Worst Animated Films You've Seen

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Worst Animated Films You've Seen

Post by Neal » December 7th, 2008, 7:17 pm

There's so many good animated films out there, but definitely a slew of bad ones, too. What are the worst (or your least favorite) animated films.

Overall:

I saw Dante's Inferno on the Ovation channel as part of an animated movie marathon they had. I'm not really conservative but this film's super-liberal lean at first was annoying and finally ruined the film for me. The jokes just weren't doing it for me and it was too slow paced.

Anime:

I watched half of Dead Leaves and half of MD Gesit and didn't like either.

Disney:

There's truly not much I don't like of Disney's animated classics. I'd say over 90% of them really entertain me. As a kid I never could get into The Rescuers. Now, I have to say Chicken Little doesn't appeal to me, and Saludos Amigos didn't excite me that much but The Three Caballeros did, funny enough.

Pixar:

I did not like Cars. Would almost call it boring. I was expecting The Incredibles to be really funny coming off of Finding Nemo. It wasn't, and I never really found myself enjoying it.

DreamWorks:

Anything by them. *cough* I didn't say that.

...now what are the worst animated films out there in your opinion?
Last edited by Neal on December 8th, 2008, 5:16 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Darkblade » December 7th, 2008, 10:49 pm

Here's a few that I hate and Neal...Does this mean you dont like the 2D movies dreamworks made?

Overall:
I didnt like Ralph Bakshi's cool world. Im a fan of Bakshi's films but however I didnt like this movie. the animation of it was good, and the music as well but however it wouldve been better as an R rated Horror film. I saw this at my friend's place at a party.

Anime:
Its pokemon and yu-gi-oh. I cant stand that anime, even the dub itself is terrible. Worst anime ever{opinion}


Disney:
The movies I grewed up with were disney movies....Now disney's got a bunch of good movies and some crappy ones. I never got into snow white or Pinocho{sorry for my spelling} I didnt like chicken little either. I did however find bolt funny though.

Pixar:
I didnt like the Incredibles. The story was good but however it wouldve been better off as a 2D film.

Dreamworks:
Sherk{and its sequels}. The only movies that I was entertained by were the movies that were made with Aardman and the 2D films

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Post by Whippet Angel » December 8th, 2008, 1:31 am

Ah, I've been thinking about making this topic myself... :P

Disney:

The Fox and the Hound - I never liked this movie. Aside from the name, it bears hardly any resemblance to the novel on which it was based. The plot that they came up with for this film, has more holes than an industrial-sized package of swiss cheese (and I never really bought into Todd and Copper's "life-long friendship" that we only see a couple minutes of when they're kids).

Dinosaur - It's a great film to watch without sound.

Dreamworks:

Madagascar - Maybe it's because I'm an art-house snob, but I HATE pop culture refs in animated films. The majority of the jokes in this film weren't even funny!

Other:

The Pebble and the Penguin - I really can't understand why so many young adults my age look back on this film with fondness. Perhaps they're just blinded by their childhood nostalgia, because everything about this film is absolutely horrid. The songs, the overly-cliche villain, the ugly character designs.... I could go on forever...

That's all I can think of for now. But I'm sure I'll think of more later on...

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Post by Ben » December 8th, 2008, 8:12 am

Good topic, but I think the thing to remember here is to present your feelings on films that were <I>intended</I> to be decent, big hitting movies but just failed on various levels.

Let's simply not turn this into a bashing of "cheapquels", spin-offs or knock-offs just for the sake of it.

If you're going to roast an animated film, you need to be able to back up the argument. So far...things are going nicely...nice!

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Post by Rosengeist » December 8th, 2008, 11:48 am

I know I've been pretty AWOL on this site since I joined, which I apologize for, it's been a pretty hectic semeseter here at school.

None-the-less, I will vote that the Warner Brothers released, Richard-Rich animated version of "The King and I" is arguably the most frustrating and disheartening animated film I've ever seen.

