Wow, I can’t believe that the project’s finished! It is quite sad, indeed!
I have always been a fan of animated films, Walt Disney’s especially had always wanted to share my love for animation with other people. Then the thought of starting a blog came to my mind. I hemmed and hawed around the idea, because I couldn’t see myself dedicating time to writing a blog or that anybody would actually want to read it.
Finally, I gave in and started my blog, “The Animation Commendation”, on November 4th, 2012. It started out quite weak with me just posting random animation news. Then (I can’t remember if my intention was to boost numbers), I decided that maybe I should start some sort of project, and I knew just what type of project it should be: a project on the animated Disney Canon.
I knew I wanted to go through each film in the Disney Canon, but wasn’t sure exactly what I wanted to do with them. I didn’t want to watch each film and review them because too many people have been doing that and I also felt that I wasn’t knowledgeable enough, at the time, to review films properly. I wanted to do something different with the Disney Canon. Then I thought, maybe I could talk about the Disney Canon songs, but I quickly discarded that idea because there were also people doing that.
Finally, it came to me that I should dedicate the project to the Disney Canon’s characters. Not the familiar ones, but the (what I deemed) forgotten/minor ones. These are the ones who’re overlooked by the vast majority of people. These are major characters, but can be forgotten. These are minor characters, and can be unmemorable. And some of them are even random characters that just appear in the background.
Once I decided on this, I started right away dedicating a post to a forgotten/minor character(s) of each of the 52 films in the Disney Canon. I was so ecstatic to start that I didn’t even re-watch the first 11 films in the Disney Canon. Those characters were picked mostly from my memory and/or random segment viewing. I only started watching the films starting from “Cinderella” and continued watching all the films that came after (with the exceptions of “The Black Cauldron”, “Beauty and the Beast”, and “Aladdin”, because I was already sure which characters I was going to pick for them).
Ok, so now to answer some questions regarding my journey. These questions are based both on what you readers have asked me and what I’ve asked myself. So, let’s get started!
1) How have the films held up in my mind after re-viewing them? Well, most of the films that I’ve always loved I still loved. And most of the films I disliked, I still disliked. But, of course, there have been exceptions. For example, “Lilo & Stitch” was a film that I’ve always disliked and after re-watching it, I now am neutral towards it. And “Peter Pan” was a film that I’ve always loved, but I found myself completely bored when re-watching it this time.
2) Who was/were my favorite forgotten/minor character(s)? Hmm, that’s a hard question to answer. I really love the police bots from “Treasure Planet”, Mt. Aconcagua from “Saludos Amigos”, Mr. Winky from “The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad”, the ocean buoys from “Melody Time”, and the British polyglot professor from “Lady and the Tramp”.
3) What was/were my favorite forgotten/minor character post(s)? This differs from the previous question in that this is about my favorite POSTS rather than characters. I really love my “Meet the Robinsons” post. I loved the jokes that I included in it as well as the general flow of the post. I also loved my “Lady and the Tramp” post, my “Sleeping Beauty” post, my “The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh” post, my “The Great Mouse Detective” post, and my “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” post amongst others.
4) Who was/were my LEAST favorite forgotten/minor character(s)? I’m defining “LEAST favorite” to mean which ones did I least like CHOOSING to be the forgotten/minor characters. Well, I didn’t like choosing Towser and Lucy from “One Hundred and One Dalmatians”, because I didn’t feel that they were forgotten/minor enough, but I had no other choice. Similarly, I wasn’t fond of choosing Akela and Rama from “The Jungle Book”, the hot water pirate from “Peter Pan”, and the Backson from “Winnie the Pooh”. I also now regret choosing the characters from the “Pastoral Symphony” sequence from “Fantasia”and feel that I could’ve made a better choice had I re-watched the film.
5) What was/were my LEAST favorite forgotten/minor character post(s)? I didn’t like how my “Beauty and the Beast” post came out. I felt like I forced too many jokes that weren’t funny and spent too long explaining things that didn’t need to be explained. And what made it sadder was that this is my favorite movie in the Canon, so it deserved a better write-up. My “Chicken Little” post also could’ve been written better. There were a lot more posts that aren’t excellent, but these two are probably my LEAST favorite.
6) And the final question: What are you going to do now that you’ve finished this project? Well, I want to take a break from starting another project for a while to focus more on this site giving out animation-related news, other “Top 13” lists, and more reviews. I also have my other blog, “My Live Action Disney Project” to devote my time towards.
But when I do want to start another project on this blog, I have two ideas. The first one is to do another forgotten/minor character series, but for a DIFFERENT animation studio. I’m not sure which one yet. I don’t want to do the Dreamworks Animation films, so maybe the Pixar ones are my next best bet.
My second idea is to do a review of every episode of a particular animated show. I’d watch each episode of this show and write a small post saying what I thought of it. So basically, it’ll be a review of an animated TV series, episode by episode. The problem is I’m not sure which show to pick.
So I leave the decision upto you all. Let me know in the comments below which of the two projects you’d like me to do? If the first one, which animation studio’s film would you like me to tackle? If the second one, which animated TV series would you like me to review? Or maybe you have a totally brand-new idea for a project that I can do. If so, let me know in the comments as well! Also, feel free to let me know in the comments which characters/posts were your favorites and least favorites!
Well, that wraps us this conclusion, and let it never be said that Disney’s animated features don’t resonate lovingly in our hearts!
So here’s goodbye so soon! You’ll find your separate way. With time so short I’ll say so long and go so soon. Goodbye!”
The Animation Commendation 
This was great. I am planning on Doug something like this for when I end my DreamWorks reviews. I am still in the process of reading the earlier ones, but your reviews are very unique. Keep up the good work.
