Say cheese! Wallace and Gromit return in ‘Vengeance Most Fowl.’

Wallace and Gromit are accustomed to danger. The madcap inventor and his loyal dog have faced foes such as a deranged robot, a serial killer who targets bread bakers, and an archnemesis who is that most fearsome of creatures, a penguin.

But in late 2023, the claymation duo appeared to face an even worse peril. Their clay manufacturer was going out of business. Without it, Aardman Animations wouldn’t be able to continue creating its beloved animated characters.

Aardman, which has also made features such as “Chicken Run” and “Shaun the Sheep Movie,” hastily issued a statement. It reassured fans that they had ample storage of clay. Thank goodness. The company was in the middle of filming “Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl.” The feature film, which opens in very limited theatrical release on Dec. 18 and debuts on Netflix on Jan. 3, 2025, will delight fans old and new.

If you’ve never seen any of the previous “Wallace & Gromit” films – and you really should, they’ve won three Oscars – here’s what you need to know beforehand. The eccentric inventor and his canine companion live in the northern British county of Yorkshire. Their greatest love in life is cheese – especially rolls of Wensleydale. But their suburban life is far from mundane. Wallace is perpetually hatching daft schemes. In the duo’s first adventure, “A Grand Day Out” (1989), he built a rocket to go to the moon. Why? It’s made of cheese.

A long-running joke is that Gromit, who doesn’t speak or bark, is smarter than his owner. Well, he is a beagle. And unlike that other famous animated beagle, who only dreams of donning goggles and flying a Sopwith Camel, Gromit can actually pilot a plane and drive a car. He also makes cups of tea. If Gromit were to compete in the Crufts Dog Show, it would be akin to Tiger Woods entering a mini-golf tournament.

“Vengeance Most Fowl” picks up where an earlier adventure left off. In “The Wrong Trousers” (1993), Wallace and Gromit foiled a penguin who masterminded a jewelry heist. The new movie begins with the thief, Feathers McGraw, being sentenced to life imprisonment inside a maximum security facility. Namely, a zoo. Meanwhile, Wallace and Gromit are blissfully unaware that the penguin is hatching a plot to escape, enact revenge, and once again steal a priceless diamond.

Their day starts, as always, with an alarm clock that activates a Rube Goldberg-like machine. It lifts Wallace out of bed, plops him onto a conveyor belt that gets him in and out of a bathtub, puts clothes on him, and whisks him downstairs to the breakfast table. Cue Gromit’s signature eye roll. Later that morning, Wallace unveils his latest invention, a robot garden gnome. Norbot can accomplish any task. That makes him an ideal tool for Feathers McGraw to commandeer for his villainous scheme.

“Vengeance Most Fowl” encapsulates everything that makes “Wallace & Gromit” movies such a joy for children and adults. Its humor is unabashedly silly, yet slyly clever. The new movie reprises one of the best sight gags in “The Wrong Trousers.” Feathers McGraw is a master of disguise. To pass as a chicken, the penguin pulls a rubber dishwashing glove onto his head. It’s as effective as Clark Kent’s glasses. His beady-eyed blink, remorseless as ever, is also deeply hilarious.

This time out, creator Nick Park is joined by a co-director, Merlin Crossingham. They frame their shots with unusual camera angles. Aardman continues to test the boundaries of what it can accomplish with painstakingly hand-crafted claymation. In this latest adventure, the animators venture underwater. Also impressive: the characters’ facial emotions. There’s comic mileage in Gromit’s expressive eyes – ranging from exasperated to determined – as the heroic dog endeavors to save the day. A staple of “Wallace & Gromit” movies is an elaborately staged chase scene. The model railroad scene from “The Wrong Trousers” evokes the ingenious heights of Harold Lloyd’s silent films. Mr. Park and Mr. Crossingham raise the bar yet again with a “Mission: Impossible”-style climatic sequence in which Gromit pulls off stunts worthy of Tom Cruise.

Given the creativity on display, it feels churlish to complain about disappointing aspects of “Vengeance Most Fowl.” But it must be said that some storyline elements feel too much like a retread of “The Wrong Trousers.” Like that adventure, this one may have worked better as a short film than as a full-length feature. And perhaps it’s time to take the characters to a fresh location, one that’s as unexpected as their original voyage to the moon.

Will there be more “Wallace & Gromit” movies? Although Aardman’s clay supplier has gone out of business, the animation company has engineered a solution. “Much like Wallace in his workshop,” its press statement said, “we have been tinkering away behind the scenes for quite some time with plans in place to ensure a smooth transition to new stocks.”

To paraphrase Wallace, “Job well done, lads.”

“Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl” is rated PG for some action and rude humor.