Board 8 > Board 8 Ranks Animated Movies 3 - The Rankings

(+) Yeah! (+)

rockus posted...

If I submitted a ranking would I still be met with the same kind of hostility? Or am I just not allowed to participate?

I didn't really want to get involved in this drama, but I feel there is something I need to clarify here. This is Board 8 ranks movies, not gamefaqs ranks movies. It is a project for members of this social community. You and your movie board buddies are not members of this community, nor have you shown any interest in becoming such other than popping in every few months to mock people for having 'wrong' movie opinions.
So to answer your question, if you submitted a list I would have just ignored it. Yeah I would feel bad for someone having to watch Jimmy Neutron or Despicable Me 3 without any payoff, but you should learn to read the room. Or at least read the topic title.

To paraphrase the wisdom of a certain bald guy with a cape, 'I'm just a guy who wants to rank movies for fun.' The way you guys casually dismiss the feelings and intelligence of people who put time into these projects makes things anything but fun.

I don't like to be told that because I don't like certain art films I am 'supposed' to like I am just some stupid troglodyte who doesn't understand 'real' cinema. I consider myself to be an animation buff, and I have seen well over 600 animated movies in my lifetime from all over the world, and I like to see the art form explored in new ways even if they don't always work. That doesn't mean I am like 'ew mainstream movies are for babies', I absolutely adore Zootopia, for example.

But back to the topic at hand, the hostility you complain of has less to do with you being an outsider and more how you all jumped into the middle a group of longtime friends and went full on fedora mode with all this smug superiority towards the 'unwashed masses'. Maybe that may make you feel better about yourselves but it is not a very good way to make friends.

Next ranking will be up a bit later today.

Holy shit you guys murdered Polar Express. That wouldve probably been my #1 if I was able to finish (I got around halfway). Its my sons favorite movie and we even went to an interactive Polar Express thing at a railroad museum last month. Its pretty magical seeing how excited he gets about it.

Admittedly though, before I had kids Id have ranked it outside the top ten more than likely. Its still a good movie on its own, but child at Christmas magic elevates it a lot.

Yeah, Polar Express being as low as it was...is strange to me. I can understand the shitty Illumination sequels, but Polar Express being bottom 5 (and someone's 40, at that) is bizarre.

Yeah I don't get it either, but I have admittedly known people to very specifically hate Polar Express for reasons I don't pretend to understand

Evil Lord is one of us now

say your goodbyes

24. Croods: A New Age

Ermine: 11
Red: 20
Karo: 24
Inviso: 25
Johnbobb: 31
Evillord: 31

Total: 142

Ermine: Well that was a surprise! I actually quite enjoyed that movie. There's a bunch of humor that doesn't hit, but there's a ton that actually does. Definitely better than the first movie. Chunky the sabertooth cat thing is great and I love him, despite his overly large head.

The grandma and the baby are completely awful. Thankfully the latter isn't in the movie much, but god the grandma ruined any moment. Everything with her was actually cringe... and I hate using that word.

But yeah, I'm really surprised at how much the humor actually hit. Good stuff.

Red: This movie was actually fairly interesting where you had the clash of two different families from different levels of advancement going on. Then it threw that out the window and everyone had to be friends to face a greater threat because Dreamworks likely thought that was more marketable or something. It is significantly less interesting than the plot they spent half the movie building up just to throw away for pointless adventure that will resolve all conflicts for no reason.

Karo: So the Croods stumble across a family of smug, highly civilized cavemen named the Bettermans (ha ha) who live in this protected enclave and actually understand the concept of bathing. Of course Grug throws a fit again because things being different scares him and there are a lot of 'neanderthals are dumb' gags as the Crood family tries to adapt to life in their new home.
It is sort of the same kind of conflict that Guy created in the first movie, giving a feeling of 'been there done that' to the story, and despite the greatly improved animation it seems like we lost something important at the heart of these characters.
It is your average modern CGI movie. Nothing too great, nothing too bad, funny at times, and not really very original. It is a somewhat decent followup to a movie that didn't really need a followup, but it isn't quite the new age it wants to be.

Inviso: I liked the first Croods movie a lot, largely because I think Nicolas Cages father character had a great growth arc. That being said, despite this movie being very fun, it felt like it took several steps backwards. Grugs whole story in the first film was about him learning to expand his horizons and accept change. This movie starts out with him still being very stubborn, averse to change, and terrified of losing his daughter. Again. Its like nothing in the first movie mattered, except for the Eep/Guy romance. And that romance was the half of the first movie that did nothing for me. So yeah, undoing Grugs character development, and giving him a weasel-y antagonist of a neighbor in Phil Betterman wasrough. I still found a lot of the jokes relating to modern day comforts to be pretty funny though. Whether it was the window gag, or treating the giant sabercat like a classic car, or having a literal man cave, that humor worked for me. And honestly, its weird that in THIS movie, the romance plot was the stronger half, because it makes sense for there to be some clash between the caveperson lifestyle and the modern lifestyle, as demonstrated by Eep and Guys tenuous relationship. So ultimately, this was fine overall, but a demonstrable step down from the original.

