I wasn’t thinking about the broader quality of the films, I was thinking specifically about the art. For example, the image of the female used in the article looks nigh indistinguishable from Anna, Elsa, Rapunzel, and all female characters contained therein. This of course brings up the comment by Frozen animation director Lino Disalvo, which he will never live down:
"Historically speaking, animating female characters are really, really difficult, ’cause they have to go through these range of emotions, but they’re very, very — you have to keep them pretty and they’re very sensitive to — you can get them off a model very quickly. So, having a film with two hero female characters was really tough, and having them both in the scene and look very different if they’re echoing the same expression; that Elsa looking angry looks different from Anna (Kristen Bell) being angry.”
Gotta’ keep those women pretty and saleable. In the case of CGI, that means they all look freaking identical.
Similarly, noted CGI curmudgeon John Kricfalusi has often said that he doesn’t like CGI because it all looks like it’s made from the same stuff. That’s not surprising since they are all using the same math. I loved Paperman’s look because it looked like it was made from different stuff. Disney won’t even give us different styles, much less different stuff.
Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, Hotel Transylvania, Flushed Away, even garbage like Igor. It’s the same stuff, but it’s at least a different style.
Regardless of the quality, I’ve grown so utterly tired of the Disney polish. It looks nice, it goes down easy, but after thirty years of eating this shit, it all tastes the same.