I can't understand why a classic musical should have been remade as an animated film. Had they done their own take on the tale I wouldn't have been so upset by it, but taking the original Rodgers and Hammersteins music and plot was just lazy and disrespectful. I felt that animating the story was redundant and absurd, the lovely original choreography and direction of the original film were scrapped for awkward jokes and over-the-top staging. The addition and subtraction of certain characters and elements, like having Kralahome as an outright villain, the aging of the kings son and the sons relationship with Tuptim, and the removal of the insinuated death of Tuptim and blatant death of the King, took away any threat, or conflict in the story.

I also feel that artisitically speaking, the colors were far, far to bright and that the character designs were incredibly bland and uninspired. I also remember some very awkward movement and acting going on with the animation of the leads. The only example I can specifically call to mind was a scene in which Anna sings a song lyric that invloves hopping like a toad and she just gets down and hops like said animal. I didn't buy that a woman in a large framed skirt and corsetry (which is part of a big joke in the original film) could crouch down to do this, and the action itself took away the dignified and rigid personality that her character was meant to have.

Aside from that, I don't know why they thought they could ever find anyone to match Yul Brenner's auditory performance in the original musical.

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Post by Rosengeist » December 8th, 2008, 11:49 am

I know I've been pretty AWOL on this site since I joined, which I apologize for, it's been a pretty hectic semeseter here at school.

None-the-less, I will vote that the Warner Brothers released, Richard-Rich animated version of "The King and I" is arguably the most frustrating and disheartening animated film I've ever seen.

I can't understand why a classic musical should have been remade as an animated film. Had they done their own take on the tale I wouldn't have been so upset by it, but taking the original Rodgers and Hammersteins music and plot was just lazy and disrespectful. I felt that animating the story was redundant and absurd, the lovely original choreography and direction of the original film were scrapped for awkward jokes and over-the-top staging. The addition and subtraction of certain characters and elements, like having Kralahome as an outright villain, the aging of the kings son and the sons relationship with Tuptim, and the removal of the deaths of Tuptim and the King, took away any threat, danger, or conflict in the story.

I also feel that artisitically speaking, the colors were far, far too bright and garish and that the character designs were incredibly bland and uninspired. I also remember some very awkward movement and acting going on with the animation of the leads. The only example I can specifically call to mind was a scene in which Anna sings a song lyric that invloves hopping like a toad and she just gets down and hops like said animal. I didn't buy that a woman in a large framed skirt and corsetry (which is part of a big joke in the original film) could crouch down to do this, and the action itself took away the dignified and rigid personality that her character should have had.

Aside from that, I don't know why they thought they could ever find anyone to match Yul Brenner's auditory performance in the original musical.

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Post by EricJ » December 8th, 2008, 3:09 pm

Rosengeist wrote:I can't understand why a classic musical should have been remade as an animated film.
(Sigh...What hath the post-Beauty&Beast "Animated films will replace Broadway someday! :D " early-90's critic-gushing wrought?)
None-the-less, I will vote that the Warner Brothers released, Richard-Rich animated version of "The King and I" is arguably the most frustrating and disheartening animated film I've ever seen.
<snip>
Frustrating, yes, disheartening, yes; singlehandedly killed off the entire 90's third-party-wannabe industry, possibly--
But it's more a case of "It's not the despair, it's the HOPE": When it does shut up long enough to actually be a version of the musical, it's a pretty good enough version to wish somebody would transcribe more classics...
Arguably better blocked than the original, in letting "Getting To Know You" get out of the one claustrophic room, including "Shall I Tell Your Majesty", or playing "Puzzlement" for humor...But, no, we had to get Richard Rich, who already takes up half the list for his Disney work.

(I still believe, however, that the Worst Animated Movie, whatever it is if we're confining ourself to native English-language releases, must necessarily have "Don Bluth" somewhere on the credits...It was always a new nightmare every time. :shock:
And that's only out of fairness to the Richard Williams and "Raggedy Ann & Andy" fans.)

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Post by eddievalient » December 9th, 2008, 10:49 am

My worst has to be Chuck Jones' "The Phantom Tollbooth". That's one of my favorite books and I thought he would have done a great job on the movie, given his reputation. Sadly, no. If I ever have the chance, I'd love to write a screenplay myself that does the job right (I always imagined it like one of those fantasy films Hallmark used to do).
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Post by GeorgeC » December 10th, 2008, 3:11 pm

It's hard to say what's the worst for me. There are just so many bad animated films to choose from!