Johnbobb: I liked the first Croods a decent bit. Less so for the story and characters, which were kinda flat and unimaginative (oh man, the dad doesn't want the daughter to date a boy, woah. Where it succeeded was the gorgeous environments and visuals (in everything aside from the goofy characters) and exciting action scenes. This one was... more of the same? Like it introduced a new location, but in doing so, made it so that there was less overall creativity in the surroundings. This puts less focus on the world and more on the characters, which... literally haven't changed at all since the last movie. The "technology" they have is simultaneously less creative and more unbelievable, instead having things like unexplained indoor plumbing? The parents are even more focused on the kids' relationships. The story follows even more generic modern day beats than the first one. Altogether just "fine" and nothing more. Also, between this and the Despicable Me movies, what the hell is the deal with banana-based comedy in kid movies now? Bananas are not inherently funny enough to be a recurring joke in multiple movies.

Evillord: I've seen the first Croods movie but can't remember anything about it. This was alright though. I kind of like the "thesis, antithesis, synthesis" storyline that this (and Lego 2) have, and the Thunder Sisters part was fun.

Outlier Rankings:

Ermine: 206
Evillord: 190
Johnbobb: 140
Red: 128
Inviso: 126
Karo: 115

That movie made me realize I have a visceral dislike for Ryan Reynolds.

23. A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon

Ermine: 9
Evillord: 11
Inviso: 26
Karo: 30
Red: 30
Johnbobb: 35

Total: 141

Ermine: I'm a bit disappointed in this film when comparing it to the first. The main baby alien character was annoying all the way throughout and really just brought it down overall. The movie still has a ton of the good humor that the first had, but any sense of emotional connection to the characters that the first movie gave us was thrown out the window.

This movie also had a bunch of lyrical songs that all felt so out of place in the movie. They kind of took me out of it each time they played, especially the one where the alien is sad or whatever and I'm like... do we really need a song telling us that we should be sad? We can freaking see what's going on, there doesn't need to be lyrics telling us.

That aside, I still love Shaun as a character. He's fun, cute and sassy. I also quite enjoyed the robot character that was added in for this and I DID appreciate that the rest of the sheep weren't as prevalent as they were in the first film. Solo Shaun stuff is always the best stuff I think. Or at least, when he's not with the rest of the herd.

Overall a bit of a letdown but still a bunch of laughs. Pretty decent.

Evillord: If the first Shaun the Sheep Movie were in this, I'd probably rank it in the top 3. Farmageddon is still fun and charming, the stop-motion animation is still lovingly done, and I still admire the dedication to dialog-free storytelling, but it doesn't have highlights as great as the scene in the restaurant, the pound section, or the part where the dog was confused for a surgeon in the first film. I did like what they did with the antagonist.

Inviso: This was fine. I mean, Ive long been a fan of Nick Aardmans work (see my rankings of Chicken Run and Flushed Away on the original Dreamworks list), but even before that, it went back to Wallace & Gromit. They were short movies that didnt overstay their welcome, and played more into the absurdity of an eccentric inventor than anything else. Even there, the third film (which introduced Shaun) started to go a little overboard in its story decisions. I dont remember what I thought of the first Shaun the Sheep movie, but this one was just okay. Its the kind of film that doesnt really lend itself to feature length status. The alien looked a little tooI dont know, it just didnt look right to me. And having it be a spastic child alien for the duration of the film was a choice, for sure. It still had some laughs and it was a fun little romp about getting an alien back home to its parents, but its a simple story, and it didnt do a whole lot extra for me. At least it didnt make me hate it.

Karo: So when Shaun and friends order pizza, they end up with a side order of baby extraterrestrial that they need to help phone home in yet another incarnation of the tiresome 'lost alien' story.
So begins an incredibly forgettable adventure that is mostly just Shaun and Lu-La wandering arbitrarily about town accompanied by marginally funny visual gags and physical humor.
Of course stereotypical evil government people get involved and they do stereotypical evil government things and this leads to our heroes having to break out of the british version of area 51.
It just lacks a certain something the first movie had, and I couldn't bring myself to really care much about anything gong on. While there were a few very funny scenes, much of the movie is very boring and predictable. When you make something with no dialogue, you really need to step up in other areas to fill the void and this film absolutely doesn't.

Red: Farm animals reunite a lost alien child with its bad alien parents. This movie is just kind of weird, and at times, just kind of dull. Definitely had a hard time holding my attention. The movie honestly felt more interesting just with more cartoon antics between the sheep and the dog but when it tried to have this weird alien plot it really had more of a made for TV cartoon movie plot. And not a particularly interesting one. At least not one that could maintain interest for even a short full length movie.

Johnbobb: This is boring. Just really, really boring. Not because it doesn't have dialogue, but because it's just boring movie trope after boring movie trope for an hour and a half, with no break. A story about a mischievous sheep sneaking aboard a UFO while a dumbass farmer tries to scheme his way into a low-effort theme park SOUNDS like an original idea, but nothing in this film has any real substance. Throwing in a bunch of musical montages isn't helping!

Outlier Rankings:

Ermine: 220
Evillord: 202
Johnbobb: 152
Red: 135
Inviso: 129
Karo: 122

I'm creeping up on you, Karo.

