When we heard the news that Aardman Animation had lost its deal with DreamWorks, we couldn’t help but think of Nick Pa𒁃rk at the Oscars, comedy bow tie, che﷽eky schoolboy grin – and we felt a heavy weight of sadness.

♋The nail in the coffin for Aardman has been the poor box office performance of Flushed Away, which set the studio back around $145 million but has only managed to make around $39 million back.

The two firms have previously collaborated on Chicken Run and Walla﷽ce And Gromit bu⭕t DreamWorks activated the option in the contract that ceases the partnership.

Park and his crew are currently working on comic caveman tale, Crood Awakening, co-scribbled by Python legend John Cleese. Aardman will now be sniffi⛦ng out a new distributor for the project.