I also think it was a week year for animation.
Frozen is probably amazing (I’ll know when it’s released) and Monsters University was quite good, the best of all Pixar releases since Toy Story 3.
But other than that, the films weren’t very good.
My feelings too^, however there were many good Live-Action films this year.
Spirit: I totally agree; in contrast to 2012, 2013 was a little weak for animation—to an extent for movies in general 
But yes, luckily Frozen and Monsters are both very good! And Despicable Me 2 was a pleasant surprise. I just want more non-sequels.
Trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle featuring a log cabin plus common loons on a lake with woodland in the distance
Mom went to work thinking there was a 2-hour delay, and the schools were closed. Yet she found nothing wrong with the roads and temperatures. (She currently works at Western Elementary in Lexington, Ohio.)
Believe me, that is weird. And very confusing to her just now!
Every animated movie I’ve see over the past few years has been ok to disappointing. The exceptions are Wreck it Ralph, Kung Fu Panda 2 (which had to grow on me), Rio, Rango and The Lorax. Pixar has been releasing some overall disappointing movies over the past few years. Which is really disheartening for me because I’ve looked to them as the gold standard. Not just in animation movies, but movies period. Any other animated studio would love to make movies like Cars 2, Brave and Monsters University. They probably wouldn’t have disappointed me as much if they were done by another studio, but I hold Pixar in a higher regard. For me, their creative height was 2007 to 2009. The three movies released during those years made me fall in love with them. I was obsessed with each of those movies. I’ve watched countless interviews with the folks behind those movies. Seen them many times in the theaters. Marked my calendar for the home video release dates, and bought them the first day they were released. I love Toy Story 3 also, but it is a sequel (which there’s nothing wrong with, but I was thirsty for more original movies), it didn’t grab me on first viewing like Pixar’s previous three movies, and Lotso’s backstory and that ending left me feeling kind of like…eh.
My main problems with animation over the past few years is that a lot of it was either bottom of the barrel and I avoided it, or I saw movies and they didn’t make me care about the characters. There were setups for things with no pay offs. Characters in movies just for comic relief who they would kill emotional moments, instead of letting them play out. No good character development. Too much of taking old cartoon properties, turning them into CGI, placing them in the modern day world with live action characters, with bottom of the barrel results (I have yet to see one of these kinds of movies that look good). There were times when something seemed like it could get interesting, only to have it turn into something uninspired and let me down. I could go on and on. Rio is guilty of some of this, but the music, energy, setting, and colors won me over. I’ve been letdown way to many times over the past few years. One more thing. I don’t mind the underdog story if it’s well executed, but I wish animation would start exploring more themes. I know animation movies are expensive to make, and studios need to get as many butts in seats as possible. But I think about a movie like Megamind and wished it could have gone a different route with the story. Maybe actually having killed Metro Man, the movie starts to explore themes of existentialism after Megamind accomplished a goal that has consumed his life.
I bought a Bullseye plush today! 
Where? At the Disney Store?
Cool! I got a Chuckles plush not to long ago. I still want to get Peas in a Pod.
My mom is listening to a voicemail, and I swear she said “Jon Anderson???”
My mother is on a 2-hour delay from her work.
Yes, I rarely get to go there, but I was able to today!
The nearest Disney Store from my house is at the Polaris Center.
Cool K9girl! That’s my favorite store! I always choose dolls rather than plushes, but when I finally make my way down to “horses” on my Disney(and Pixar 
) collection list, I plan to get plushes.And Bullseye is adorable!
I usually visit the Disney Store plus Amazon on my tablet to find Pixar stuff, but in terms of trying to catch up this year, my best bet would be eBay.
So what’s on my mind right now? I just rescued a trapped wren from our screened-in porch…
I almost got a doll, but I didn’t have enough cash with me. And Bullseye was on sale.
Cool.
I got Sims 3 a couple of days ago! Really enjoying it. There should be some new post on the sims thread by me with pictures in a few days.
I think we are having another spam problem in the Other Disney forums…Ugh! 
I’m SO sick of all the Bilbo bashing going on.
People are acting like he’s a horrible person. He’s imperfect like everyone else, but he’s easily the most innocent and caring one of the group.
People are just ripping him apart for his actions in that one scene where [spoil]he kills that one creature before getting the ring back.[/spoil] What was he supposed to do??? He’s not an experienced fighter, and he’s going way out of his comfort zone on a dangerous journey to help someone, and if he found something that turns him invisible to someone attacking him, why should he leave it there just to avoid killing a creature that’s probably dangerous and possibly villainous like the spiders??? Who has time to wait and see if that big creature is dangerous, especially if you were just attacked by other big creatures? What if a villain got ahold of the ring and turned invisible? That would be dangerous!!! Should he have turned his back on the creature to pick up the ring? 
No, that would be stupid.
I think it was justified for him to kill that creature and protect the ring.
They are being extreme and calling his actions “brutal.” [spoil]What about the scene where the dwarves pulled the legs off that one spider, causing it to suffer a lot more than being stabbed by a sword???[/spoil] That was actually brutal. I think it was justified as self defense also, although with Bilbo’s situation it was more indirect (but still self defense in my opinion).
Then someone was saying that the book character was horrible. [spoil]The worst thing he did was give away the arkenstone, but I think he did it with a good heart because he wanted the fighting to stop.[/spoil]
Even if the ring is influential on him, is it really his fault? He didn’t know it belonged to anyone when he picked it up, and by the time he found out, it would have been a danger to his life to give it back, since Gollum could turn invisible and kill him. Once someone has the ring, the influence will come no matter who you are, and I don’t think it’s the person’s fault. He even started to tell Gandalf about it, and I think it was the ring itself that made him lie, not his own decision, otherwise he wouldn’t have brought up finding something.
So, a horrible character is someone who goes out of his comfort zone on a dangerous journey to help someone, finds a ring that can protect you from an attack by turning you invisible, spares the life of its “owner,” intended to tell someone about the ring, and then takes the life of a creature that’s probably dangerous while protecting it? That doesn’t sound horrible to me.