Evil lord and I agree on the weirdest things

Shaun the Sheep was one of the more disappointing things on this list. I normally love Aardman stuff and Wallace and Gromit isn't just good but excellent. Farmageddon just felt like one of the worse episodes of the Shaun the Sheep cartoon which is like, five minute shorts, but extended to be way longer.

Sheep007 posted...

Shaun the Sheep was one of the more disappointing things on this list. I normally love Aardman stuff and Wallace and Gromit isn't just good but excellent. Farmageddon just felt like one of the worse episodes of the Shaun the Sheep cartoon which is like, five minute shorts, but extended to be way longer.

Yeah it really felt like a made for a TV slot cartoon that kept overstaying its welcome.

This occured to me way too late, but Secret Life of Pets 2 is three separate stories, with tenuous connections between them at best. I wonder if there was a cancelled TV series, and the completed episodes were combined to make a film? That happened with a couple of the direct-to-DVD Disney sequels.

GavsEvans123 posted...

This occured to me way too late, but Secret Life of Pets 2 is three separate stories, with tenuous connections between them at best. I wonder if there was a cancelled TV series, and the completed episodes were combined to make a film? That happened with a couple of the direct-to-DVD Disney sequels.

But that's the way the first movie was too!

22. Abominable

Inviso: 13
Johnbobb: 15
Red: 15
Ermine: 21
Evillord: 33
Karo: 37

Total: 134

Inviso: This felt like a Disney movie, specifically a standalone Disney movie that didnt utterly fail at trying to craft the story behind a sequel. Thats not even an insult; I think Disney is very good, (when theyre trying) at crafting an emotional narrative, and capitalizing on sentimentality. On paper, weve seen tons of kids befriend a strange creature, and then government and/or big business thugs try to capture said creature storylines, and a lot of them can be hackneyed. This didnt feel like that at all, but rather they gave us a main character whos directionless in the wake of her fathers death, and via a magical beast, shes able to go on the road trip hed always planned on taking her. She comes to grips with her fathers passing, while simultaneously helping to reunite the yeti family. Also, this is just a minor thing, but I loved how cartoonishly evil the bad guy was. Its just more interesting to watch a bad guy whos just bad, and not misunderstood.

Johnbobb: I like this trend of modern animated movies exploring characters of different races and ethnicities and their cultures while still making the movies entertaining and beautiful to look ata. This one does a lot of stuff right, and stands out as the best of the weirdly significant amount of animated Bigfoot/Yeti movies to come out in the last few years

Red: Somehow not the only movie on this list from 2019 about befriending a Yeti and trying to take it home. The magical yeti makes for some fun scenes but I really think where this movie sets itself apart it bit is the dynamic with the villains. Taking a character type we've probably seen a thousand times and then giving them just a little twist to be a villain works. Or at least compared to a lot of the villains on this list works. Probably say this like 10 times on this list but everything not a sequel is automatically refreshing.

Ermine: This movie was alright.

Had some really awful and weird dialog that made no sense and god I hated that little kid character.

But by far the most unbelievable thing in this film is a huge billboard that says VISIT EVEREST.

Really?

No one wants to visit Everest. You'll die. So put that shit away.

Run of the mill movie at the end of the day, nothing that offensive but nothing that really stuck out as amazing in any way.

Evillord: A few movies on this list are obvious garbage, but this one just feels kind of rote. The plot also stops working later on because the Yeti's magic can easily solve every problem the heroes encounter, though at least it makes for some nice visuals.

Karo: So there's this young girl in China who befriends a magical Yeti who heartless adults are trying to hunt down for experimentation in the typical ET storyline. Next they would normally be chased by the army but in China everything is perfect including the military so the bad guys are a private force of multinational corporate poachers lead by a pair of western capitalist pig dogs. Remember kids, foreigners are evil and the government is your friend! If you disagree you will be run over by a tank.
In order to take Totoro back to Mount Everest, Yi and her two annoying friends travel across the country in a boring, soulless endeavor seemingly more focused in showing off potential Chinese tourist destinations than having any real character development. Hey guys, come and see all these cool places in China you can visit, like those pretty mountains, this humongous Buddha statue, or the Uyghur harmony learning centers... ahh wait no don't look oh fuck
I just was not interested in anything going on, nor was I affected by the movie's many awkward attempts to do 'feels', and the whole thing feels half-assed and phoned in on nearly every level.
With a rote plot and substandard animation, Abominable cannot even measure up to the middling standards of modern Dreamworks, let alone the industry at large. Is it a sobering look into a future where Hollywood is stuck licking the butthole of the CCP in order to get to the mega china bux, and clearly the one thing the world fucking needs is more assaults on artistic freedom. Fuck you.

Outlier Rankings:

Ermine: 221
Evillord: 213
Johnbobb: 159
Red: 142
Inviso: 138
Karo: 137

Haha I think I wouldve won the outlier if I finished my list.

I only watched 31 of the 40, but what I had as number one is out already (Its Such A Beautiful Day) and my least favorite is still in. Fun following along so far though!

