character posters of Guy. Check them out below!

The Croods hits theatres March 22, 2013.