You know, there was a time when I wanted to write about how I thought animation should probably be relegated to the streaming services rather than head to the big screen now.
This was maybe a year ago, when the Toy Story spin-off, Lightyear, underperformed, and it seemed like animation was struggling to find its audience in theaters. I mean, if Pixar, which I actually think is in its golden age, was struggling at the box office, then all hope was lost, right?
Well, apparently I was wrong, since the 2023 animated movies coming out these days, such as Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, make animation seem extremely healthy on the big screen right now. So much so that I actually think that this is one of the best years for animation ever, and I have four reasons why.
We Got One Of The Biggest Movies Of The Year With An Animated Movie
Did the critics love The Super Mario Bros. Movie? No. In fact, CinemaBlend's very own Eric Eisenberg only gave it two stars in his review, commenting on its paper thin storyline and its over-reliance on Easter eggs. And yeah, he's right. The plot is paper thin, and the film is loaded with Easter eggs. But, guess what? I loved The Super Mario Bros. Movie, and so did millions of others, all to the tune of $1.246 billion dollars worldwide, making it the biggest movie (so far) of 2023.
I mean, come on now. How often does that happen? While the powerhouse that once was the MCU has had its hit and its miss in 2023, it's interesting to note that Mario beat both Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania (the miss), and (the hit) Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, at the box office, and still has a lead over Barbie (though, she very well might catch up).
It blows my mind how much Mario (an Illumination flick, no less!) made at the box office, and it just goes to show that people will come out in droves to theaters to see an animated movie if they really love and cherish the property. Critical scores be damned!
But, We Also Got Two Highly Acclaimed Animated Films Based On Older Properties
Honestly, 2023 feels like the year of the elder Millennial/Gen Xer when it comes to animated movies, since we're getting so many properties from our childhoods brought back to the big screen. First off, we got the aforementioned Mario. With many of us having grown up with an NES on our carpets (and some of us having seen the original, live-action Super Mario Bros. movie), watching Mario on the big screen in animated form was a shot right in the nostalgia.
But, that wasn't all, as we also got another Spider-Verse movie (featuring a very '90s character in Spider-Man 2099), as well as another Ninja Turtles movie. I mean, could we get a better smattering of ‘90s goodness than that? As a '90s kid, my inner child has been doing backflips off the bed all year.
Even So, The Aforementioned Older Properties Feel Extremely Fresh
Here’s what’s really interesting, though, and why I think all of the movies I mentioned have shown such signs of success. Yes, Mario, Across the Spider-Verse (which really should have kept the “Part 1” in its title after that cliffhanger), and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem all feature characters from an older era, they’ve also been updated for a new generation that would undoubtedly want to see them.
Let’s take The Super Mario Bros. Movie for instance. Sure, there are TONS of references to the older games to keep the graying fans in the audience happy, but the overall look of the film is modern. In fact, a lot of it has the template of the more recent games in the series, like Super Mario Odyssey, Super Mario 3D World, and New Super Mario Bros., so it will be instantly recognizable for its true target audience (Because, come on now. We all saw it, but it wasn’t for us. It was for the kiddies).
The Spider-Verse movies have been about Spider-People from all different eras, but their focus has been on the relatively recent (he debuted in 2011) Miles Morales. His struggles to break out on his own as a young person with great responsibility resonates with younger people who understand what it means to be confused about where the world is heading, and their place in it.
And then, you have Mutant Mayhem, which actually understood the assignment this time and made the Mutant Ninja Turtles ACTUAL TEENAGERS. By doing so, it livened up a pretty old property and brought it to a whole new generation.
This is important, because even though I would have seen a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle movie regardless of its quality (I’ve seen and ranked all of them prior to Mutant Mayhem), after the abysmal Michael Bay-produced Turtles movies, the brand needed something new and fresh to be relevant again in the theaters, and this is it. I loved the movie, and my children also loved it. Two vastly different generations walking out of the theater happy after seeing an animated movie? It almost feels like the heyday of Pixar again. Speaking of which…
Animated Movies Are Benefiting From Strong Word-Of-Mouth
I want to circle back to Pixar, because I think their current story is an interesting one. Yes, Lightyear was a bomb, and for a time, it seemed like their most recent movie, Elemental, was going to be a bomb, too. CinemaBlend’s Dirk Libbey wrote about how he was annoyed by Elemental’s then-recent mediocre ticket receipts, and it did seem like the film was going to flop at the box office.
But then, it didn’t. As of right now, Elemental has grossed around $400 million worldwide. Does that make Elemental a massive hit? No, as it reportedly cost somewhere in the ballpark of $200 million to make (Which isn’t factoring in all of the other stuff that comes attached to marketing a movie). Is it a flop, though? Absolutely not. That's because of strong word of mouth.
Elemental is a really good movie, and one that I think has legs because people talked about it to others. Being in an interracial marriage, I’ve talked about it myself on this website, and I think word of mouth from several others helped raise it from having what might have been disastrous numbers.
Unfortunately, my talking up Ruby Gillman, Teenage Kraken couldn’t help that one, but I think the problem there is that I seem to be in the minority with liking it. A movie has to actually be well received and have an audience to get good word of mouth, after all.
Out of the gate successes like Mario probably didn’t need much word of mouth to be a hit, but it got it with a lot of fans proclaiming that the critics were “wrong.” Inversely, Across the Spider-Verse was a sequel that was buttressed by the Oscar-winning success of Into the Spider-Verse. Of course the sequel was excellent, but a lot of people probably told others that it was just as good (if not better than) the movie that came before it.
We’ll have to wait and see what people say about Mutant Mayhem, but I have high hopes that strong word of mouth is also going to spread for that one as well. It’s fantastic!
So, yeah. This is a banner year for animation. But, what do you think? Have you seen any (or all?) of the movies I mentioned here? For more news on all things animation, be sure to swing around here often!
