It's summertime, and the livin' is easy; cicadas are chirping and skirts are riding high. And we all know what that means for the cinema: a wave of sequels and franchise movies to last us until there's a chill in the air once again. The "Transformers" sequel is already out there, proving that the fanboy appetite for vengeance-seeking toys and Megan Fox in short shorts is near insatiable.

Nothing could be further than the inhuman digital bombast of a Michael Bay film, though, than the gentle humor and lovingly handcrafted claymation of Nick Park's "Wallace & Gromit" series. Despite having begun two decades ago with "A Grand Day Out" (1989), this must still be the most low-key franchise on the planet.

Park's first Wallace & Gromit film was his film-school project; from there, a couple of other highly popular short films (1993's "The Wrong Trousers," and 1995's "A Close Shave") for Aardman Animation convinced Dreamworks to snatch up Park as a hot property, which led to 2000's feature-length "Chicken Run." This left the future of W&G in doubt, but the daft duo were back in 2005 with their longest film yet, "The Curse of the Were-Rabbit".