Popculturology Ranks Pixar's 14 Movies

From 1995 to 2010, Pixar Studios was a movie-making force unlike anything we had ever seen. In 1995, the studio released the first ever entirely CGI movie, with Toy Story capturing the hearts of moviegoers. While other studios cranked out pop culture reference-heavy and instantly dated animated movies, Pixar focused on telling the best stories they possibly could, giving the world classics like Finding Nemo, WALL-E and Up. The studio dominated the Oscar for Best Animated Feature, at one point winning six times in eight years. During this period, Cars was the closest thing you could call a miss for Pixar, but based on the strength of everything else the studio had done and would do, people gave that movie a pass.

Unfortunately, Pixar's golden reputation was shattered in 2011, when Cars 2 was released. The movie — more of a really long commercial for toys — focused on Larry the Cable Guy's Mater character, a mistake so huge, it's still hard to believe Pixar erred in such a way. The studio followed Cars 2 with 2012's Brave, an animated movie that would have been above average for a regular studio, but was sub-par work for Pixar.

Pixar's latest movie, Monsters University, was released last weekend, debuting with the second-biggest opening weekend box office haul in the studio's history. The movie was a huge improvement over Cars 2 and Brave, giving Pixar fans hope that the studio was back on track. A lot of publications and websites used Monsters University's release as an opportunity to offer their rankings of Pixar's 14 movies. After seeing a list of this kind that was so awful over the weekend (seriously, I don't know why a publication would let people who clearly have never seen a Pixar movie rank Pixar movies), I felt that someone had to step in and set things right.

Past the jump you'll find Popculturology's ranking of Pixar's 14 movies.



14. Cars 2
Released: 2011
Opening weekend: $66.14 million / Domestic gross: $191.45 million
Not nominated for Oscar for Best Animated Feature

Fun fact: Since the creation of the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature, no Pixar movie featuring the voice of Larry the Cable Guy has won the prize. If you put the lowest-common-denominator talent of Larry the Cable Guy in your movie, you're already giving up. It was bad enough that Pixar turned to him for Cars, but building an entire film around the actor was crime against animation. When Disney bought Pixar, John Lasseter was given keys to the company's animation kingdom, and as the brains behind Pixar's success, it's still baffling that Cars 2 was directed by Lasseter. This wasn't just a misstep — it was a purposeful dive onto a land mine.

13. Cars
Released: 2006
Opening weekend: $60.12 million / Domestic gross: $244.08 million
Nominated for Oscar for Best Animated Feature (Lost to Happy Feet)

When Cars first came out, it was noticeable that the movie didn't quite measure up to Pixar's high standards, but it wasn't until Cars 2 debuted that it became crystal clear. I think the studio was always handcuffed when it came to Cars — the concept just didn't have the same spark as talking toys, monsters running a business or an entire ocean of adventure.

12. Brave
Released: 2012
Opening weekend: $66.32 million / Domestic gross: $237.28 million
Won Oscar for Best Animated Feature

There are butts in Brave. I could stop this segment right there, and that would be all I'd need to say to explain why Brave doesn't live up to Pixar's reputation. Other studios enjoy cramming their animated movies with bathroom humor and moonings, but that was never Pixar's style. Brave had a lot of factors working against it, with original director Brenda Chapman getting yanked from the project partway through, and Mark Andrews coming in to replace her. This movie may have won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature, but it did so based on the strength of the Pixar brand. Wreck-It Ralph was a superior animated film in 2012.

11. A Bug's Life
Released: 1998
Opening weekend: $33.26 million / Domestic gross: $162.80 million
Oscar for Best Animated Feature not yet established

A Bug's Life was all about Pixar proving that Toy Story wasn't a fluke. While it isn't as great as some of the studio's other offerings, A Bug's Life showed that Pixar was the home to original concepts, creative characters and timeless humor. Unfortunately, DreamWorks Animation rushed their copycat movie Antz into theaters before A Bug's Life. In the end, though, Pixar was the one laughing, with A Bug's Life outgrossing Antz and DreamWorks' movie only being mentioned in the future when people are comparing it to A Bug's Life.

10. Monsters University
Released: 2013
Opening weekend: $82.43 million
Eligible for 2014 Oscar for Best Animated Feature

The concept behind Monsters Inc. is one of Pixar's most original, so I genuinely loved returning to that world with Monsters University. Unlike some prequels that ruin the characters you once fell in love with (cough, Star Wars, cough), Monsters University only strengthened our bonds with Mike and Sulley, while giving us an entirely new bunch of monsters to hang out with. I love Charlie Day's Art.

9. Ratatouille
Released: 2007
Opening weekend: $42.03 million / Domestic gross: $206.45 million

Won Oscar for Best Animated Feature

Ratatouille was probably the hardest sell in the Pixar library. A rat who wants to cook French cuisine? It doesn't take any courage to greenlight a Shrek sequel. Believing that Ratatouille could be a success took bravery. Brad Bird pulled it off, thanks to Pixar's gorgeous rendering of Paris and the voice talents of Patton Oswalt.