That ranking's a bit sad, namely because there's a different, specific movie I feel deserved to be eliminated before this one for sure.

Inviso posted...

That ranking's a bit sad, namely because there's a different, specific movie I feel deserved to be eliminated before this one for sure.

No

The Visit Everest poster was probably the one thing in the movie I found amusing. Otherwise a kinda sweet but mostly average animated movie. Not a sequel, though!

Wouldn't have expected that one to finish this high when the list started. I'm inclined to think its placement reflects how much this group didn't like these 40 movies in general. I also got a slightly sinister vibe from it considering what I know about China's government, but on the other hand I think its a shame how its basis in Chinese culture is ultimately superficial, and the story structure and overall aesthetic are cribbed from bog-standard American animated movies. Totally uninspiring movie on the whole imo.

The contests for both highest and lowest outlier score are extremely tight atm, it's been fun to watch that leaderboard.

Inviso posted...

That ranking's a bit sad, namely because there's a different, specific movie I feel deserved to be eliminated before this one for sure.

I expect we will see that one within the next few movies, for what it's worth, though I might be surprised.

Yeah we were all slamming th emovie for its pro-China stance and Visit Everest billboard.

It wasn't a good movie but it wasn't entirely unpleasant or completely boring like some other things.

21. I Lost My Body

Johnbobb: 11
Evillord: 13
Karo: 25
Ermine: 25
Red: 27
Inviso: 30

Total: 131

Johnbobb: Someone saw Thing in the Addams Family and thought "there's a story to be told here." They were right! It's a great story.

Evillord: Even though I'm not normally a sucker for romances, I thought all the scenes with Naoufel and Gabrielle in this movie were really cute and well-written. I also really liked the hand's storyline, but my concern with this one is that it's two mostly-separate halves (they do come together in the end) that don't fit too well together, even though I enjoyed watching them both individually. It's sad to see that this is the last French movie on the list, because I liked them all a lot.

Karo: This is actually two movies running concurrently, the story of a missing hand looking for the rest of its body, and the story of a pizza delivery guy with a crush on a girl.
This 'romance' starts with the dude hearing a girl's voice on an intercom while failing as a delivery boy, and falling in love with her for some reason. This dumb kid then looks up this girl's personal info, stalks her all day, and then browbeats her uncle into hiring him just so he can get close to her and then is like 'why u no leik me :('
Jesus Christ, this is the kind of story I expect to see on incel forums, not in an oscar-nomimated animated movie.
The journeys of the disembodied hand are the strongest part of the movie, not only does it have incredible artistry in its cinematography and music, but oddly enough little Grabby McHandjob is the most compelling character in the narrative.
It would have been much better as an experimental short film about the hand, with the dumbass delivery boy and his lame story kicked to the curb (and kicked in the balls for good measure).

Ermine: I disliked the first half of this movie with the guy's hand and I don't think some of the beginning scenes really added much to the overall story that the film was trying to tell. Like I don't need to see a hand strangle a pigeon for a minute or fight with a bunch of rats. I also really question the decision to make this a Rated R movie. I think most of the scenes (except one) that would earn the movie that rating added absolutely nothing to the film and really could have just been done away with. The hand being cut off scene... Yes, that was important and integral to the film... but even that could have been toned down slightly perhaps, maybe at the actual cutting part to be slightly less gorey.

Some really good music though, there's a track in particular I really enjoy and the back half of this film is pretty decent.

Red: The story of a severed hand trying to reunite with its body. Actually its not and the severed had plot is ultimately pointless padding that never really serves any purpose. He cuts his hand in an act of stupidity by never learning the one thing he was attempted to be taught at the beginning of the movie, because we want a severed hand subplot that isn't really related to anything. The hand is kind of a jerk to all the animals too, so there isn't much to like about it. But the actual plot has fake conflict over information withheld from each other for not much reason and the film really feels like they knew how they wanted the middle to go but no real way for any character arcs to end. It was an interesting main plot middle, but the end is a bit rushed and the hand adventure adds nothing.

Inviso: This one is strange, to say the least. Its like youve got a short film about a disembodied hand wandering around, and then the rest of the runtime is meant to develop the character and explain how exactly he got to lose his hand. But its hard to enjoy this film for me, because I absolutely hated the main character. Hes just such a socially-awkward loser, and Im sorry, but I dont want to watch a movie about myself, striking out with a girl after awkwardly chasing after her. Keep in mind, this character stalks a girl, inserts himself into her life, and then thinks it will be some kind of romantic gesture to reveal that he was stalking her the whole time. And then this all results in him getting upset at a party, having a rough night, and slicing his own hand off with a bandsaw due to lack of sleep. The ending is justit feels its supposed to be triumphant, but at the same time, it doesnt feel like the main character earned that triumph in any way. Ultimately, I will rank this higher it perhaps deserves because the characterization is decent, if not even remotely enjoyable, and this feel like it deserves better than some of the trash movies Ive watched that still outrank other artistic films on this list.

Outlier Rankings:

Ermine: 225
Evillord: 221
Johnbobb: 169
Red: 148
Inviso: 147
Karo: 141

Damn. I'd almost overtaken Karo, too.

