The Typography of Disney Animation Logos #5: Three More Anthologies…

We are now well into the second half of the 1940s... Walt Disney and his crew still can't afford to do a single-story animated feature. They pressed on, doing more anthologies, more short cartoons, and then... Live-action pictures, from hybrid films (Song of the South) to short nature documentaries (the True-Life Adventures)... Three more post-war …

The Typography of Disney Animation Logos #4: Goodwill and Package Features

We're now on Round 4. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and Pinocchio Fantasia Dumbo and Bambi Saludos Amigos, The Three Caballeros, and Make Mine Music Fun & Fancy Free, Melody Time, and The Adventures of the Ichabod and Mr. Toad Cinderella, Alice in Wonderland, and Peter Pan Sleeping Beauty, 101 Dalmatians, and The Sword …

Animad Max

An animated Mad Max movie is something I'd really love to see... An animated Mad Max movie would also be something rather unprecedented in the mainstream film market... A mostly live-action film franchise going animated... When does that usually ever happen? When I say a live-action series going animated, I mean a series that's going …

Pixar Generalizations and Complaints That I Don’t Like!

Loving certain works of entertainment can come with a price. I know that very well as a fan of animation, and especially the legendary Disney animated classics "canon". Back in August of 2015 on my mainline news blog, I ripped five generalizations about the body of work apart. Now, I want to do the same …

Breaking Down the Later Disney Renaissance, Part 5

This is it folks... We're at the end of the Disney Renaissance. Or, more appropriately, the time where most people mark the end of Disney's esteemed Renaissance era of animated features. We're at the last film in a streak of box office successes, the end of an apparently idyllic time that soured a bit in …

Breaking Down the Later Disney Renaissance, Part 3

Was it possible that the very directors who played a big part in the launching of the Disney Renaissance would be the ones to save it? I'm talking about Ron Clements and John Musker. They joined Walt Disney Productions in the mid-to-late 1970s, getting their kicks on features like The Rescuers and The Fox and …

A Whole Other Ocean: A Full Review of ‘Finding Dory’

Arriving thirteen years after its magnificent, underwater predecessor, Finding Dory proved to be a worthy sequel and a very good film in its own right. Finding Dory's main strengths are in its development of Dory. I remember the cries and concerns when it was announced that the Finding Nemo sequel would focus heavily on the …

Disregarding the Clickbait: Real Talk on a ‘Monsters, Inc.’ Sequel

Monsters, Inc. turned fifteen today... Monsters, Inc. was actually the very film that got me into Pixar. I was ten, already a huge Disney fan, but for some reason didn't quite connect with the works of the hopping lamp just yet. I didn't pop in my Toy Story and Toy Story 2 VHS tapes as …

2016’s Animated Oscars… Hard to Predict?

The Oscars... The Best Animated Feature category... Who is in the running? I think this year, we don't have too many definite answers. This is a bit premature, because four more major animated features are left, one of which comes from the on-a-roll Walt Disney Animation Studios. The features are Warner Animation Group's high-flying comedy …

Cake Icing: Custom Logos

Logos... Custom variants of well-known logos... The Walt Disney studio has a long history of doing this. Disney had signed with RKO Radio Pictures in 1937, who would distribute all of their features and shorts for roughly fifteen years. Before each film (with the exception of the first, Snow White), the RKO logo would precede …