8. Monsters Inc.

Released: 2001

Opening weekend: $62.58 million / Domestic gross: $255.87 million

Nominated for Oscar for Best Animated Feature (Lost to Shrek)

Beyond the diversity of monsters that Pixar created to populate Monsters Inc., one has to marvel at the chase scene that takes place in the doors facility. Monsters Inc. succeeds on so many levels — both an action film and a buddy comedy, the movie is also able to make our hearts break when Sulley has to say goodbye to Boo. It's a shame that Shrek was given the Oscar for Best Animated Feature over Monsters Inc.

7. The Incredibles

Released: 2004

Opening weekend: $70.47 million / Domestic gross: $261.44 million

Won Oscar for Best Animated Feature

The Incredibles was Pixar's first movie to focus on an all-human cast, a task made easy by the fact that animators got to work with a family that could stretch, turn invisible and move faster than our eyes could follow them. Pixar boldly released a movie with a message that railed against our culture that tells everyone they're special regardless of the truth that if everyone is special, no one is special. The Incredibles is the best Fantastic Four movie we've ever gotten.

6. WALL-E

Released: 2008

Opening weekend: $63.09 million / Domestic gross: $223.81 million

Won Oscar for Best Animated Feature

WALL-E is an interesting Pixar movie. The first half is hauntingly beautiful, with long, wordless segments telling the story of a robot alone on Earth who falls in love with another robot. When WALL-E thinks he's lost Eve, his female companion, he tenderly takes care of her until she reboots. The second half of WALL-E falls into the trappings of a "just great" movie, unfortunately dragging down the stellar first half.

5. Finding Nemo

Released: 2003

Opening weekend: $70.25 million / Domestic gross: $339.71 million

Won Oscar for Best Animated Feature

It's easy to forget, but when Pixar decided to set an entire movie underwater, animating water wasn't an easy thing to do. Because the story called for it, though, Pixar made Finding Nemo happen. The story of a father's search for his lost son may be the backbone of Finding Nemo, but Ellen DeGeneres' Dory is the heart of the movie. Luckily for Finding Nemo and Dory fans, we'll get to see these fish again in 2015's Finding Dory.

4. Up

Released: 2009

Opening weekend: $68.11 million / Domestic gross: $293.00 million

Won Oscar for Best Animated Feature, was nominated for Best Picture

This is Pixar at its most untouchable. An elderly man as a main character. An original story that looks at the reality of chasing your dreams. An opening scene about a couple learning they can't have children. And, yes, it's OK to get teary during that opening scene. Up is Pixar's greatest non-Toy Story film, and not only was it rewarded with an Oscar for Best Animated Feature, but it also became only the second animated film at the time to be nominated for Best Picture.

3. Toy Story 2
Released: 1999
Opening weekend: $57.39 million / Domestic gross: $245.85 million

Oscar for Best Animated Feature not yet established

I think people forget that Toy Story 2 is a real competitor for the title of Best Pixar Movie. Maybe it gets lost between Toy Story and Toy Story 3. Maybe the fact that it was a sequel makes it easy to dismiss it. The reality is that Toy Story 2 took a bunch of characters first introduced to us in 1995 and told a completely new story with them. On top of that, Toy Story 2 developed several classic Pixar characters, with Jessie the Cowgirl being the most important of the group. The song When She Loved Me was nominated for Best Original Song at the Oscars — and both Tom Hanks and Tim Allen have admitted that it's made them cry.

2. Toy Story 3

Released: 2010

Opening weekend: $110.31 million / Domestic gross: $415.00 million

Won Oscar for Best Animated Feature, was nominated for Best Picture

There's a real case to be made that Toy Story 3 should've been named Best Picture of 2010. The Academy is probably never going to let an animated movie take home its top prize though, so we'll just have to be content with Toy Story 3 being considered one of the all-time greatest animated films. Toy Story 3 had a daunting obstacle to overcome: The question asking why we needed another Toy Story over ten years after the first sequel. Was there really a new story to tell? The answer to that question was a resounding "yes," as Toy Story 3 closed the book on the tale of Andy's toys, forcing a lot of fans who had grown up with Pixar to deal face-to-face with the end of their own childhoods too. I have to mention the heart-wrenching scene of Woody, Buzz and their friends taking each others' hands as they accepted that death was coming. I've heard that grown men have been known to shed a tear or two during that scene.

1. Toy Story

Released: 1995

Opening weekend: $29.14 million / Domestic gross: $191.80 million

Oscar for Best Animated Feature not yet established

The one that started the Pixar story. Prior to Toy Story, the world had never seen an all-computer generated movie. It would have been easy to deliver a shoddy movie that checked off that box, but Pixar set the tone from step one by demanding a film that wasn't just an impressive technological feat but was also a impressive storytelling feat at the same time. Reaching that point wasn't easy, with the Pixar braintrust going back to square one after Disney execs hated the first version of Toy Story. If it wasn't for this studio (almost) always demanding superior work from themselves, we wouldn't still be talking about Pixar.