I love Pixar films. Very much. They’ve been around me for a long, long time - Toy Story came out when I was 4 and was my first 3D-animated film (as well as generally the first). A Bug’s Life was the first film I saw at the cinema. Monsters, Inc was my first ever owned DVD. WALL-E was my first Blu-Ray.
So here’s my personal ranking of every single one, as I’ve seen them all. Only includes Pixar, not Disney animation, and full feature-length films up to Onward (if I remember, I will update this here and there with any new ones).
It’s all down to opinion too - this doesn’t reflect general consensus! Ranked from least favourite to favourite.
Monsters University
This is the only Pixar film I don’t actually like. I do need to give it another go one day, but I found myself quite bored and disappointed with Monsters University - I think my general distaste for prequels works against this one sadly.
A Bug’s Life
Good film by every metric, A Bug’s Life also had a pretty darn entertaining PS1 game as well. Just not a huge fan of the colour palettes used in the film - I think every other early Pixar film gets away with being dated by being such eye candy in other ways, where it doesn’t work when so much of A Bug’s Life is set in close-ups of jungles. I still like this film though, which to me, only goes to show how much I love Pixar.
Brave
Purely hurt by the theme. I’m not big on fantasy films, so while this is a great film, it’s largely in a genre that disinterests me. Great voice cast though.
Toy Story 4
I really liked this film in stasis, but it had three major issues for me. One - it provided a large addendum to a trilogy that ended perfectly - and didn’t leave the series on nearly as perfect an ending. Two - I spent most of the film wondering what the rules of toy sentience actually are in the universe. What age do kids lose the ability to inject unwanted sentience into literally anything they give a face and a name? I’m pretty sure I made Lego figures as a child with names, and then took them apart - would that have killed them in-universe? And then three - I just couldn’t build an emotional attachment into a spork. Given how good Pixar has been to make me empathise with such a wide range of people, animals, toys and even vehicles, that seems like a failing to me.
Up
Where I think Up loses the magic for me, where other people get so much out of it, is that the introductory sequence doesn’t really resonate with me. I lost most of my grandparents earlier into my life, so there’s no immediate relatable emotion for me. This is the same reason eg. I find Futurama’s Game of Tones heavier hitting than Jurassic Bark. Taking the intro out of the equation then, the film’s good, just far from one of my favourites.
Toy Story 2
Definitely the weakest of the original Toy Story trilogy for me, but again, that’s not saying much for such a fantastic series.
Cars 2
Cars 2, for me, is the opposite of Up. Up is a film where I recognise its high quality and why people love it so much but it doesn’t resonate for me on a personal level. Cars 2, however, is a film where I can tell why it’s panned but damn if I don’t just smile my way through the whole thing. It’s dumb, it’s Mater-heavy, but… basically, it’s the live-action Speed Racer film if Pixar made it. I loved that too.
Toy Story
The original Toy Story and original Pixar is dated by modern standards, although it plays into that well by making the main on-screen human character, Sid, the villain. What an introduction to 3D films though.
The Good Dinosaur
Don’t have a vast amount to say here - The Good Dinosaur is a fairly forgettable but completely enjoyable Pixar film with no particularly massive frills but nothing I have to complain about either.
The Incredibles 2
As also impacted Toy Story 4 for me, my issues with The Incredibles 2 are largely conceptual. The original film, from so far back in Pixar’s history, concluded with the reintroduction of superheroes into public acceptance. I was ready for the sequel to show the new age of superhero glory days… instead it just made superheroes vilified all over again. Great film besides that, but I hope if The Incredibles gets a trilogy ender, it can move past the “family drama” phase and climax in a more bombastic manner.
Toy Story 3
The third Toy Story, and for 9 years the finale, was an incredible end to the story arc naturally introduced in the first film. The film proper is okay, but its power lies in its ending, a masterpiece that perfectly capped off three films’ worth of buildup. Well, until the spork happened, anyway.
Onward
Onward for me is a great example of why I prefer Pixar’s one-shots to their sequels. Rather than expecting one thing and ending up disappointed (even when the sequel is great), I went into Onward with zero knowledge of where it was heading, and was constantly surprised by it. Suffers a little from the same reasons I ranked Brave so low, although Onward was far more grounded so the fantasy elements were just elements here. And a beautiful ending to the story.
Monsters, Inc
This was the first Pixar film I would have called my out and out favourite at the time. Monsters Inc was, and remains, a real showcase of Pixar’s talents not only as storytellers but also animators, with some incredible scenes - I will never forget the first time I saw the complex of doorways behind the company’s scenes. Emotional moments, funny moments, scene after scene of enjoyment, and 19 years on, still great visually - Sully still looks huggable and fuzzy as ever.
Finding Nemo & Finding Dory
The duo of films about finding fish are inseparable for me on a quality level. They’re both immensely enjoyable films, with a surprising variety of locations for films starring mostly aquatic characters, with a plethora of memorable moments.
Cars & Cars 3
Again inseparable, Cars and its functional story sequel Cars 3 (which essentially completely ignored the events of the second instalment) really hit me. I’ve always loved films that can set a scene I want to take in for myself, and Radiator Springs is a fantastic example of that. I’ve never had issues empathising with the characters either, a complaint I know many have with these films. Cars 3 is maybe slightly weaker than the first for me when considering everything, but having 10 years of love for the original gave one particular scene about the Hudson Hornet in Cars 3 an incredible level of power that brought it onto the same level at the end of the day.
The Incredibles
My favourite superhero film - and a great way to enter my current top 5, too. The Incredibles had a little bit of everything - a swift, enjoyable introduction to the Incredibles family, great character drama, some fantastic action sequences, and one of the most complex villains in Pixar’s history.
Coco
For my money, Coco is currently the most visually gorgeous Pixar film to date. You can freeze it on basically any scene and spend hours poring over minutiae. The ending was fairly easy to telegraph (although parts of the story definitely were not), but in spite of knowing where it was going, the execution of Coco’s final few minutes hit me like a freight train and had me crying my eyes out.
Ratatouille
The ultimate grower, Ratatouille is a film I had lower opinions of the first time I watched it, then basically every time since, it’s jumped and jumped up the list until it now finds itself comfortably in my top 3. It has everything I favour in a film on top of being all-around stunning.
Inside Out
Coco got me once, but Inside Out gets me twice. Every time. The scene with Bing Bong, and then Riley’s moment of growing up, shatter me into tiny pieces. Even just imagining the key melody from the soundtrack is enough to send chills down my spine. In any ranking of films in the world, Inside Out being the top would be an absolute joy. But…
WALL-E
It’s set design again. WALL-E’s depiction of the ruinous, dead remains of future Earth, is immersive, terrifying, and fascinating. The echoes of the Buy ‘n’ Large jingle, the clips of Put On Your Sunday Clothes, and WALL-E’s collection of interesting refuse give an astonishing depth of personality to such a dilapidated planet. Conversely, the bright, commercialised, populated Axiom ship is a feast for the eyes, a captivating if equally scary view of what life might have been like before ruination.
The film is effectively dialogue-less for the vast majority of its first half and yet tells a more endearing story than most films can achieve with pages of script. The characters, particularly WALL-E and EVE, but even ancilliary bit parts like a cockroach, are rammed with personality through a few small mannerisms and sound effects.
No amount of words can do WALL-E, or my feelings for it, justice, and given how the film itself is presented, they never will.