In 2018, this little movie called “Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse” came out and blew everyone away, so much so that it is getting not one but two sequels. With its unique art style, great cast, and apparent appreciation of comic books, this movie was truly one of a kind. The film heralded universal praise and continues to be held to that degree with its sequel coming out next month. One thing that there’s been an uptick of in the recent years since Spider-Verse’s release, is a lot of debate about animation as an art form. Some people believe it’s better than ever for animation, while others believe the art form is slowly losing its value and that’s what we’re here to discuss. 

Disney broke onto the movie scene in 1937 with their first ever feature-length animated film, and it was that of Snow White & The Seven Dwarves. Since then, the company has produced hundreds of animated films, and that became their staple. However, in the last 10 years, Disney has been focusing on 3D Animation and live-action remakes instead of the traditional 2D designs that made them so well known, and many people have blamed this for the downfall of animation as a whole. Many people feel that Disney’s reworking of past products and failing Pixar films have changed how people see animation as an art form. With Disney pumping out live-action remakes faster than you can say “Come up with something original”, their use of these classic stories has been received as lackluster. As stated by Sarah El-Mahmoud for CinemaBlend, “The incredible imagination that went into something such as the iconic opening scene of The Lion King backdropped by the ‘Circle of Life’ again feels like a ripoff in the upcoming remake because it’s almost a shot-for-shot recreation of the scene in the teaser trailer.” 

These reimaginations aren’t holding the same impact for many viewers, yet Disney continues to make them. As for their animated films (ONLY coming out of Pixar), none of their recent endeavors have been able to reach financial or critical acclaim in the last few years, with films like Lightyear, Turning Red, and Strange World. Fun fact: Disney seems to just not care at all about Strange World entirely, with most people not even knowing the movie exists, it was a financial total loss, and the Pixar official site doesn’t even list the film in their filmography. All of this has caused the general public to doubt their next upcoming feature film, Elemental despite it not being out yet. While many people argue this could mean the death of animation, many others disagree.

Circling back to Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse, this film influenced the entire animation industry. Sony Animation Studios, the distribution company for Spider-Verse, released a film called Mitchell and The Machines, made by the same people with an almost identical animation style. While this film didn’t perform as well as Spider-Verse did, it continued the trend of that animation style. Other projects such as Entergalactic, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, Puss In Boots: The Last Wish, Arcane, and more all draw inspiration from Spider-Verse. With all of these projects coming out, it’s hard to say that animation is less popular than it used to be, if anything it seems that it’s only getting better. On the other hand, because Pixar is so popular, and the fact that animated television shows have become much slimmer, a lot of the general audience may have been having these feelings. 

While animated films seem to be getting better, it doesn’t seem like there’s much hope for children’s television cartoons outside of streaming services. Cartoon Network is going through a merger which has created significant undesirable changes to the network, Nickelodeon isn’t doing great, and Disney Channel doesn’t produce much animation anymore. As these were THE channels for kid’s shows from the early 2000s and on, it can be understood that most people would think the art form is going through a hard spot it might not recover from. 

While it’s a slippery slope right now, it can be argued that this current time is just a hiccup for animation. Animation has been thriving for almost 100 years at this point, and the idea of it “dying” doesn’t seem very likely. Who knows, maybe this will encourage evolution, or maybe it will fade away. What do you think?