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11. ???
12. ???
13. Abominable
14. ???
15. ???
16. ???
17. ???
18. Ralph Breaks the Internet
19. Ferdinand
20. ???
21. Spies in Disguise
22. The Grinch
23. Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation
24. Trolls World Tour
25. Croods: A New Age
26. A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon
27. The Polar Express
28. It's Such a Beautiful Day
29. ???
30. I Lost My Body
31. The Secret Life of Pets 2
32. Despicable Me 3
33. Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius
34. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
35. ???
36. Boy and the World
37. ???
38. The Illusionist
39. Anomalisa
40. Fritz the Cat

I didn't realize how well I was doing until noting the low outlier placement. Still wish my 35 was out by now though (I didn't expect 37 to go this early).

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15. Ralph Breaks the Internet
16. Anomalisa
17. ???
18. Spies in Disguise
19. Trolls World Tour
20. ???
21. The Grinch
22. ???
23. ???
24. Croods: A New Age
25. I Lost My Body
26. ???
27. Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation
28. The Polar Express
29. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
30. A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon
31. Despicable Me 3
32. The Illusionist
33. The Boy and the World
34. ???
35. The Secret Life of Pets 2
36. Ferdinand
37. Abominable
38. Fritz the Cat
39. It's Such a Beautiful Day
40. Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius

That hand is far and away one of my least favorite characters on this list.

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7. ???
8. ???
9. ???
10. Ralph Breaks the Internet
11. ???
12. ???
13. ???
14. ???
15. Abominable
16. ???
17. ???
18. The Secret Life of Pets 2
19. ???
20. Croods: A New Age
21. Spies in Disguise
22. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
23. Ferdinand
24. ???
25. The Illusionist
26. Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation
27. I Lost My Body
28. Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius
29. The Grinch
30. A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon
31. Despicable Me 3
32. ???
33. ???
34. ???
35. Boy and the World
36. Anomalisa
37. Trolls World Tour
38. It's Such a Beautiful Day
39. Fritz the Cat
40. The Polar Express

1. ???
2. The Secret Life of Pets 2 (2019)
3. ???
4. ???
5. ???
6. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (2009)
7. ???
8. The Grinch (2018)
9. A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon (2019)
10. Fritz The Cat (1972)
11. Croods: A New Age (2020)
12. ???
13. ???
14. Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation (2018)
15. ???
16. ???
17. ???
18. ???
19. ???
20. ???
21. Abominable (2019)
22. Ferdinand (2017)
23. ???
24. The Illusionist (2010)
25. I Lost My Body (2019)
26. Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius (2001)
27. ???
28. ???
29. ???
30. Boy and the World (2013)
31. The Polar Express (2004)
32. Spies in Disguise (2019)
33. ???
34. ???
35. ???
36. Ralph Breaks the Internet (2018)
37. Trolls World Tour (2020)
38. Anomalisa (2015)
39. It's Such a Beautiful Day (2012)
40. Despicable Me 3 (2017)

20. Frozen II

Red: 13
Inviso: 16
Johnbobb: 17
Evillord: 23
Ermine: 28
Karo: 34

Total: 131

Red: A sequel we unfortunately knew was coming the moment frozen made megabucks and you went a year without being able to hide from hearing Let It Go everywhere. Hell if there is something to bet on getting a reference in any new Disney film, it is probably Let It Go. If there was something you could bet on a Frozen 2 dealing with, it is the origin of Elsa's powers. And to no surprise, we're dealing somewhat with the origin of Elsa's powers. Except in doing so we're also going to spit on the original and decide Elsa doesn't really belong as queen and needs to go live with magic people because she doesn't belong in Arendelle or something. It is really bad messaging that really leaves a big stain on the franchise if you think about it too hard. The music is mostly though but we don't hit the highs of the original. Still wouldn't be surprised if we're hit with a Frozen 3 at some point in our lives.

Inviso: It says a lot about the quality of this list as a whole, that Frozen 2 is ranking as highly as it is. Frozen 1 is overrated, but at least it has a coherent narrative from start to finish. Sure, they had to rewrite when they realized how awesome Elsa was, and therefore they couldnt just make her a generic Disney villain (whichhonestly, probably hurt the brand in terms of replicating villains of the past). Anyway, with Frozen 2, its very clear that the success of Frozen 1 forced Disneys hand into creating a sequel, and they didnt have the best ideas for it. Elsa is still awesome, and continuing her story of questioning why shes uniquely magically was a good choicebut everything else feels off. Theres this theme of growing up that doesnt mesh with Elsa learning about the past, yet its Olafs main thingplus theres this weird will they/wont they storyline with Kristoff and Anna. Basically, much like Frozen 1, Elsa carries the film as best she can, but unlike Frozen 1, I feel like the other characters dont uphold their end of the bargain as much as they need to. Its still decent enough, but Elsa alone cant push this higher.

Johnbobb: Frozen 2: Frozen Harder, where the ice is icier and Olaf is sillier and...
https://imgur.com/1K1L6kn
...oh

Evillord: I actually liked this more than expected. I thought the two girls learning about their country's dark past was a nice story idea and there were some cool visuals, especially the part where Elsa is trying to freeze her way across the stormy sea. It does suffer from trying to tie everything up too nicely, though (I would've respected it more if the castle really did get destroyed) and the songs are generally lackluster.

