WWE stars get animated as surfing penguins in Surf’s Up 2: WaveMania

Would an animated movie about surfing penguins interest you? No? Well, what if those surfing penguins were based on WWE stars and voiced by those pro wrestlers? Are you intrigued now?

Sony Pictures Animation and WWE Studios are teaming up to produce Surf’s Up 2: WaveMania, a sequel to 2007’s Surf’s Up, that will have character designs based on WWE personalities, with those wrestlers providing voices for the movie’s surfing penguins. If you’ve ever wondered what Triple H and The Undertaker might look like as penguins, this promotional art provides a glimpse.

Surf’s Up 2: WaveMania brings back Cody Maverick, teaming him with a group of hulked-out surfers who love to take on big waves known as The Hang 5. As you can see in the image above, the WWE personalities voicing the characters are Vince McMahon, Triple H, John Cena, The Undertaker and WWE Diva Paige.

Told in a mockumentary-style format, the original Surf’s Up followed Cody Maverick (voiced by Shia LeBeouf), a penguin who aspired to be a champion surfer. Successful animated films are almost guaranteed to get sequels, but U.S. audiences didn’t quite respond to this one. The $80 million movie drew a box office of $58 million domestically. But add a $90 million international box office (along with a 78 percent positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes), and Surf’s Up was a hit that generated a sequel, albeit nearly 10 years later.

WWE Studios likely agreed to co-finance and produce the film with Sony Pictures, with the condition that WWE wrestlers were involved as voices and characters. (As you’d expect, almost all of the WWE Studios projects have involved a WWE star in some capacity.) Hey, that’s not a bad delivery vehicle to younger audiences. Many more people may end up seeing this sequel because of the WWE’s involvement.

Here’s the trailer for the first Surf’s Up movie, if you need a refresher or what to know what any of this is about.

[The Hollywood Reporter]