The Revival Era of Disney Animation

This era is more reminiscent of The Disney Renaissance Era more than the Post Renaissance Era as this era brought back Disney Princesses with more broadway-like song numbers. Unlike in the Post Renaissance Era, Disney finally has a better grasp on CGI animation, keeping in mind their traditional animation pertaining to rich, aesthetic backgrounds, and living up to the standards or even surpassing Pixar in this area so it is not a stretch to say that this era is like the Disney Renaissance Era with a touch of the Silver Age but in the form of CGI animation.

One of the distinct differences is the flow of the plot, particularly in Disney Princess films. The Disney Princess plays a more active role as she now helps move the story forward often with a sidekick or her beginning-to-be love interest. Another interesting thing to note is how Disney now shows the specific scenes that shows how the Princess falls in love with her “prince”. It was very unlikely of Disney to do that when comparing the plots of the Disney Princess films from the past, more specifically from the Golden and Silver Age. Although Disney is aware of this as it references it in the film Frozen when Anna, a princess from Arendelle, met a prince, Hans, had a musical number with him then introduced him to her sister, Elsa, who was the queen, proclaiming that they were going to get married. Disney acknowledged the shallowness of the portrayal of love in their previous films as Elsa replied to her sister that she “can’t marry a man she just met”. Through showing more scenes of the Disney Princess with her love interest and the princess having a more active role in her own film, Disney creates more well-rounded princesses with distinguishable traits. An example would be Tiana in Princess and the Frog. Tiana works day and night to save up for her dream of owning a restaurant and she is known to be hardworking and independent. If one compares her to Aurora in Sleeping Beauty, Tiana is considered to have more personality and depth to her character because she is an active participant in her story and that is shown and focused on in the film.

Overall, this era has had numerous blockbuster hits and is one of the most successful eras in Disney’s animation history as it took home countless awards and with Frozen being the highest grossing animated film of all time. The Walt Disney Studio has remained relevant through all these years.