Ermine: It is sad to rank this movie so low after I enjoyed the first film so much but this really was just a complete let down in every regard. The songs aren't even CLOSE to as good as they were in the first and "Into the Unknown" is such an obvious attempt to recreate "Let It Go" that it hurts.

WE MUST HAVE AN EPIC INCREDIBLE SONG WITH THE SAME EXACT ENERGY AS LET IT GO...!

No, stop, just let things be natural. This song was the most unnatural forcing of anything I've ever seen. And the song itself isn't even that bad, it's kind of good! Just the context behind it feels so forced and ugh.

And then we have the characters... what the hell did they do to Anna and Kristoph to make them so unlikable now? Why are these arguments they are having and romantic trouble so incredible cringe and forced? Oh that's right, because the writers decided to shit own their own characters and make them say things they would absolutely never say.

The plot? Man, I just don't care. They had this cool lizard thing that I thought was going to be relevant and then it just didn't matter at all... because reasons?

What a shit show.

Karo: In a small bout of schizophrenia Elsa wakes the magical spirits of the enchanted forest that we are only just now hearing about and wrecks the kingdom again, and thus everyone embarks on a forced arbitrary quest to set things right. Anyway they head into the lost woods and find a tribe of magical native people and these soldiers who were trapped in the forest for like 30 years and still have their uniforms in good repair and have perfectly cut hair.
The way Elsa acts throughout the film is truly bizarre, it is like they decided to fuse part of Moana's personality onto her and make her into this wild obsessive woman who hears a magical siren call and is like 'fuck all these people who love and care about me, I gotta do some adventure shit'. Elsa then gets pissed when Anna is worried about her and wants to be by her side, so in order to keep her sister safe from harm, Elsa puts her into a canoe made of ice and shoves her down a rocky embankment nearly killing her.
The music is frankly forgettable for the most part. There are a few decent songs, but the majority I have forgotten completely within an hour of finishing the movie. Given how music was such a big part of the first film this is truly disappointing.
Soooo, Anna frees the forest by destroying a dam that was hurting the environment, something the all powerful spirits of nature were not able to do themselves for REASONS, and everyone lives happily ever after. Sort of.
Elsa stays behind to be the bitch of the spirit world because that is what is 'expected' of her, leaving the kingdom in the capable hands of her ditzy twin sister who tried to marry a psychopath after knowing him for 10 minutes, and we end with the touching moral of 'magic people are cool but they should stay with other magic people'.
Jesus fucking Christ.
How do we go from themes of accepting others for being different and being proud of yourself to themes of blind conformity and extolling racial separatism in just one film? How the fuck do you miss the point of your own movie this badly that you make a sequel with the literal opposite message?
How do you turn a simple story of the love between sisters into a contrived clusterfuck of confusing mysticism and laughable 'gotcha' moments that plays out like some abysmal piece of bad fanfiction?
By making sequels that have absolutely no reason for existing, that is how. Just listen to your own damn song Disney, and let it fucking go.

Outlier Rankings:

Ermine: 233
Evillord: 224
Johnbobb: 172
Red: 155
Karo: 155
Inviso: 151

I prefer Frozen 2 to Frozen!

But that might just be because my three year old prefers it as well so I get to watch it a couple times a week.

I enjoyed Frozen 2 more than my memory of Frozen 1, but I'm not sure I'd still feel that way if I re-watched the first film.

Late, but:

1. It's Such a Beautiful Day
2. ?
3. ?
4. Boy & the World
5. ?
6. ?
7. The Illusionist
8. Fritz the Cat
9. ?
10. ?
11. A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon
12. ?
13. I Lost My Body
14. Anomalisa
15. ?
16. ?
17. ?
18. ?
19. ?
20. ?
21. ?
22. ?
23. Frozen II
24. Trolls World Tour
25. ?
26. ?
27. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
28. Spies in Disguise
29. Hotel Transylvania: Summer Vacation
30. Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius
31. The Croods: A New Age
32. ?
33. Abominable
34. The Polar Express
35. Despicable Me 3
36. ?
37. The Secret Life of Pets 2
38. Ralph Breaks the Internet
39. The Grinch
40. Ferdinand

My top 10 hasn't fared the best, but my lowest picks are almost all gone too. It's the movies I put in the upper-middle that have all been spared so far.

I'm going to enjoy a very limited time as the lowest outlier, before my 35 and 37 inevitably tank me back below Red and Karo.

Also, I didn't mention this in my write-up, but I hate how "Into the Unknown" was the big smash hit song from this movie.

"Show Yourself" is a much better song, and works well with the themes of "Let It Go" as well. It's from a far more empowering part of the movie, too, rather than whatever the hell "Into the Unknown" was trying to be.

Agreed, Show Yourself was definitely my favorite song from that movie.