Films are bad for different reasons --
a) poor animation -- basically anything done by Filmation is pretty sad looking. It's bargain-basement animation at its finest! :lol:

b) screenplay -- by far the most memorable bad animated film I've seen in theaters was Ghost in the Shell (2): Innocence. I have never sat through such a pretentious film before and since. It's like sitting through the worst philosophy you can imagine and getting lectured to by a guy who just wants to impress you with everything he knows from world philosophies and religions... and it all adds up to crud. Sure, there are some great action sequences, but it's not worth sitting through all those talking heads! (This would be a great place to put an icon of a character shooting his head off -- that's what I felt like doing sitting through GiTS2!)
Japanese anime screenwriters are masters at scripting horrible movies. There's a reason American studios tend to keep the films basic, guys. You look at a Japanese animated film that runs 2 hours you will appreciate 85-minute length films even more!

c) really, really annoying characters that appear to have no traits other than screaming and "perfuming the wind" at appropriate times. Take your pick of a DreamWorks movie!

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Post by EricJ » December 10th, 2008, 4:29 pm

GeorgeC wrote:b) screenplay -- by far the most memorable bad animated film I've seen in theaters was Ghost in the Shell (2): Innocence. I have never sat through such a pretentious film before and since. It's like sitting through the worst philosophy you can imagine and getting lectured to by a guy who just wants to impress you with everything he knows from world philosophies and religions... and it all adds up to crud. Sure, there are some great action sequences, but it's not worth sitting through all those talking heads!
Japanese anime screenwriters are masters at scripting horrible movies. There's a reason American studios tend to keep the films basic, guys.
There's also a reason the Japanese make their films so "ponderous"--
Anime is perceived as something little kids watch at home for free, so every animator with a major independent theatrical-feature deal (ie., an artistic one-off, not a cash-in of a popular series) wants to cut loose of cheap commercial perceptions and create....ART. 8)
(Which's why anime fans in the US have their work cut out for them telling first-time US mainstream newbies to Just Say NO to Theatrical Anime, and seek out those cool TV series on disk, instead.)

FTR, GITS2 is still considered a laughingstock in its own country as well:
In one silly comedy-anime, a character tells an "ancient legend" that turns into an old-school SNES RPG-game onscreen--The hero has to choose a Sleep spell to defeat his enemies, and the menu offers either the powerful "Angel's Egg" spell or the "GITS2: Innocence" spell to knock his enemies into dreamland... :P

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Post by Sunday » December 10th, 2008, 5:03 pm

G.I. Joe: The Movie - For all its ridiculously over the top 80's appeal, I have yet to be able to sit through the thing in its entirety.

Charlotte's Web - I remember nothing but pale & stale animation, tinny uninspired music, a rather dull story, and whiny, shrieking vocals for unappealing characters. It's been ages since I last saw it, though, so it may not be a fair judgment. Does anyone know if the 2006 movie ended up any better?
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Post by Josh » December 18th, 2008, 9:47 am

I agree with Rosengeist about The King and I. When it was released in 1999, I hadn't heard nor read much about the movie, since I didn't have internet access. My friends and I rented The King and I, hoping it would be pretty good. I'm sad to say that we were disappointed with the film, for most of the reasons Rosengeist mentioned.

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Post by American_dog_2008 » December 18th, 2008, 2:06 pm

The Pagemaster if half animated counts.

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Post by Once Upon A Dream » December 18th, 2008, 2:37 pm

Disney:
The Wild,Atlantis,Hunchback Of Noterdame and Dinosaur,Dinosaur is lame but I don't hate it while I do hate the others I worte.
Dreamworks:
Flushed Away count? (Well,it's not a good movie,it's overused).
I don't like Prince Of Egypt.
Others:
Some movie,and some new ones like Monster House and Ant Bully (I haven seen them but not fully on TV).
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Post by Neal » December 18th, 2008, 11:40 pm

Anything can 'count'. I refuse to see Fushed Away because of DreamWorks. Sure, it's partially Aardman but even so, Katzenberg supposedly did his best to influence this and his push to Americanize Aardman led to their eventual falling out.

The Wild isn't really Disney. Just Disney distributed. It's no more Disney than Spirited Away or any Studio Ghibli film.
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