Thanks for the support!
Great post! Both from your perspectives as a blog writer as well as your summary of the actual experience. Thanks so much for all of your insight and interest into the characters and these beautiful films.
Thank you for your support!
Every episode? There are only a few TV shows for which I would recommend this. Gargoyles is one of them. House of Mouse another. But otherwise, how about making season reviews and only point out the highlights?
Hmm…interesting idea. I’ll have to think about it.
Thanks for your support though!
It sounds like it would be a useful exercise to review my old posts in an honest way, as you do here — that’s a good idea. Do you have any interest in reviewing anime episodes (e.g., reviewing the Death Note series)?
Sorry no, I never got into Japanese animation. The only Japanese animation I’ve seen has been Studio Ghibli films…and only four of them til date!
Thanks for commenting and glad I gave you an idea!
If you have only seen four of the Miyazaki/Studio Ghibli films to date, I would absolutely recommend you make a project to watch each of his films. I actually believe that he has more of a Midas Touch than Pixar. Plus, it is not as extensive as the Disney Canon, so it would be over much more quickly.
However, it would be hard to cite a forgotten character in these films since nobody even knows the main character…you may need to tweak the formula slightly for a Studio Ghibli project.
Congratulation on completing your project. I have enjoyed your unique approach to the films.
Thanks for the compliments! The thing is I don’t really like Japanese animation. I don’t like the way the characters look; I don’t like the way the characters move, etc. So watching these as a project rather than watching them when I honestly feel like watching them will be more a burden for me than an enjoyment.
My life has gotten a little out of control in the last 6 months but I’ve caught your posts and love your perspective on things. And I’m ok with the fact that we’ve agreed to disagree about Meet the Robinsons 😉
Glad you like my blog!
Well, I like “Meet the Robinsons” a lot…just not in my top 10 list, lol.
Wow, I really admire how you remained consistent in posting and how you stuck through with this project till its end…..any tips??:D
Secondly, I have in mind this project..its more of a personal project you could do…
As a Muslim, to make the shows we watch more productive, I realised that these shows are packed with great life lessons, especially the film ‘meet the robinsons’, which is why its one of my all time favourites:D
Another example is, a film I have recently rewatched: ‘happily never after’. Among the lessons i find here is that babies make you soft lol(this is a good thing btw).
Another lesson is that by living strictly by the book and only by the book (like how the prince did), you’ll find it very hard to attain any significant success.
Hence, we need a teacher in our lives to explain the context of which such a rule in the book must be implemented.
Furthermore, we need to refer to further sources of knowledge to explain to us what we read in the book for we might have interpreted it wrongly.
Hope this make sense…??
Salam:))
Wasalaam,
Thanks for the congrats. I guess it was easy to stick with it because it’s something I love talking about as well as the fact that I use this blog to relax with.
I think I understand your project. Is it extracting the lessons from what we watch and learn exactly HOW to implement them in our daily lives?
Hmm..them what about the times when we feel that we’re ‘not in the mood to write/blog?’
yup! that is exactly what i had in mind, although its more organised!
Well I don’t promise my readers that I’ll update the blog any particular time, like every day or every other day, so they’re not expecting a post. That way I can only write when I AM in the mood to write.
Sorry for the many questions…but how do you get in the mood/what makes you get in the mood? Or is it like random bursts of inspiration or motivation?
Thanks for answering them btw! You might have just given me the ideas for my next post….
Anyways, what do you think of the project I suggested??
Well, I automatically get in the mood when I watch an animated film/learn an animation-related news that I want to share, then I write about it.
It’s a good project, Jazakallah!
Hmmm..okaay…thanks for this very interesting ‘interview’!
BarakAllahu feek!
If you decide to make the decision to implement this project, let me know how it goes:D
Ameen!
Sure!
Congrats on finishing the project! I am waiting eagerly for the next one and also enjoying your live action posts
Thanks; glad to know people are reading my live-action reviews!
I am probably going to start my own blog similar to this, but I’m wondering what kind of Disney canon project to do. Any ideas?
I’d love to follow your blog.
The go-to answer is to watch each film in the Canon and review them. But like I said, I didn’t want to do that, since so many people have done it already and at the time I didn’t feel I was capable enough of reviewing a film (I still feel that way actually).
Maybe you can do a look at the songs from each, or the scenes, or the lines/quotes, or another aspect of it.
Or maybe you can do something fictional. Like imagine yourself as a character going through a world where all the Disney films “live” in different areas of the world. And you can describe your journeys in each.
For example, you can check out the “Snow White” world and then comment on how the economy is based on mining, mention the monarchy, talk about the citizens (all 7 of them), etc. Basically make each film seem like a REAL community in a bigger “Disney” world.
Now THAT would be cool! However, I was thinking of going with the certain scenes thing. With that I would talk about my favorite scenes from each film (or, in the case of the bad movies, the scenes I disliked the least). And there are SO MANY scenes in Disney films that I love (the reprise of “Part Of Your World”, the climax of “Sleeping Beauty”) so that’d be fun to do.
Cool, whatever you decide to do, make sure you let me know when your blog is up.
That I will do.
I know I’m late for this, lol, but I was just looking at your blog and thought I’d suggest that if you wanted to do a Disney TV show, Kim Possible is a good choice. All of the episodes are on YouTube (or the vast majority) and it is a somewhat forgotten series, IMO. Of course you could to Phineas and Ferb, another one of my favorites, but it’s completely up to you. Have a magical day! 😀
Thanks for suggesting! I’ve been thinking about doing all the episodes of “Arthur”, but am not sure. Now I’ll consider your suggestions too! Thanks!
I’m not too huge of a fan of Arthur, but PBS shows are always a good choice.