19. The Incredibles 2

Red: 9
Inviso: 17
Evillord: 19
Karo: 22
Johnbobb: 25
Ermine: 35

Total: 127

Red: One of exactly two sequel movies on the list that actually called for a sequel, dropping us in pretty much immediately where the first left off. Despite not leaving a lot of glaring holes in the first movie, The Incredibles left a mostly open super hero world to explore and in a world of super hero movies being more main stream a sequel felt inevitable and almost necessary. The family dynamic surrounding with dealing with supers and their return/shunning from the world still plays and we're given an expansion of the role supers(And villains) played in society. I wouldn't call it the most original movie out there, but still the odd welcome sequel on this list.

Inviso: I almost feel bad about ranking this film this high, because a lot of this ranking comes from the polish and prestige inherent in a lot of Pixars work. Incredibles 2 falls into a lot of the same pitfalls as other movies on this list, namely coming in as sequels and trying to spread the narrative too thin for its own good. The first movie was almost entirely about Bobs mid-life crisis and trying to prove himself. This time around, while the plot feels EXTREMELY similar (surprise villain hired the main hero to work for them the WHOLE TIME), its a little disjointed. Helen is the one trying to prove herself this time, but Bob is trying to be a stay-at-home dad, and Jack Jack is developing a vast array of powers, and Violet is struggling with her social life. To rip off Syndrome, when everyone gets a story arc, no one gets a story arc. That being said, the story is still decent, albeit inferior to the original. The characters are extremely strong and well-written, and at the very least, their multitude of arcs feel as well-crafted as they possibly can. And the overall quality of the film-making is solid as well. That puts it ahead of a lot of the field Ive watched thus far, even if its not the greatest movie ever.

Evillord: While good, I don't think this movie lived up to the first one, which is my favorite Pixar film. I liked seeing the new characters' powers, the villain's motivation was kind of interesting (more so than most Pixar villains not named Syndrome or Lotso, anyway,) and seeing Bob try to handle the kids at home was cute, but there's not really anything that wowed me like the first one did.

Karo: This starts literally right where the first movie left off, where the super family combats the Underminer with the power of teamwork and bad parenting. Half the city gets wrecked and so they aren't allowed to be superheroes anymore. Again.
They then meet a sketchy businessman who offers to pay them money for breaking the law so he can assumedly create a hero-based reality show or something. The movie then splits into two parts, Elastigirl doing some very basic and uninspired superhero stuff, and Mr. Incredible being terrible at stay at home dad stuff. Both storylines are unremarkable and rote.
The lone bright spot in the movie is the Screenslaver, a supervillain who can use any electronic screen to turn their victims into mindless puppets, which is brilliant on a number of levels. Screenslaver is a top 3 Pixar villain, by which I mean they have a rudimentary level of character complexity and some motivation beyond revenge or being a bully. Goddamn, Pixar, you really suck at making bad guys.
The original was made in an era before we had like a dozen superhero flicks every year, and it felt special. Now it is just.. why? This is not the best superhero film of the year, hell, it isnt even the best ANIMATED superhero film of the year. The reasons for the existence of this are nothing but greed and memberberries, and neither of those are good reasons.

Johnbobb: I can't quite place why this sequel didn't quite do it for me like the original did. By all means, it's MORE of everything that was good in the first one. More heroes, more Jak-Jak shenanigans, more crime-fighting, more of Mrs. Incredible's absurd cake. But something just didn't quite click with me as much. Like it's fun, but definitely not the instantly-quoteable fun of the first one. The not-so-surprising surprise villain of this one is no Syndrome, and while the action is great, it just kinda felt like a retread in a lot of ways.

Ermine: I enjoy that the movie focuses more on Elastigirl since she's probably the best character in the family, but with a twist and plot as predictable as bread turning into toast when you put it into a toaster, there really isn't much here for me to enjoy. The rest of the family is as boring as ever. No the raccoon scene with Jack-Jack isn't cute. It's dumb.

I just don't care about any of these characters and never will... I'd say this is sliiiightly better than the first due to a slightly less annoying villain but it's hard to say.

Outlier Rankings:

Ermine: 249
Evillord: 224
Johnbobb: 178
Red: 165
Karo: 158
Inviso: 153

Okay, with THAT ranking, I'm genuinely surprised that my 35 is still in, especially with all the early trashing of similarly-toned films.

Finally, back to films I've seen! And it's the result of the sequelitis Disney got blighted with ugh... Well I must say I was disappointed by these two for different reasons, but I still enjoyed them for what they were. The Frozen 2 teaser trailer was infuriating in that it was more hype than the actual movie, promising a darker tone, more action, and less comic relief. To be fair it did deliver on two of those, but in its efforts to still appeal to children it comes across as tone-deaf.

What are kids supposed to find funny about Olaf having an existential crisis anyway? In fact the only time I recall laughing at all during Frozen 2 is when Olaf is summarizing the events of the first film to the forest dwellers ("their parents are DEAD" made me lose my shit hard). Also the whole elemental spirit thing seems incredibly contrived. At least half of them come across that way anyway; as adorable as Bruni is, and as cool as the Nocc is the both of them are clearly designed to sell merchandise.

I would have no problem with that if they had more relevance to the story, but they only exist as proxies to show off Elsa's new magical ability to calm all the other elements which also makes no sense at all. How is ice the 5th elemental spirit when the 5th spirit is the bridge that connects all the others? Fire and ice no mix! Yes the scene where Bruni relaxes in Elsa's hands is cute, but Coming Soon to a Disney Store Near You doesn't justify his entire existence and augh, enough of this!
---
Incredibles 2 was always going to be fighting an uphill battle for me since the first one remains my favorite Pixar film to date, and honestly it wasn't as big a letdown as Frozen's sequel because I knew from the jump not to expect it to be as good or better than the original. After all you can't top perfection, and I was just happy Pixar was willing to return to the same universe after so many years instead of giving us Cars 5 or Monster Retirement Home.

My issue was not with the original characters as they were faithful to the original or the plot as it was kind of refreshing they tried something new while still referencing the first film. I can totally buy Bob feeling insecure because Helen is the face of the superhero reinstatement movement, and I feel Violet's struggle to be noticed again after she worked so hard to come out of her shell the first time. What I don't buy is Helen (and everyone else by extension) getting ganked by the obviously sus Deavor character when she was proven to be so intelligent and competent in both movies prior to her capture.

I'm saying she should have seen that betrayal coming, and no not because her name is literally Evil Endeavor, but because the only thing they had in common was the incredibly shallow girl power angle and such. I'm all for feminist undertones in my family movies because it's been a long time coming but maybe having the subtlety of a brick to the noggin wasn't the move. Anyway the animation was incredible (pun intended), and I loved everything involving the Screen Slaver while she was still masked. However my biggest takeaway from the film was how much it made me miss Syndrome. Oh yeah... I forgot because my favorites Vi and Dash were so underutilized my favorite segments ended up involving Jack-Jack and/or Edna Mode. That's also a bit of a letdown.

18. The Red Turtle

Evillord: 2
Red: 16
Karo: 17
Johnbobb: 20
Ermine: 33
Inviso: 37

Total: 125

Evillord: This dialog-free movie ends up covering such a wide range of subjects, from growing up to death to what it takes to be happy, that it's hard to summarize, but it was definitely more interesting and emotional than most films I've seen. I felt like I came away from it with a new perspective on life.

Red: When this movie started I honestly thought it was going to bore me out of my mind. But once the family is established and we're dealing with their way of life on the island it had me surprisingly hooked. Every character grows and gets their own conclusion. It definitely had a rather slow start and took awhile to really get the characters moving, but once we get to the middle I was susprisingly invested in where it was going. Still not necessarily my thing, but it was far more interesting than I was expecting as it started.

Karo: A minimalistic and dialogue-free story of a man who is marooned on a tropical island and his relationship with a giant sea turtle. I mean like actual relationship as in the turtle transforms into a beautiful woman and makes babies with him. The movie follows this family and their life on the island up until the original castaway grows old and passes away, and Mrs Turtle returns to the sea.
It is equal parts haunting and beautiful in a strange way, and it is very different from any animated movie I have seen before. It is not afflicted with the pretentiousness or lack of structure that plagues a lot of independent animated movies, it is charming in its simplicity and mesmerizing in its depiction of this nameless castaway and the depths of his speechless personage.
In an industry full of frantic hijinks and screaming characters, there are some lessons to be learned here about the value of slowing things down and letting it all sink in, and modern American animation could definitely make use of taking some of these lessons to heart.

Johnbobb: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z74hjn5rMuU

Ermine: So that was a movie.

I mean... I get it. I can get why people would be super into this... and these types of movies can really suck me in and get me invested but, this just really didn't, at all.

Lost me as soon as the turtle turned into his new wife and the film never really recovered.

Bleh.

Inviso: I know this isnt ENTIRELY Studio Ghibli, since its half Western-inspired, but it definitely runs afoul of some of the biggest pitfalls Ghibli has to offer. Ghibli is very hit-or-miss, in that when they go the exciting and whimsical route, they can create amazing works of cinema. But when they try to be somewhat grounded in reality, they get kinda wrapped up in that kind of sentimentality. This film is largely silent, save for the occasional Hey!, and outside of the inherent fantasy elements of a turtle becoming a woman, its a very flat story. Its about a guy who gets shipwrecked on a desert island, and winds up living out his life there after escape proves impossible. He kills a sea turtle out of spite, and that turtle turns into a woman, whom he has a child with, before growing and dying. There really isnt a lot of content to this movie, and with the silence, it makes for a very boring watch.

Outlier Rankings:

Ermine: 264
Evillord: 240
Johnbobb: 180
Inviso: 172
Red: 167
Karo: 159

Okay, while I ranked this lower (and I'm genuinely happy it didn't rank higher, because I figured I'd be the only one to tank its score), I'm REALLY surprised that my 35 is still in at this point.

Red Turtle was a movie with a message that delivered it in a way that just didn't hook me. I've seen people go crazy for it, but I just didn't find it engaging.

I like most artsy foreign/indie animation stuff, but Red Turtle just bored me to death. I feel like most of the acclaim it got was because people saw the Ghibli logo at the start and went in thinking "Oh, this must be a great movie".